County Commissioners Vote to Designate Chemical Plant Site a Brownfield Area
BARTOW | County commissioners voted unanimously Tuesday to approve designating as a brownfield area the KC Industries property near Mulberry.
The 200-acre site on Prairie Mine Road has been used as a chemical plant since 1957. The contamination is the result of practices that occurred before 1972 when Kaiser Aluminum and Chemical, the plant’s former owner, began disposing of the plant’s acidic waste in a deep injection well instead of surface ponds, said Paul Maasen, the plant’s current owner.
Maasen, who managed the plant for Kaiser, said he acquired the plant in 2000 and has been working with a succession of companies to get the site cleaned up.
“I have a Florida Department of Environmental Protection-approved cleanup program and plan to begin work this year,” he said.
The bulk of the cleanup should be completed by 2014, he said
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