NORTHAMPTON — Mayor Gina-Louise Sciarra and Ward 5 City Councilor Alex Jarrett are calling for a meeting with officials at BI-QEM, the Florence plastics manufacturer that is under investigation after an outdoor formaldehyde spill, to discuss the company’s record of environmental infractions and bring the facility into compliance.
Sciarra said her office received a citizen complaint March 29 and notified the Northampton Fire Department of the chemical spill at 238 Nonotuck St.
A description of the spill provided by Sciarra and Jarrett in a joint statement reveals that emergency responders found a 55-gallon drum about one-quarter full of frozen material, and the same material was on the ground outside the containment pit for a large chemical storage tank.
The pit itself contained about 100 gallons of the frozen material, determined to be the toxic chemical formaldehyde that is used for certain industrial purposes. Plant managers reportedly said the tank had overflowed during a delivery about 18 hours prior.
“It was determined that there was no active leak at the tank or any off-gassing of the spilled material,” Sciarra and Jarrett wrote in their statement.
State regulators from the Department of Environmental Protection responded and informed the plant’s managers that the amount of material spilled required immediate notification. BI-QEM hired a cleanup contractor, while MassDEP banned the company from filling the tank any further until a state investigation is finished.
“The health and safety of our residents is our highest priority,” Sciarra said. “Nothing short of full compliance with all environmental laws and regulations will be acceptable to the City of Northampton.”
Jarrett said that the latest environmental “violation and Bi-QEM’s past record are deeply concerning to me and I will be working to address this in every way I can.”
Jarrett said company officials have agreed to meet with the city, but a date has not been decided yet.
BI-QEM, formerly known as Chemiplastica, has been in operation since the late 1800s. Sciarra, Jarrett, state lawmakers, and state and federal regulators “have been working together closely for the past several months to identify and work to correct a host of issues at the factory,” Sciarra and Jarrett said in their joint statement.
On March 8, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency ordered BI-QEM to correct a variety of hazards that were identified during a February inspection. According to the EPA website that tracks compliance, inspectors found “leaking formaldehyde pipes, excessive amounts of potentially combustible dust, electrical hazards, and lack of overflow controls on a large formaldehyde tank.”
Brian Steele can be reached at bsteele@gazettenet.com.