CALGARY – Construction of a sulfur processing plant in a rural Alberta community has received tentative approval from local authorities but some of the plant’s neighbors are cautious about living close to such an industry.
Lionel Cathcart, a local ostrich farmer, doesn’t want the plant next to him.
Besides heavy demands on the water supply he is worried about traffic on narrow country roads and potential for reduced property values.
If he had known three years ago such an industry would be located so near to him, he said he wouldn’t have bought land in the area.
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“I don’t want to look at a situation where my mortgage is worth more than my land value,” he said.
It’s a conundrum for many communities. Industries inject jobs and money into the region but residents worry some industries will hurt their environment.
Hopes to open in 1997
SulFer Works, a subsidiary of the New Zealand fertilizer company Fernz Inc., wants to build a sulfur processing plant near the villages of Beiseker and Irricana. Located in the Municipal District of Rockyview surrounding Calgary, the plant hopes to be running next year if all criteria are met.
After public hearings this summer, SulFer Works won approval from the municipal council. But first the company promised to drill a well and prove it yields enough water for the plant to operate without affecting the neighbors.
The company calculates it needs 260,000 litres per day to operate around the clock.
Ultimately, Meeking thinks the company will use well water and surface water, likely derived from treated sewage water from the villages of Irricana and Beiseker.
Neighboring farmers who attended hearings expressed worries the company will use too much water and run the farmers’ wells dry because they draw from same aquifer. There is also concern over pollution and traffic congestion on the gravel roads leading to the proposed site.
About 1,440 people live in the affected communities and not all are opposed to the company.
Those who are opposed likely won’t try to stop the plant in court, because ordinary people can’t afford litigation costs, said Cathcart.
SulFur Works is Fernz Inc.’s first venture in Canada and it hopes to start making sulfur pellets for the fertilizer industry by the fall of 1997, said Doug Meeking of Agra Earth and Environmental Ltd. in Calgary. Meeking’s firm is a consultant for the New Zealand firm.
The company wants to take sulfur from nearby sour gas plants and process it into pellets for fertilizer blends. Sulfur is a gas plant byproduct. SulFer Works would consume about 120,000 tonnes of sulfur per year. The four gas plants in the surrounding MD of Rockyview generate about 500,000 tonnes of sulfur per year, said Meeking.
SulFer Works plans to pulverize the sulfur to the consistency of talcum powder. Next, it’s mixed in a slurry with a binder compound derived from a pulp and paper industry byproduct. Pellets are produced by drying the slurry and excess water is driven off as steam.
The only way it can be absorbed by the soil as a nutrient is through this refining process. Meeking insists there is no sulfur dioxide smell or other sulfur emissions.
The company selected the area because it wanted to be close to good roads and a rail line to ship the product. The site is also within 80 kilometres of several gas plants. A large amount of raw sulfur is shipped by rail to the United States and to the Pacific Rim.
