The State Ports Authority will spend up to $400,000 on environmental cleanup costs at a former coal terminal it is selling to a company for a new manufacturing plant.The SPA’s board of directors approved the expense Wednesday.
The board previously agreed to sell a former coal tipple at the end of Greenleaf Street in the Charleston Neck Area and about 15 acres of adjacent land to Agru America Inc. for $3 million.
The Georgtown-based company did not cause the pollution but knew the property had environmental issues when it agreed to buy the old coal export site. Agru America has signed an agreement with the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control that will let the company apply for tax credits under a voluntary cleanup plan.
“The buyer, during the course of examining the property and entering a contract with DHEC for cleanup of the property, has encountered some material that apparently is related to old coal operations before we acquired the property in 1968,” SPA attorney Philip Lawrence said. “They’ve asked us, as the current property owner, to contribute toward the cleanup costs.”
Lawrence said port management felt it was fair to help pay for the cleanup, “although we need to verify that those costs are cleanup costs.”
Soil testing at the property has shown arsenic, various metals and semi-volatile organic compounds that exceed federal screening levels. In addition, a groundwater monitoring well on the property has shown arsenic levels above the maximum limits allowed by law. A cleanup effort, supervised by DHEC, would have to bring contaminants to below the maximum limits.
SPA spokeswoman Erin Dhand said the total cost of the cleanup has not been finalized.
Agru America plans to build a $29.6 million facility at the site that will make high-density polyethylene for geomembrane and other products for export through the Port of Charleston.
The property once housed a coal export facility during the first half of the 20th century and the contamination stems from that operation and uncontrolled dumping that took place on the property, according to DHEC. Trash including appliances, roofing shingles and siding containing asbestos have been found on the site.
The agreement with DHEC also exempts Agru America from any third-party lawsuits related to the pollution. Agru America plans to create 36 jobs at the new facility, according to documents filed with state regulators.
The company began with a polypropylene pipe plant in Massachusetts in 1988 and now employs 200 people at three facilities in Georgetown, Andrews and Fernley, Nev. The company is part of Alois Gruber GmbH, an Austrian family-owned business with production facilities in Austria, the United States, Germany, China and India, and distribution to over 80 countries.
