In 2000, Forrest Paint was one of the biggest toxic air polluters in Eugene (Oregon).

The west Eugene paint company emitted 107,335 lbs. of vaporized industrial solvents and other chemicals into the air, according to the latest figures from Eugene's Toxics Right To Know Database. The chemicals, including acetone, naphtha and xylene, can cause kidney, liver, blood, eye and fetal damage, nausea, vomiting and, at high levels, death.

But next year, Forrest Paint President Scott Forrest says he expects to reduce those toxic emissions 90 to 95 percent by composting air from his factory. "This year our emissions will be 5 percent of what it was two years ago," he says.

"It's a very good thing they're doing," says David Monk, director of the Oregon Toxics Alliance environmental group.

The new technology from BioReaction Industries in Tualatin pumps 10,000 cubic feet of factory air a minute through stacked hoppers holding thousands of one-inch mesh balls full of fungi and bacteria. Like a backyard composter, the fungi and bacteria eat the pollution, producing carbon dioxide and water as a byproduct.

Monk calls the new biofilter technology "impressive" and predicts it will become the industry standard. "There really is no downside. It's as good as we could hope for."

Forrest says the biofilter has many advantages over the common practice of incinerating polluted air flow to clean it. There's some risk that incinerating flammable solvents in the air could cause a plant explosion, he says. "It's like putting a candle up there, it might be unsafe."

An incinerator would also cost $500,000 to install and $12,000 a month in natural gas to run, according to Forrest. The biofilter cost $130,000 to install and burns about $1,000 a month of natural gas to keep the compost at an optimal 80 degrees. Forrest says he's examining whether some of the waste heat can be recycled to warm the factory.

Forrest Paint has applied for a pollution control tax credit with the state that could reimburse the company for up to half of the cost of the biofilter.

Perhaps the biggest advantage is that the biofilter is better for the environment. Unlike the biofilter, incineration produces waste nitrogen oxide pollution and large quantities of carbon dioxide. "There's miniscule stress to the environment" compared to afterburners, Forrest says.

The biofilter was first installed in the summer of 2000, but took some tweaking to get up to full efficiency, according to Forrest. "When we got into it, it was unproven technology," he says. By last November, a new larger filter was installed and the temperature and moisture levels fully adjusted.

Forrest says he was motivated to clean up the plant's emissions by concern in the community over toxics and by the prospect of stricter EPA regulations that may be on the way.

In 1996, Eugeneans passed a local Toxics Right to Know law requiring companies to issue detailed reports of their use and release of toxic chemicals. Forrest says the right to know law didn't cause him to reduce emissions. He says his factory was already reporting emissions to the federal government and considering ways to reduce them.

But Forrest says concern about public perception did influence his decision to invest in the biofilter. "It has to do with doing business in the center or Eugene," Forrest says of his motivations. People in Eugene are very concerned about toxic chemicals, he says, and there's more and more people living near his factory near 11th and McKinley streets. "It would look good for our image in Eugene."

Forrest says he considered moving his 30-year old factory with 130 employees out of the city to a more rural area where less people would complain about the pollution. But he decided if he did that, "all we're going to do is move the problem, not solve it."

Monk says studies of an older Toxics Right to Know program in Massachusetts have shown that public exposure can prompt companies to reduce pollution by controlling emissions or using less toxic materials. "It gave them some impetus to realize that something should be done about it, for their own peace of mind or their own status in the community," Monk says. "I don't think any business wants to be looked at in their community as a purveyor of cancer and ill health."
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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