Business, Neighbors Clash Over Contamination

For Fire Mountain Farms owner Bob Thode, a field of treated sludge is a gift to the environment and cash in his pocket.

For neighbor Bob Guenther, that same field is a toxic disaster.

The war between Thode, a businessman with a master’s degree in environmental studies, and Guenther, a labor lobbyist, has raged for more than a decade. In the middle: the Department of Ecology and Lewis County Code Enforcement.

Since 2002, Fire Mountain Farms has accepted biosolids from wastewater treatment plants and applied them to its land.

It makes its profit by disposing of other companies’ unwanted, treated sludge, using the land for general farming and building agricultural lagoons.

Fire Mountain — described by Thode as a family-owned, natural resources-based company — has 18 full-time employees.

The most recent battle concerns nitrates, chemicals that in large doses can contaminate water. Thode’s Cinebar site, one of six in Lewis County, recently has shown unsafe levels of nitrates.

Twice yearly monitoring suggests the nitrate levels are continuing to rise.

Thode says it’s under control. He’s working on a plan that will take care of it.

Guenther, on the other hand, said he’s already found contamination in a well near Thode’s Napavine site, which he says is a result of Thode’s unscrupulous business practices.

“I maintain this is not biosolids for beneficial use,” Guenther said. “It’s a biosolids dump purely for profit.”

Washington supports returning the treated sludge — primarily organic, semi-solid product resulting from the wastewater treatment process — to the land, as long as certain conditions are met.

When applied properly, biosolids offer fertility and water retention, according to the Department of Ecology.

But when applied improperly, biosolids threaten ground and surface water purity. 

In recent weeks, Ecology has visited Fire Mountain Farms frequently.

A number of Fire Mountain Farms testing sites show nitrates that exceed the Environmental Protection Agency’s standard of safe water: approximately 10 milligrams per liter.

High nitrate levels in surface water may result in elevated levels of disinfection byproducts, which have been linked to increased cancer and reproductive health risks in humans, according to Oregon’s Department of Environmental Quality.

Of seven surface water sites tested at Thode’s Cinebar site, five showed nitrate levels trending upward, according to a May 2013 water quality report

Two of the sites reached historic highs: 15.9 milligrams per liter at one, 14.9 milligrams per liter at the other.

Both were downstream from Fire Mountain’s land.

Groundwater measured in domestic wells showed two stable sites and one that continues to trend upward.

It most recently was measured at 10.7 milligrams per liter.

For every biosolids operation, Ecology sets the pace at which the sludge can be safely applied.

If done too quickly, nitrates, which are highly mobile, will pass through the root zone and into the water system.

Jamie Olivarez, Ecology’s biosolids expert, is now working with Thode on a site plan that will set a new rate of application.

Oliverez cautioned against villainizing the application companies. Nitrate issues are not unique to biosolids appliers, he said.

“Less than 0.5 percent of agricultural land in Washington is biosolids land,” he said. “Nitrates are also a concern around animal and commercial operations that use synthetic nitrates.”

Thode believes livestock are the source of contamination at his Cinebar site, and that in general, septic systems are as much the culprit as is fertilizer.

“No one issue can be blamed for all the contamination that gets into the groundwater,” Thode said. “We need to look at the system as a whole.”

“I think it is important to note that the nitrate issues at Burnt Ridge would not have come to light if we were not monitoring the surface and groundwater as part of our biosolids operation,” he added.

Those who live near Fire Mountain Farm’s Napavine site struggle to describe the powerful stench they’ve suffered through on and off for the last decade.

“The smell, the stink is so bad, you can’t even breathe” Ernestine Blum, who lives nearby, said. “You can’t have any outdoor activities. Your grandkids come around and they want to know, ‘Why does it stink so bad here?’”

It was enough, Guenther added, to make a former county commissioner “upchuck in the ditch.”

According to Guenther, problems over the years have included not disking the sludge into the field quickly enough, applying too much sludge, not aerating his lagoon and not properly lining his lagoon.

Blum now believes she has a new and serious concern: E coli and elevated nitrates in her well water. She’s not sure of the source, but suspects Thode’s biosolids fields, which are about 100 yards from her property.

Despite the complaints about Newaukum Prairie, the water there shows little contamination, according to the 2013 quality report.

With one exception, the water measured at all sites were well within the allowable range, with one upgradient monitoring well coming in at .013, and one downstream surface water site coming in at .08. Guenther and Blum said they question the veracity of the reports.

Both say they’re not interested in fighting — but something must be done.

“It’s not personal,” Guenther said. “I just want it taken care of.”

“We have gone to a great deal of work to minimize the conflicting land uses that exist and get along with most of our neighbors,” Thode said. “There are no easy answers here, and all involved will need to continue to work together to make it work.”