Sunday, November 19, 1995
By SAID DEEP
Detroit Journal Staff Writer
A Birmingham-based waste disposal company that has battled for four years to operate a hazardous waste injection well in Romulus will step up its fight, seeking a second well.
Environmental Disposal Systems notified the western Wayne County suburb last week that it has asked for state permission to drill a 4,020-foot well northwest of Inkster and Wick. The company has been thwarted in courts and by Romulus officials in its bid to open its first well, southeast of I-275 and I-94, drilled two years ago.
Designed to allow industry to pump hazardous waste into the earth below the water table, deep injection wells have been used by chemical companies and other industries on their own property. EDS hopes to open the first commercial deep injection well in Michigan.
Local officials, environmentalists and the disposal industry across the state are watching the dispute.
"This well issue is not just a Romulus thing but a county and state issue, too," said R.P. Lilly, a member of Romulus Environmentalists Care About People, a citizens group opposed to the well.
"Michigan has the world's largest freshwater supply. Why should we gamble it away with this?" Lilly said.
Hazardous wastes destined for the injection well could include various acids, steel mill processing wastes, liquids leached from landfills and ethylene glycol used as de-icer for aircraft. Critics fear that such liquids will pollute the water table.
"There is absolutely no reason for this facility, no proven need. People have developed ways to recycle and reprocess this stuff," Lilly said. "The state can't and won't police this, and there could be 'midnight dumping' of anything into the well."
EDS contends there is little danger, because the wastes are to be injected under pressure below the water table.
Last April, Romulus zoning officials ruled that the first well, some 4,500 feet deep, couldn't operate because the site was not zoned properly. They rejected a company bid for a zoning variance.
The company says it has invested more than $2 million in the well. The Detroit Police and Fire Pension fund has sunk nearly $5 million in the project. Romulus has won two court battles against EDS.
The first came last year when Wayne County Circuit Court ruled that the company needed Romulus planning commission approval to operate the well; the company argued that its state and federal permits superseded city authority.
The second was last summer, when a federal judge dismissed a $103-million lawsuit filed by EDS against Mayor Beverly McAnally and other city officials who the company said violated the firm's rights.
Earlier this year, the company spent thousands of dollars on local newspaper ads and fliers, helping defeat a ballot request for tax money to continue to fight the company in court.
See related story: Romulus mayor seeks recount in election defeat
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