The ESCO steel parts manufacturing plant has been in NW Portland for a long time—98 years, to be exact—melting down scrap metal for new products and releasing an ample amount of toxic chemicals in the process. Not more toxic chemicals than are allowed under state and federal clean air laws, however, and as the Nob Hill neighborhood has grown up around the plant, neighbors have increasingly complained about the smell and potential impact of the estimated 206,390 pounds of toxins released annually.
After 16 years of neighborhood activism, the neighborhood and ESCO finally came to a happy agreement this week: ESCO is agreeing to cut its pollution by 20 percent over the next five years.
The details of the 80-page Good Neighbor Agreement were first reported in the Oregonian. This is a big deal, both for the neighbors who are worried about the air their kids are breathing at very nearby Chapman Elementary, and for all of Portland, which deals with the complications of industry being amid dense residential areas. While industries usually wait to change until the government forces them to, ESCO will spend $5 million upgrading its filtering system over the next five years, all of which goes beyond what environmental laws say they need to do.
“We couldn’t understand why there were so many concerns, because when we looked at the data, we thought we were doing a good job,” ESCO manager Ian Bingham told a meeting of over 100 people at Chapman School on Tuesday night. “But when we responded to complaints with an answer like, “We’re in compliance,” that answer wan’t very satisfactory to neighbors… This is simply the most constructive path forward, both now and in the long term.”
“This neighborhood sits as the poster child for urban density right next to old industrial development,” said environmental lawyer Aubrey Baldwin. “The agreement is full of firsts, it’s really a landmark moment in the history of how industry relates to its neighbors.”
As part of the agreement, a neighborhood group will be able to check up on the installation of the pollution controls, ESCO will do a public release every quarter summarizing complaints about smells, and ESCO will be open for an annual public tour. In exchange, the neighborhood organizations have agreed not to challenge an upcoming ESCO permit renewal or sue ESCO for issues related to their emissions.
One of the largest activists behind the effort, Neighbors for Clean Air organizer Mary Peveto, notes that while she’s happy with the agreement, every neighborhood shouldn’t have to go through years to effort to get industries to evolve. ESCO is the fourth largest polluter in Portland, behind industry in North and Northeast Portland. “I think this should shine a glaring light on the deficiency of our regulatory framework for taking care of our public health concerns,” says Peveto. “The amount of resources and the weight put on the community, not all communities are going to be able to pull this off.”
Working with ESCO to create change took hundreds of hours of community time and resources—to do a job Peveto thinks the state should be handling. “Does this kind of method of addressing polluting hot spots really make sense? I think there’s inherent issues of equity if we’re saying this is the way we should address this.”
polluter in rich neighborhood full of well-organized honkies folds like a house of cards.
meanwhile, in the poor neck of the woods… not much changes.
@Dreww – Get over yourself. The neighborhood fought for 16 years, ESCO didn’t “fold like a house of cards.” That’s a gross misstatement. The neighborhood was determined to be one of the worst air-quality zones in the country at one point, and all it would have taken to fix it was a $5 million dollar investment from a company with almost a billion in sales.
The neighbors should have banned together and burnt that mother fucker to the ground years ago. It’s literally killing their children. But hey, at least now they have a promise from the company to fix it.
“killing their children” ?
Let’s not exaggerate too much, OK?
there are definitely worse places in the city, and the state for that matter than the NW neighborhoods around ESCO. what it really comes down to, is that a small, incredibly vocal, privileged and wealthy group managed to push an industrial polluter above and beyond what was required. is it a good thing? absolutely. less bad stuff in the air is great.
and.. as for the “killing their children” comment… ESCO has been there for a long time, long before the folks living in the affected neighborhoods moved in, so their purchase of those expensive properties was a calculated risk. I find it interesting that the clean air groups that have attacked ESCO haven’t bothered with polluters in the less affluent areas of portland…
Well said reece.
Anytime a company goes above and beyond pollution requirements is a good thing, certainly – but I’ve never really noticed any smell, etc when I’ve been over in that area. Which is fairly often too.
I have the impression that some of these people just won’t be pleased till the company is shut down.
Felt good to see the Mercury finally covering ESCO developments and note the long-running neighborhood activist campaign that yielded result. However, they didn’t mention the most tenacious and effective of the neighborhood activist groups in NW namely the NWDA; (Northwest District Association’s Health & Environment committee’s persistent
and thorough chair, Sharon Genasci, whose house hosted the meetintgs for years). Nor did the Mercury mention the heroic role played by Allan Classen’s neighborhood
monthly paper the NW Examiner which provided the only regular coverage of ESCO’s discharges and the neighborhood activists’ struggles and changing tactics in the face of
DEQ running interference for ESCO!!
http://www.northwestdistrictassociation.or…
Nor any citing of creative tactics like the window decals for all those residential apartments and houses around ESCO that gave the telephone line and online link to
the clever Smell It, Report It! odor complaint forms.
However, neither the Merc, the Weak Willy (neither a repository of ESCO advertising
down through the toxic years of socialized risk and privatized profits)
http://www.wweek.com/portland/blog-3051-th…
or the O ever did any real-time investigative coverage like the NW Examiner’s
Paul Koberstein and of late Allan Classen. The O’s business section ran only brief late mention of the long history of faulty forge & foundry discharges of heavy metal soot when ESCO decided to go from private family-held LLC to publicly traded multi-national.
More disclosure on discharges & remedies for obsolete protective plant gear vis a vis the DEQ & EPA would’ve then been required, if not terribly rigorously enforced. Again the public is way off thinking DEQ & EPA are there to protect public from limited liability corporate polluters. As Erin Brockovich and Ed Masry learned in their case against
California’s privatized PG&E and CalEPA the real paradigm is other way around; these state and federal environmental “watchdog” agencies are there to protect the LLC’s from Public Interest litigation!
I used to live right across the street from Esco. You could hear them turning on one of their ‘processes’ and a few minutes later would be hit with the smell. Terrible, nauseating, headache inducing smell of hot-hot metal. And if you smell hot metal, it means you are inhaling metal, however small of particles it may be. This was back in 2003 and I seem to recall they were allowed by the state to release a couple (2-3 i think) of tons of lead into the air per year. This coupled with the rapidly accumulating grey dust that settled onto every flat surface of the apartment and the proximity to daily congestion of idling cars on the 405 was a good imperative to moving.
RE: “killing their children.” I feel obligated to point out that the pollution from ESCO hasn’t been linked to any diseases in the neighborhood and it’s within the level the government deems safe. For what that’s worth.
Douche – if you lived near a brewery, do you get drunk from the odor, which is REALLY strong? Or do you develop liver cancer?
@frankie
Fermentation happens in a contained system. Brewers have no incentive for alcohol to escape their premises. What you are smelling is the mash, starches being converted to sugar.
Cognac on the other hand, evaporates off 3-5% of the alcohol while it is developing/resting in oak barrels. The French, poetic as they are, refer to this as the ‘Angel’s Share’.
I like that part about the ‘Angels Share’ – but odors don’t kill. If it did, I’m sure cancer rates, etc, would be markedly higher around ESCO – and their workers especially would have much much higher cancer rates of some sort.
I haven’t seen any evidence of that.
I’m unaware of any epidemiological studies on cancer rates surrounding Esco or rates of their workers., I would be interested in looking at them if you have any sources though.
Here’s what I do know:
Esco releases toxics into the air daily (it’s listed on their DEQ permit).
There was a constant dark gray dust covering the windows and windowsills of our apartment.
It smelled really bad, gave me headaches, my respitory system was irritated a lot.
After moving to NE the smell, headaches, and respiratory irritation stopped.