Tag Archives: Marathon Pulp

Green Investment Group Inc. of Illinois, USA is interested in taking over the former Marathon Pulp mill in Marathon, Ontario.

Marathon Pulp closed in February 2009 and declared bankruptcy shortly after.

The Marathon Pulp site is known to be contaminated.  There were multiple chemical spills in 2009 and 2010 after the mill had closed, including a chemical plume on Lake Superior.

The responsibility over the cleanup of the site was debated in court for 2 years.  Tembec, as co-owner of the mill, was found responsible for all known and unknown environmental issues, including the remediation.

Another former owner, Ball Packaging, was responsible for paying for a sand cap that was placed on contaminated sediment in the harbour.

To sell the property to Green Investment Group Inc., the Ontario Ministry of the Environment will have to approve the sale, and allow the environmental responsibility to be passed from Tembec to the new owner.

Northern Ontario Business is reporting that terms have now been agreed upon between Green Investment Group, the Ministry of the Environment, and the mill’s owner Tembec that will allow a sale agreement to be drafted. Green Investment Group plans to redevelop the site into a green energy industrial park.

Protocol Biomass, of Toronto, has been identified by Northern Ontario Business as one company that may be a future tenant. Protocol Biomass has been looking for a site in the area to make torrified wood pellets for export to Europe. European electrical generating stations use the blackened wood pellets to produce energy.

Green Investment Group has previously purchased former Smurfit-Stone paper mills across North America.  To see Green Investment Group’s progress on these sites in Canada, visit their pages dedicated to each project:

• Brunswick North Industrial Park, Bathurst, New Brunswick
• Pontiac Industrial Regional Park – Portage-du-Fort, Quebec
• New Richmond, Quebec

Read more:
Brownfield developer poised to land Marathon Pulp (Northern Ontario Business)

Back in September we learned that the Ontario Ministry of Environment, former mill co-owner Tembec, and other unnamed “parties” reached a tentative settlement regarding the environmental cleanup of the Marathon Pulp mill site.

Ontario’s Environmental Review Tribunal has now ruled in favour of that tentative agreement that will see a multi-party approach to the cleanup.

The mill was owned and operated from 1945 until 2009 by a series of owners. Marathon Pulp Inc. was the most recent owner, and went into bankruptcy in 2009.

Parties involved in the agreement:

• Tembec – co-owned Marathon Pulp Inc. with Kruger (each company owned 50% of Marathon Pulp Inc.). The shareholders decided Tembec would be the operator of the mill, and would market its products. Tembec managed and controlled the mill site from 1999-2009.
• Ball Packaging Products Corp. (“Ball”) – the predecessors of Ball Packaging Products, through amalgamation, owned and operated the Marathon pulp mill prior to 1983.
• Georgia-Pacific LLC (“GP”) – Tembec and Kruger purchased the mill in 1999 from Fort James Corporation. Fort James was subsequently acquired by Georgia-Pacific in 2000.
• Ontario Ministry of the Environment (“MOE”) – the provincial government regulator responsible for environmental protection in Ontario.

Tembec has been monitoring the site for the last two years on orders from the MOE. Tembec was forced to clean-up the numerous chemical spills that occurred at the site in 2009 and 2010.

Points of interest in the agreement:

• Tembec, with any necessary assistance from the MOE, Ball, and GP, will obtain an order from the bankruptcy court to give Tembec priority over any other claims on the site. Tembec will be entitled to a charge on the assets, property and undertakings of Marathon Pulp located at the site as security for their costs already incurred, and costs that they have yet to incur while fulfilling the obligations of the agreement.
• Tembec will provide $1.6 million in financial assurance for the closing the open landfill, monitoring the closed landfill (if required), decommissioning of the aeration stabilization basin and surge settling basin, decommission of the effluent pipeline and all related ground structures, continued monitoring of the closed bark pile. $400,000 of this financial assurance will be used towards improving the site’s security, and monitoring.
• Ball will pay $3 million in cash towards the remediation of the Peninsula Harbour of Lake Superior. The harbour remediation includes capping mercury and PCB contamination.
• GP will contribute towards Ball’s $3 million. Beyond this contribution (the amount will be determined between Ball and GP), GP will have no further obligation or liability in regards to the cleanup of Marathon Pulp
• Tembec has been given the right to sell the Marathon Pulp mill, or any of its assets on site.
• Tembec will provide site security
• Tembec will arrange for electricity to the site
• Tembec will remove all waste wood chips from the former wood chip area within 6 months
• Tembec may demolish buildings on the site, providing they first submit a plan satisfactory to the Ontario Ministry of the Environment
• Pic River First Nation is satisfied with this agreement.
• The town of Marathon provided a written submission indicating the approval of the agreement was not in the public’s interest because the limited scope of work and financial assurance proposed by the agreement do not meet the environmental remediation and risk management objectives contemplated by the original MOE director’s orders in regards to the clean-up required. Tembec feels that Marathon’s objections are based on misunderstanding. The tribunal has decided that Marathon’s concerns are adequately addressed by the agreement.

Source: Ontario Environment Review Tribunal (see decision (.pdf))

Photo History of the Marathon mill

Do you have fond memories of the Marathon Pulp mill? Here is a video montage of photographs highlighting the mill during 1946 – 2009.

For two years there has been an ongoing dispute as to who is responsible for the environmental clean-up at the dormant pulp mill in Marathon, Ontario.

The Chronicle Journal is reporting that the Ontario Ministry of Environment, former mill co-owner Tembec, and other unnamed “parties” reached a tentative settlement on Friday, but no details have been made public.

The tentative deal may be approved by the province’s Environmental Review Tribunal on October 6, in order to avoid a full hearing.

Tembec has been monitoring the site for the last two years on orders from the Ontario Ministry of the Environment. Tembec was forced to clean-up the numerous chemical spills that occurred at the site in 2009 and 2010.

Tembec co-owned the mill before it went bankrupt in March 2009, and has been fighting the provincial order that requires it be in care and control of the vacant property.

Once the agreement over the environmental responsibilities is finalized, it may pave the way for a new owner of the mill to step in.

Protocol Biomass Corporation, a biofuel company from Toronto, has expressed interest in retrofitting the facility to manufacture wood pellets and ship them to European markets. Protocol Biomass is particularly interested in producing blacken wood pellets that have been heated until they are more of a charcoal-like substance. This material is used by European electrical generating stations. However, the company still needs to secure a long-term wood supply allocation from the province.

Read more:
Tentative pulp mill deal reached (Chronicle Journal)

When the province of Ontario announced a plan in November 2009 to free up 11 million cubic metres of unused wood fibre in the province through a wood supply competition, over 100 value-added wood projects submitted an application.

The wood supply competition for the unused wood fibre has been called a “short-term” opportunity by Ontario’s Minister of Northern Development, Mines and Forestry, Michael Gravelle to attract new investment in the forest sector, by supporting new and innovative ventures.

A longer-term goal of the province is to reform its forest tenure system. The province plans to launch two pilot models, known as Local Forest Management Corporations (LFMC), to better manage Crown forests and oversee the competitive sale of Crown timber. The models will test some new principles of allocation, licensing and the pricing of wood over a five-to-seven-year period.

The biggest driving force behind the forest tenure reform is the goal of the province to stop companies from hoarding wood.

The wood supply competition is causing frustration, both because of its delays, and because of its secrecy. Applicants to the competition were told when they applied to keep quiet about their application.

Gravelle originally said announcements on wood applications would begin in October. He later pushed that time-line back to the end of this year.

Protocol Biomass Corporation, a biofuel company from Toronto, is one of the companies voicing their frustration with Ontario’s slow progress on its wood supply allocation.

The company wanted to take over the vacant pulp mill in Marathon, Ontario and had plans to begin retrofitting the facility this fall to manufacture wood pellets and ship them to European markets.

If the company can get a large enough wood supply, it would like to spend $100 million dollars installing new equipment in the mill, and hire up to 125 people to manufacture the pellets.

Tom Logan, President of Protocol Biomass, said no bank will give them financing with only a two-year wood supply, so he is left to wait for word from the province.

Marathon’s mayor, Rick Dumas, is also voicing his frustration over the wood supply, and is upset over Gravelle’s failure to make allocation announcements within the time lines he had originally set out.

Gravelle is now apologizing for raising false expectations over the wood supply competition and has said no announcements will be forth coming until sometime in 2011 because of the need for due diligence. While he said he appreciates Dumas’ eagerness to move things forward, Gravelle said the province has already received 115 applications for wood supply and his ministry is working as quickly as it can to process them.

Sources:
BioFuel Project Delayed (CKDR Dryden)
Still waiting (TbNewsWatch)
Northern communities, companies wait for wood tenure (Northern Ontario Business)

Please let this be an April Fool’s Joke.

Thunder Bay’s Chronicle Journal is reporting that another chemical spill has occurred into Lake Superior from Marathon, Ontario’s dormant pulp mill.

The spill of diluted chemicals is even bigger than the four previous previous leaks.

This leak is believed to be coming from a clarifier pond. The pond had been frozen, but a plume was noticed on the harbour surface, indicating a leak. Lisa Brygidyr, a spokesman for the Ministry of Environment, said they can not figure out how it thawed so quickly.

During normal mill operations, spent pulp chemicals are sent to a clarifier before being pumped to a secondary treatment plant.
On Tuesday and Wednesday, Tembec crews began vacuuming out about 100,000 gallons of diluted pulping liquors, sewer water and treated effluent that remained in the clarifier.

The clarifier pond is not supposed to be used as a storage tank. However, the Ministry of the Environment allowed Tembec to put excess diluted black liquor material into it earlier this year when a holding tank at the mill was found to be leaking from the bottom.

As news of the fourth spill spread through town Wednesday, some were heart-sick that the lake had been fouled yet again.

“Absolutely, that‘s the story going around town – that if only (Tembec) had cleaned the site up in summer and fall, we would not be facing this situation today,” said Marathon Mayor Rick Dumas.

Late last summer the Ministry of the Environment ordered Tembec to heat the mill, or remove the black liquor chemicals. Tembec disagreed with the Ministry and by the time an agreement was reached, it was December and cold.

Source:
Spill a concern (Chronicle Journal)

Tembec officials, as the former operators of the Marathon Pulp mill in Ontario, say their winter contingency plans are reaching their final stages.

1.4 million litres of black liquor have been moved by truck from on-site storage tanks to the AbitibiBowater Fort Frances mill and to the Clean Harbour Waste facility in Sarnia.

Tembec project manager, Bob Gregor, said the remaining 270,000 litres of chemicals are now semi- frozen and will have to be stored on site until the spring when they can be safely removed.

Also nearly complete is the removal of 1.5 million litres of chemical effluent that have been pumped from a pipeline and trucked to a nearby spill basin.

Source:
Marathon clean up almost complete (TbNewsWatch)

As a former owner of Marathon Pulp, Ball Packaging is now among the companies that will share responsibility for the environment clean up in Marathon, Ontario.

The Ministry of the Environment (MOE) has found Ball Packaging was responsible for discharging mercury and dangerous PCB chemicals into Lake Superior when it owned the mill (prior to 1983).

Ball Packaging is now based in the U.S. The MOE wants the company to provide financial assurance that they will assist in the environmental clean up, in the form of $6 million.

Ball Packaging has 30 days to consult with their lawyers and to formulate a plan clean up the pollution.

Source:
Former Marathon Pulp owner ordered to cleanup (TbNewsWatch)

The clean-up at Marathon Pulp in Ontario will now have to wait until the spring.

1.4 million litres have been trucked to AbitibiBowater‘s mill in Fort Frances, and to the Clean Harbour Hazardous Waste facility in Sarnia.

However, 270,000 litres of chemicals that were scheduled to be transfered next week, have congealed because of the cold weather. They will not be able to be transported until the spring.

Chemical effluent is still being pumped from a pipeline and into trucks to be dumped into a nearby spill basin. The process is expected to take another 2 weeks.

Source:
Marathon Pulp cleanup hits snag

A 50 metre long plume was spotted on Lake Superior near Marathon, Ontario – close to where pump and chemical trucks have been cleaning up after black liquor leaked from a section of a five-kilometre effluent pipe about 10 days ago.

There are currently no concerns that the material could get into drinking water, because the nearest intake pipe on Lake Superior is located 80 kilometres away in Terrace Bay.

The sighted plume is the latest glitch to hamper the transfer and cleanup of about one million U.S. gallons of the diluted liquors that were left on site following the bankruptcy of Marathon Pulp last March.

The effluent pipe that leads to a secondary treatment plant has leaked three times since the operation began in early December. Earlier this month, a storage tank inside the dormant mill was found to be leaking.

A good portion of the liquors have been trucked off site to the AbitibiBowater pulp mill in Fort Frances.

About 150,000 gallons being vacuumed up from the site of the third leak is to be transferred to a spill basin east of town and at the end of the pipe.

Source:
New chemical concerns (Chronicle Journal)

The chemical clean-up crews in Marathon, Ontario hit another snag this week when a leak was found in the seam on an indoor holding tank containing the black liquor.

The black liquor was removed from the holding tank and transferred to a tank outside.

Crews have been busy vacuuming the chemicals out of the cracked effluent pipe that has leaked three times since December. The chemicals are then being transferred to AbitibiBowater‘s Fort Frances mill.

It is estimated there are 80 truck loads of chemicals to be moved, but only two trucks are available for transport. A third truck is on stand-by to deal with any future spills or leaks.

As the previous owner of the bankrupt mill, Tembec is on the hook for the chemical removal. The Ontario Ministry of the Environment is closing monitoring the chemical removal.

The environmental cleanup is expected to take several more weeks.

Source:
Marathon mill cleanup to go on for weeks (Chronicle Journal)