VTI a STAR IN 2005

Hmm, all was going as my expectations, posted about a year ago – 50p by end Feb 06, and now look at it!

I believe its time to brace ourselves chaps.

Anyone who remembers my posts from that time will recall that I emphasised that there are many potential solutions to the I-99 situation, and that I hoped that VTI would perform the trial contract brilliantly, because that was IMHO the only way they could be sure of a follow up on the project.

As I believe I tried to explain in one of those earlier long posts, the priorities in selecting a solution to problems such as I99 are:-
Priority 1. That the solution succeeds completely and is guaranteed long term.
Priority 2 & 3 are intertwined, and are, cost and time.

The method used to prove bauxsol in the trial always seemed odd and risky to me, and in the end I came to the conclusion, posters from that time may recall, that the trial was very much intended to provide Pennsylvania with a solution which could be applied at any future time, as & if further pollution problems arose, without severely damaging or having to close the road. In other words, the key to this trial was showing that the method of installation worked (as well as the bauxsol).

Virotec became potentially the most attractive solution because the company were, no doubt, prepared to give a long term guarantee, once the trial installation was proved successful, and the method of installation, once proved by the trial, should have allowed an immediate restart on completing I-99, where the costs associated with the delayed opening must be monstrous. This time factor tipped the balance in favour of the bauxsol insitu, potentially post road construction, but expensive, solution, I believe.

So my conclusion is that the comments from Kline etc. indicate less than full satisfaction with the results to date, and Virotec need the next lot to show real improvements, to get a breathing space while bauxsol proves itself. No public officials will be prepared to continue with VTI, with or without guarantees, if the results aren’t convincing, IMHO. The norm is to go for certainty, and while this trial has been going on, work has obviously continued on alternatives. In fact, what do we know about the “disposal” alternatives now? – all I’m aware of is that they are going through planning processes. It could even be that the client has found, and is in the process of licensing etc. good tips/borrow pits along the line with plenty of impermeable clay within the excavations. If that was the case, the potential cheapness of this solution, combined with the certainty it provides might exceed the detrimental cost of further delays, although these may not be long anyway, and can at least be estimated with some clarity, as opposed to the current VTI uncertainty.

The stuff about the Pendot people coming up with a new mix of materials for the job is drivel IMHO. Even if it worked fantastically well, the state of Pennsylvania are not going to allow its use unless a fully insured public company is behind it and providing guarantees.

What I didn’t like was the revelation that Chromium was found to be released in the bauxsol process. The method by which highly expensive (in disposal terms – perhaps £70-100/tonne) special waste is defined, involves a series of different parameters, the results of which are effectively added together to give a classification. Hexavalent Chromium is an immediate special waste qualifier, IIRC, at 25 parts per million on the basis of its carcenogenic qualities.

Not much progress on the water authority front, which again is dissapointing. But this is one where it has to come sometime IMHO, provided of course that the chromium problem is not relevant.
My expectation is that the areas available for use of dried turds at their present heavy metal load must be dissapearing. For example, most of the old colliery heaps have now been reinstated to parkland. The use in areas to be used as forestry land still exists, but as with all environmental matters, the awfull smell currently created when this stuff is spread is becoming less and less acceptable to the general public. As I said long ago on here, once one water company bites the bullet and invests in using bauxsol to lock up the heavy metals and stop the smell, the change from having to pay people to take their dried turds to perhaps having a desireable by product, which may be saleable, should get to each company in due course – so I hope VTI are providing at least one company with a low price at this stage.

Anyway, I’m still in but now pessimistic about my 50p by Feb target.
Regards.