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Toxic chemical: Seeking a solution Brainerd, Baxter officials to meet with MPCA on future of facility Staff Writer Brainerd and Baxter city officials will meet Tuesday morning in St. Paul with officials from the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency to discuss potential causes for the elevated levels of a toxic chemical found in Brainerd's treated wastewater released into the Mississippi River, a MPCA spokesperson said Monday.
Walker Smith, a MPCA spokesperson in St. Paul, said the meeting will primarily involve discussion about Brainerd's application to expand its wastewater treatment facility, which was put on hold after the agency found elevated levels of the toxic chemical, a perfluorated chemical or PFC compound in the wastewater.
If the city does not receive a permit for the expansion of the plant in August, the cost of delay to build the treatment facility would increase by more than $5 million, according to Brainerd and Baxter city officials. The plant expansion was expected to be completed by 2009.
Twenty-eight wastewater treatment plants were sampled by the MPCA in April and tested for 13 different perfluorated chemicals. The results from Brainerd's facility were significantly higher than the other facilities surveyed. On April 17 the MPCA collected samples from the treated water at the Brainerd plant being discharged into the Mississippi River and from the sludge left after the water had been treated.
According to the MPCA, Brainerd's sample contained 1.5 parts per billion of perfluorooctane sulfonate or PFOS. The Brainerd plant had compound levels 14 times greater than those found at the main treatment plant in the Twin Cities, or .11 ppb, and even 214 times greater than those discharged from a St. Cloud treatment plant which was .007 ppb.
Only three labs in the country have tests available for PFC compounds, which is why it took until July 16 when the MPCA received the test results, said Smith. Brainerd and Baxter city officials were notified Friday about the elevated levels of the compound, as was the rest of the public when the MPCA released a news release about the findings.
A MPCA staff member from Duluth will be in Brainerd Wednesday to once again obtain samples from the plant and at various sites along the Mississippi River, said Smith. The MPCA, likely working with the DNR, will collect fish from the Mississippi River in Brainerd within the next couple of weeks to find out if these chemicals are in the fish tissue, said Smith.
MPCA officials have said that there are no immediate health concerns for the public because nobody drinks the discharged wastewater and it's unlikely that any area residents are directly exposed to the treated wastewater. The greatest concern is the bioaccumulation of the compound in fish. Smith said there weren't any tests for this chemical until about three or four years ago.
"It's a chemical where we weren't aware of any potential health risks of exposure until about six or seven years ago," said Smith. "In the grand scheme of chemicals and pollutants, it's an emerging contaminant. A lot of research still needs to be done about any health effects and exposure to the chemical."
Smith said one of the next steps in Brainerd is to find the cause of the elevated levels of PFOS. The likely culprit is a commercial business or industry, he said.
According to the Minnesota Department of Health, PFCs are a family of manmade chemicals that were used for decades to make products that resist heat, oil, stains, grease and water. The chemical structures of the compounds make them extremely resistant to breakdown in the environment.
According to the MPCA, 3M was the sole manufacturer of PFOS until the company stopped making it in 2002. It is no longer manufactured. It was used in the Scotchgard products 3M made, said Smith, but also has been used in carpets and furniture, as well as automobile interiors, firefighting foam, denture cleaners, paper coatings and some shampoos.
JODIE TWEED may be reached at jodie.tweed@brainerddispatch.com or 855-5858.
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