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About 20 Dairyland Power Cooperative officials were on hand at a public meeting on Oct. 17 at Viroqua High School to present detailed information and listen to questions about a proposed 600-acre "offsite" ash landfill near Genoa

Dairyland has proposed building the $26 million facility in order to dispose of ash from its coal-fired electrical generation plant near Genoa that will be producing much larger volumes of coal ash by 2010 when new federally-mandated "scrubber" technology is installed to remove contaminants from its exhaust.

Those who attended the meeting were greeted by a number of displays in the high school commons that were manned by Dairyland employees and presented information on subjects including the technology behind the scrubber, chemical composition of the ash waste, the criteria for choosing the site for the landfill, Dairyland's other environmental initiatives and examples of Dairyland's current landfill near Alma, which is much like the one being proposed for Vernon County.

Dairyland presented a prepared slide show three times during the evening and answered questions from residents. Dairyland's director of external relations, Brian Rude, and offsite project manager, Wendy Berndt, narrated the slide show and answered questions. Rude said the cooperative had listened to landowner concerns at the last informational meeting on Oct. 6, which was hosted at the Carl and Dan Volden farm, which neighbors one of the proposed ash landfill sites.

Rude and Berndt admitted they did not have all of the answers to questions but the project is "early in the process."

"We even read the blogs because we are trying to stay on top of what people's questions are because we know they are very legitimate questions and concerns," said Rude. "I got an email that said if you can't answer every question you are either lying or incompetent. The fact is we can't answer every question because there is a long process ahead of us."

Rude said the DNR permitting process was at least three to four years long and the scrubber has not yet been constructed, so it is difficult to know all of the details, but Dairyland is committed to protecting the environment and minimizing the impact of the project on those involved. Rude said the cooperative doesn't have much choice but to develop a site because alternative uses for the ash are not sufficiently developed and Dairyland is required by the EPA to reduce the emissions at their facilities by 2010 in Genoa and 2012 at its Alma facility.

"I wish I would be able to stand up here and tell you we have found some beneficial reuse for this material and we don't have to do this and then we could all have a party at the Volden's farm (the site of the last informational meeting)," said Rude. "But the fact is there is not a beneficial reuse right now."

Currently Dairyland reuses about 85 percent of its ash aggregate for road projects and cement additives. According to Dairyland, the new scrubber process will make the ash unusable for those projects and significantly increase the amount of ash that will need to be land filled from about 20,000 cubic yards a year to about 165,000-225,000 per year.

When asked about the "toxic" nature of the ash itself, Rude said Dairyland will do everything possible to protect the natural resources and follow all current regulations. Rude said the landfill would use "state of the art" technology to protect the environment and "all of this is designed so this material doesn't reach groundwater,"

Dairyland's Director of Environmental Affairs Don Huff said the waste material does contain "traces" of heavy metals, but the concentration is "very, very low."

Berndt explained how the Alma site, which is currently is used to landfill the cooperative's ash, is constructed and operated. Berndt said that facility is built to current DNR standards and has no groundwater issues associated with it. Some questioned the how long the current standards have been in place and the track record of the Alma facility.

When asked about phases one, two and three at Alma, Huff said those were "earlier designs" and there have been "some releases" on those phases.

"We have addressed those and that's why the designs for this landfill have changed," said Huff. "So, we aren't going to have those types of releases from those earlier facilities. We have learned a lot about landfills in the last 25-30 years. Our whole goal is protect human health and the environment."

When asked about transport of materials Berndt said the material will be transported by pneumatic tankers that are enclosed. When the material is placed on the site it is usually watered and compacted, so it does not become airborne.

Local resident Jim Feltes said the numbers presented by Dairyland on truck traffic didn't add up. Feltes said if the worst case scenario is to produce up to 225,000 cubic yards of material and dividing that by the size of the trucks the number of trucks needed would be closer to 100 per day and not the projected 8-20.

Feltes said the number also did not reflect the number of trucks that will be needed for the lime that will be mixed with the ash at a three-to-four ratio.

County board member Dave Ebbert urged Rude to look seriously at other alternatives so landowners do not need to be displaced.

"In the overall case you are talking about what is cost effective for the co-op and we all understand that," said Ebbert. "But if you didn't have the power of eminent domain to get this ground and on the free market you had to have people offer this ground to you, maybe some of these alternatives would rise higher in the cost-effective category as opposed to paying fair market value for ground that nobody wants to sell you."

Jim Thelen owns recreational property in Newton Valley that is downstream from one of the proposed sites and asked about runoff and catastrophic failure in the event of flooding.

"We have had episodes in 1907, 1951 and in 2007 when we had 12 inches of rain in a single day," said Thelen "...What are you going to do if there is a catastrophic failure?"

"This facility is a bowl on top of a ridge," said Berndt. "It will be designed to meet a 25-year storm event."

"It is a serious concern and the possibility of a catastrophic failure is something we do have to address," said Rude.

Local resident Theresa Cary asked if Dairyland would do a full environmental impact study (EIS) instead of an environmental assessment (EA). Berndt and Rude said Dairyland would be willing to do an EIS.

"At some point if you ask if the ground water will never, ever, ever, ever be impacted, it gets hard," said Rude. "You have to do the best you can with the technology you have."

County board supervisor Karen Dahl asked Rude to clarify statements that the option of hauling the waste to the current Vernon County landfill had been ruled out because it did not have the capacity to handle the volume of ash. Dahl said she had spoken to Vernon County Solid Waste Administrator Gail Frie and was told there are another 300 acres available for expansion of the landfill. Frie later confirmed he has had discussions with adjacent land owners and they are interested in selling property to the landfill.

Rude said he is open to looking at the Vernon County land fill option, but there are negative impacts to that as well, including higher trucking costs and increased truck traffic through more communities.

Local resident Vince Hundt asked about the possibility of using transportation that brings coal and lime to the facility and "turn the whole system right around" and send the waste to an existing coal mine or lime pit for disposal.

"You are talking about 10 percent of the coal going back as waste," said Hundt.

Huff and Rude said they have been looking at those options and have been discussing the option with the providers of the lime "in particular."

Adjacent landowner Carl Volden questioned the positive environmental impact of the scrubbers if the waste has to be trucked away.

"Hauling this with trucks up two 12 percent grade, one-mile long hills and we are trying to clean up the air?" said Volden. "If you add in all of the fuel and the carbon emissions that will be spewed into the air and all the trucks to haul in the lime from Duluth, Chicago, Green Bay and the Quad Cities, tremendous amounts of fuel that will be used and then hauling the waste up our hills… I don't know what you really gain. That's why I think recycling is what we should look at."

"Excellent points," said Rude

Rude said he had been involved with some of the regulations regarding reducing carbon emissions and most legislators had not thought about the issues that legislation would create.

"There was never really any real discussion or debate that I ever heard about these possible negative impacts of how the technology was going to work," said Rude. "We did not have that discussion and you have to look at the whole picture."