WAUNAKEE, Wis. (AP) - For the second time in two months, a pipe has burst at a biodigester near Waunakee, spilling about 20,000 gallons of manure into a retention basin.
A Dane County official said the waste didn’t reach waterways outside of the biodigester property. In November when 300,000 gallons spilled, some manure flowed to a creek feeding into Lake Mendota, the Wisconsin State Journal reported (https://bit.ly/1mL47LQ ).
The latest spill happened Monday afternoon at the Clear Horizons biodigester. A biodigester is a tank in which manure is broken down in a controlled fashion, releasing energy that can be converted to electricity and leaving leftover waste that can be used as fertilizer.
Both spills apparently had similar causes, said Jim Ditter, the chief executive of PPC Partners, which owns the Clear Horizons biodigester. In both cases an equipment vibration or shift in the soil led fractured a fitting on a curved pipe in the pumping system.
Company spokesman Leo Maney said the company planned to immediately install flexible connectors at the elbows of these pipes to prevent future failures.
“We have identified 20 elbows that need replacing,” Ditter said in an email to the State Journal on Wednesday. “The order was placed today.”
Josh Wescott, the chief of staff to Dane County Executive Joe Parisi, said this week’s spill wasn’t as bad as the previous because the company had people on the site at the time.
In November, however, the spill happened at 11 p.m. Manure spilled from the digester tank for about six hours until an employee arrived for work in the morning. A plant manager said at the time that alarms and monitoring devices failed to activate.
Parisi sent a letter on Tuesday asking Clear Horizons to “thoroughly review and modify” its current operational plan, staffing levels, procedures and safety features.
Reports on the November spill have been forwarded to state Department of Natural Resources enforcement staff. No determination on any fine or other action has been decided as yet, agency spokesman Bob Manwell said.
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Information from: Wisconsin State Journal, https://www.madison.com/wsj
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