Sanimax USA LLC failed to seek a required major air permit amendment and conduct air emissions modeling prior to making changes to its pollution control equipment systems at its animal products rendering facility in South St. Paul, Minnesota, according to a Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) enforcement investigation.
An MPCA staff inspection in May 2023 confirmed that the company had taken a piece of pollution control equipment required by the permit to control emissions out of service. The company routed the emissions to a different type of control equipment that was not permitted and had no enforceable conditions. Routing emissions to unpermitted equipment could potentially make it more difficult to determine if there are exceedances that could impact air quality. The company also failed to conduct air quality modeling before making these changes in 2019.
Other violations included failing to consistently conduct daily visible emissions checks and failing to report excessive deviations of pressure drop and water flow rate readings for pollution control equipment.
In addition to paying the $55,000 civil penalty, Sanimax USA has been required to complete a series of corrective actions including:
- Putting required pollution control equipment back into operation and ensuring emissions from their process are controlled by permitted equipment. This occurred in September 2023.
- Submitting a plan to ensure future projects and plans will be evaluated so modeling requirements will be completed when necessary.
- Submitting a plan to ensure that daily monitoring is conducted and pollution control equipment operates within permitted limits.
MPCA rules and regulations are designed to protect human health and the environment by limiting pollution emissions and discharges from facilities. When companies do not fully comply with regulatory requirements, the resulting pollution can be harmful to people and the environment.
When calculating penalties, the MPCA considers how seriously the violations affected or could have affected the environment, and whether they were first-time or repeat violations. The agency also attempts to recover the economic benefit the company gained by failing to comply with environmental laws in a timely manner.