Seven months after Mayor Rahm Emanuel vowed to make it too costly to store dusty petroleum coke in Chicago, one of the operators apparently has caved to the legal and political pressure.
Emanuel announced late Wednesday that Beemsterboer Slag Corp. has opted to sell its storage terminal along the Calumet River at 106th Street rather than continue to fight a series of lawsuits and regulatory actions filed against the Hammond-based company by city, state and federal officials.
The mayor also noted in a news release that Beemsterboer recently withdrew applications for new state permits to store petroleum coke and coal on the edge of the South Deering neighborhood.
Last week, an administrative law judge fined the company $50,000 for violating a city order to stop storing petroleum coke at a separate nearby site, which city attorneys said was permitted to handle only road salt.
“We take this issue very seriously and will not let any company or individuals violate our law and hurt our quality of life in order to make a quick buck,” Emanuel said in a statement Wednesday.
Beemsterboer is one of two companies that have piled huge mounds of petroleum coke, or petcoke, just south of the Chicago Skyway bridge, making the city a key repository for the refinery byproduct. Some of the high-carbon, high-sulfur material is burned along with coal at power plants and cement kilns in the United States, but increasingly it is shipped to China, Mexico and other countries with more lenient environmental laws.
Neighbors in the South Deering and East Side neighborhoods have complained for months about gritty dust blowing off the Chicago piles, sometimes in black clouds so thick that people kept their children inside with the windows closed.
Emanuel earlier this year pushed for new regulations that require any large petcoke piles in the city to be fully enclosed by 2016. A new zoning ordinance effectively bans new operations.
Beemsterboer officials did not return telephone calls Wednesday.
The largest petcoke operation in Chicago, KCBX Terminals, has threatened to sue unless the city allows its piles to remain uncovered for an additional two years past Emanuel’s deadline.
Controlled by industrialists Charles and David Koch, the firm is dramatically expanding its storage of petcoke from the nearby BP refinery in Whiting and other refineries across the Midwest. Illinois officials last year cleared the way for the company to handle up to 11 million tons a year of petcoke and coal at its sprawling open-air terminal off Burley Avenue between 108th and 111th streets.
KCBX says it has taken several steps to tamp down dust, including pole-mounted sprinklers that can be adjusted based on wind speed and direction. The company also has filed documents contending it is not responsible for dust problems in surrounding neighborhoods.
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