Luverne, Minnesota, has lost out to Madison, South Dakota, for the location of trū Shrimp's first production facility, and the business is dismissing a Minnesota water quality standard as a "really obscure technicality in the water effluent realm" that caused the company to head to South Dakota.
Boosters of the project parrot that frame, which seems designed to get the North Star State to gut its own water quality standards, such as they are. For a look at South Dakota's water quality issues, Bluestem's readers might start at South Dakota News Watch's Rivers at Risk series' S.D. waterways serve as dumping grounds for human, industrial, ag wastes, which notes that "industry growth has led to heightened pollution and violations of wastewater quality standards are common."
Reports in the Sioux Falls Argus Leader in How South Dakota won over Tru Shrimp in spite of Minnesota plans of a courtship between the shrimp folks and the state. More on that later.
Minnesota state senator Bill Weber, R-Luverne, dismisses the water quality issue in FULL STORY: trū Shrimp steps back from plans to build shrimp harbor in Luverne, in the Worthington Globe:
“At this point, the official position is it’s a postponement,” Weber said. “The goal is to build there, but we’re going to have to work through a specific MPCA (Minnesota Pollution Control Agency) rule, which quite frankly isn’t a rule they have to worry about in Iowa and South Dakota.”
Weber explained that he has asked for further information from trū Shrimp’s engineers in order to learn more about what the company needs specifically in order to complete the project. He added that the regulations pertain to the flow of electricity through water.
“With the MPCA requirements, it’s impossible for them (trū Shrimp) to get a plan in place that will allow them to meet the timeline that they want,” Weber said. “It’s very disappointing, and I think we always recognized the business climate has given South South Dakota an edge, but they had been dedicated to locating in Minnesota — at least for their original plan.
At Wortington's Radio Works, Justin Wettschreck reported similar news in State regulatory issue causes Luverne to lose first tru-Shrimp production facility:
The statement says, "However, as a part of the final permitting process, the company encountered a state regulatory challenge that could not be addressed in the timeframe needed to meet its commercialization goals."
Sen. Bill Weber, who just learned of the problem this week, said he was told it was a specific conductance issue, which is a measure of the ability of a substance to conduct electric current. He said he dealt with specific conductance when Prime Iowa Pork looked into opening a facility in Luverne.
To his knowledge, trū Shrimp became aware of the problem six to eight weeks ago, Weber said.
Luverne Mayor Pat Baustian, in communication with other city leaders, stated trū Shrimp CEO Michael Ziebell said because trū Shrimp could not currently meet the wastewater discharge criteria for meeting the levels of specific conductance, they are postponing the construction of Luverne Bay Harbor for up to three years.
The regulations regarding specific conductance are set by the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency. According to several sources, South Dakota and Iowa do not have any set levels for specific conductance.
Weber said he is hoping to get more information from the engineers at trū Shrimp before he proceeds to the next steps.
"The reality of it is, if we don't get this fixed through the MPCA - come to grips with this specific conductance thing, we're going to watch another $300 million project cross the state line," he stated.
To Weber's knowledge, the project has not been cancelled, it is postponed.
A statement from the city of Luverne and Baustain says, " Although the City of Luverne is disappointed in the delay of constructing the Luverne Bay Harbor, we are committed to working alongside trū Shrimp and the State of Minnesota to shape public policies to reduce state regulatory roadblocks. The City of Luverne stands ready to facilitate the construction of the second trū Shrimp harbor in Luverne in three years.
If that isn't a dog whistle to Governor-elect Tim Walz to get his regulatory humility on, we're not sure what is--but it also illustrates that Weber will accept whatever frame business hands him when it comes to water quality. This is a sad state of affairs, when a little quality time with Mr. Google illustrates why "specific conductance" --measuring the flow of electricity through water--is an important tool for detecting water quality issues.
Why specific conductance matters to water quality
Bucknell University's Environmental Center's Glossary of Water Quality Terms and Definitions sums up the issue:
Specific conductance (μS/cm) – ability of water to conduct an electrical current standardized to a particular temperature (“specific” to 25°C); units are the inverse of resistance (microSiemens) over a 1 cm path length.
Conductivity is affected by dissolved substances in the water, particularly salts. Conductivity values naturally vary considerably depending on regional geology, proximity to oceans, and rainfall. High amounts of dissolved salts in freshwater can be stressful to aquatic life and indicate possible contamination from a variety of human sources. Examples include runoff from roads (particularly after winter deicing), effluent from certain industries and sewage treatment plants, mine drainage, and fertilized cropland or lawns. In general, distilled water has a conductivity of 14 μS/cm, and seawater has a conductivity of 40,000 μS/cm. Fresh surface water typically has conductivity in the range of 40-1000 μS/cis m.
Monitoring specific conductance is an indirect means of detecting "the presence of dissolved solids such as chloride, nitrate, sulfate, phosphate, sodium, magnesium, calcium, and iron, and can be used as an indicator of water pollution," as the City of Boulder/USGS Water Quality Monitoring General Information on Specific Conductance page notes.
In fact, there's a snazzy little study online, Real-Time Conductivity Monitoring Provides Estimates of Chloride Levels in Minnesota Watershed, that discusses using specific conductance as a tool to help measure the amount of salt in Shingle Creek, which flows into the Mississippi River in Minneapolis.
Given that shrimp live in salt water, we're curious why meeting specific conductance rules are something to be sniffed at. After all, that road salt is a problem; in January 2018, the Associated Press reported 50 Minnesota lakes and streams were impaired because of road salt.
Ask Carthage about the difficulty of removing salt once it's in the environment.
Moreover, specific conductance is part of the discussion of water quality in Minnesota. The MPCA's Salty Discharge” Monitoring At NPDES/SDS Permitted Facilities includes the measure. As for Iowa Prime Pork, the Worthington Globe reported in June that "PIP will also pay for an estimated $6.76 million in required upgrades to the city’s wastewater treatment facility, paying for half of the cost over five years."
South Dakota wooes the true shrimp
In How South Dakota won over Tru Shrimp in spite of Minnesota plans, the Argus Leader's Patrick Anderson tells of the courtship between the company and the state:
Friday was Dennis Daugaard's last full day in office, and here, in the headquarters of the Heartland Consumers Power District, South Dakota's outgoing governor was about to make a victory speech.
This day was years in the making for Daugaard, the result of an extended courtship. There were golf outings in Pierre, invites to the Buffalo Roundup in Custer State Park, visits to a research plant in southwestern Minnesota and multiple pitches trying to sell the benefits of running a business in South Dakota.
So, in perhaps his last public appearance as South Dakota's governor, Daugaard talked about Tru Shrimp. The fledgling yet ambitious shrimp producer had just announced plans to open its first production facility in Madison.
"I can’t think of a better way to spend that last day than to celebrate a success like this,” Daugaard said.
Daugaard counted it as a win for his administration and his economic development office, which kicked in money for a $6.5 million low-interest loan to help attract Tru Shrimp to Madison, along with the potential for 120 jobs and tens of millions of dollars of economic impact.
Oh surprise--as if pseudo-events and $6.5 million in low-interest loans simply appear suddenly by magic.
Indeed, the sidelining of the Luverne project seems designed to get Weber and other trū Shrimp lackies busy finding a way to salt Minnesota's waters on a South Dakota scale, as if Minnesota needs any more impaired waters.
Photo: Outgoing South Dakota Gov. Dennis Daugaard poses for a portrait with company leaders of Trū Shrimp, an aquaculture shrimp maker. The company announced its first production facility in Madison.(Photo: Patrick Anderson, Argus Leader). It's magic!
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I don't follow the industry any more but the last I heard recirculating systems discharged 10% of their water daily. Over time that would amount to a lot of salt being discharged unless they have some way of recovering it through some method like evaporation ponds or reverse osmosis.
They might be able to avoid the salt problem entirely by replacing the saltwater shrimp with freshwater prawns (Macrobrachium rosenbergii).
Posted by: John Reynolds | Jan 15, 2019 at 07:35 AM