Locals say US Nitrogen has been releasing dangerous chemicals into the air and water. WUOT’s Pierce Gentry investigated these complaints, and uncovered a history of violations that have gone largely unpunished. Jacqui Sieber sat down with him to learn more ...
Jacqui Sieber: So how did you first hear about this plant? What made you want to look into it?
Pierce Gentry: Well I first heard about this plant on Facebook. There’s a local activist – her name is Park Overall – and she has been posting on Facebook about this plant for years, since it first moved in back in 2016. And she put out this big post on Facebook. It blew up, it got thousands of likes and shares. And until that point I had never heard of US Nitrogen or even a nitric acid plant. But, after reaching out to her and speaking to her about her concerns, I soon learned that there was a lot of controversy surrounding this plant and what exactly has been going on there.
Jacqui: What complaints are you hearing from residents who live near the plant? What health concerns have they shared with you?
Pierce: Well, it seems that none of the people who live around the plant wanted it to be there in the first place. Initially, when the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conversation, or TDEC, when they were going over draft permits they received over 500 comments from people who live in the area saying that they didn't want this nitric acid plant near their home.
And after it was built and fired up in 2016, people started complaining about strange clouds rising above the plant. One woman, Sherry Cooper, shared her story with me of how she’s been affected. She lives on a hill that overlooks the plant a little less than a mile away. And she says that the orange clouds actually come over her house when they’re released from the plant.
And ever since 2016, she says she’s been dealing with some pretty major lung issues. Here she is speaking with me at a park a few weeks ago:
Sherry Cooper: I was literally dying up by my hill. I had crystal nodules in my lungs — tumors. I couldn't hardly walk or talk. So I didn't leave my hill. I've been a prisoner on my hill since 2016.
Jacqui: Okay, so what have regulators done about this?
Pierce: Well, TDEC has fined US Nitrogen a few times for some of its permit violations – not all of them, though. Those fines have totaled to-date to about $23,500. But people have complained about the plant a lot. And TDEC does, to their credit, send out inspectors. But typically these inspections happen hours or even days after the complaints are made and by the time the inspectors get out there they say they can’t find anything wrong.
Jacqui: And what is US Nitrogen’s response?
Pierce: Yeah so US Nitrogen insists that they’re not releasing anything dangerous. But, I spoke to a professor here at the University of Tennessee who studies air quality, and he told me that orange vapor is an indicator of nitric acid which is dangerous to human health. And people have complained about symptoms that nitric acid would cause nearby.
After a release at the plant in November, this local resident called Greene County 911 about the cloud that they saw:
911 Call: Yeah I'm down here in Midway, near US Nitrogen. I went outside this morning, and my eyes was burning, my skin was burning, and they had orange stuff coming everywhere out of their pipes.
Jacqui: So what are outside voices saying about the plant? What would they like to see change?
Pierce: Yeah, activists have been speaking out for a long time. One of them of course is Park Overall, who was making those posts on Facebook. She's a retired actress who’s from Greeneville and has retired back there. Her goal is just to have the plant shut down.
She was really happy to hear that back in June, the U.S. Chemical Safety Board announced that it was investigating the Austin Powder Company — the owner of US Nitrogen — along with its Red Diamond facility in Ohio. In June, that facility released a cloud of orange nitric acid vapor into the air which prompted an evacuation for people who lived nearby. So they’re investigating that plant along with US Nitrogen for its release in November.
Jacqui: That was Pierce Gentry speaking about his latest investigation into US Nitrogen. Thank you for your reporting, Pierce
Pierce: Thank you for having me, Jacqui.
