Fresh Loaf

The AJC’s Alison Young had a great piece this weekend about a now-defunct smelter that for decades burned lead at an industrial site just blocks from Morningside. The site where the smelter was located — right where Piedmont Road crosses under I-85 — is now a concrete plant. But the residual pollution caused by the smelter has largely been forgotten by state and federal regulators.

How much lead dust rained down over the years and how far the winds blew is not currently known. But experts say that, despite the passage of decades, the lead would remain relatively near the surface unless the soil has been removed or buried under clean fill dirt. [...]

Tests conducted privately in 2003 show large swaths of the smelter property contained potentially dangerous levels of lead, above 400 parts per million (ppm), according to site plans and a soil removal permit issued by the city of Atlanta to contractors for the property’s owner at that time, Metalico of Georgia Inc. The testing was within the boundaries of the smelter property at 740 Lambert Drive NE.

After reading the story, a source who keeps a close eye on Georgia’s environment told CL this weekend that he’s curious about the smelter’s proximity to Peachtree Creek. If floods seeped up toxins in nearby soil, they could have spread downstream.

Thanks to Young, the Environmental Protection Agency is  investigating the matter. Kudos to the journalist for taking on this story on her own initiative and effecting some government action. Snippets don’t do it justice, so go check it out in full.

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Jim Powell, the Democrat who last year went through hell in his campaign for Georgia Public Service Commission, is on environmental news service Greenwire’s shortlist for the Environmental Protection Agency’s Region 4 administrator job.

Region 4, Atlanta

Territory: Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and six tribes.

Issues: Oversight of coal-fired power plants and coal-ash dumps. Of 44 coal-ash impoundment sites determined by the Obama administration to be high-hazard sites, 20 of them are this region. Wetlands protection is also a top issue, since the region includes Gulf Coast marshes and the Everglades.

Possible picks: Acting Region 4 Administrator Stanley Meiburg; acting Deputy Administrator Beverly Banister; Russell Wright, assistant administrator of Region 4’s Office of Policy and Management; John Hankinson, former Region 4 administrator in the Clinton administration; and Jim Powell, a former senior official with the Energy Department who retired in 2007.

Powell slogged through the state’s legal system in a residency challenge from Georgia Secretary of State Karen Handel, ultimately winning in state Supreme Court. Republican Lauren “Bubba” McDonald beat Powell in a runoff to replace Angela Speir.

(Photo by Joeff Davis)

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EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson made her first official visit to Atlanta today to award a $1 million grant that’ll help clean up toxic sites in the city and along the Beltline.

The grant, which will be used to start a revolving loan fund, will pay for clean-ups of hazardous or polluted properties along seven of the city’s redevelopment corridors: Memorial Drive, Pryor Road, Donald Lee Hollowell Parkway, Simpson Road, Campbellton Road, Jonesboro Road and Stadium Area/Summerhill.

The Beltline, the city’s proposed 22-mile loop of parks, trails and transit, overlaps some of those selected areas.

After the jump, some more info about the grant — plus the requisite photo of public officials holding a giant plastic check!

(more…)

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The Atlanta Business Chronicle reports the Beltline will receive $1 million as part of a $1.8 million grant package from the U.S. government to clean up brownfields.

The grants, which include $400,000 from the federal government’s stimulus program and $1.4 million from the EPA brownfields general program funding, will help revitalize former industrial and commercial sites, EPA said. Brownfields are sites where expansion, redevelopment, or reuse may be complicated by the presence or potential presence of a hazardous substance, pollutant, or contaminant.

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Ajeet Rohatgi, the Georgia Tech professor who founded the Norcross-based solar power technology company Suniva, has been recognized by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and several other organizations for his life’s work in the clean energy field.

After over thirty years of innovative research and discoveries in photovoltaic (PV) technology, Dr. Ajeet Rohatgi, founder and CTO of Suniva, was recently recognized by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the American Solar Energy Society (ASES) for a lifetime’s contribution to making solar technology a realistic, low-cost energy solution. The U.S. EPA will honor Dr. Rohatgi as an Individual Climate Protection Award Winner in a ceremony held today at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C.

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Dr. Rohatgi is a regents professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology, where he founded the school’s PV research program and later established the first University Center of Excellence for Photovoltaic Research and Education (UCEP), a program funded by the U.S. Department of Energy. In 2007, he founded Suniva, a Norcross, GA-based company, to commercialize the world’s most advanced low-cost high-efficiency solar cells.

“This is a critical time in the history of solar research and deployment. Never before in my career have I seen today’s confluence of technological advances, political will and economic conditions necessary to bring solar into the mainstream. I’m honored to receive such recognitions as America and the world embrace photovoltaics as a practical energy solution,” said Rohatgi.

In last week’s Green Guide, we noted Suniva as one of metro Atlanta’s examples of a company that’s making strides to foster a green economy.

(Courtesy Suniva)

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One of the many downsides about the building boom slowdown: Atlanta was one of several cities catching on to the common sense practice of green building.

According to a recent report by the Environmental Protection Agency, the city ranks ninth in the nation when it comes to energy-efficient buildings, behind Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minn., and ahead of Seattle. Los Angeles tops the list.

The federal agency says Atlanta has 97 Energy Star qualified buildings — or 24 million square feet of floorspace. Owners of the buildings save an estimated $16.4 million each year on their energy bills.

To view the top 25 cities with energy-efficient buildings, visit the EPA’s website. You can also view the specific buildings according to city, ZIP code and specifications.

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The Atlanta Regional Commission’s innovative program to help local communities benefit from the spot-planning blunders of their pasts has garnered the organization the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s National Smart Growth Achievement Award.

Since 1999, the Livable Centers Initiative (LCI) program has helped local communities design vibrant “town centers” where residents can live, work and play. Local governments apply to the commission for grants that pay for planning studies. To date, more than $141 million has been allocated.

Sounds mundane, but it’s actually cool. The program has sparked the interest of planning organizations across the nation as regions are finally trying to figure out how decades of sprawl can be retrofit to create town centers, increase areas of activity, and rethink transportation corridors. Think of it as making sense of exurban eyesores and annoyances. Or turning jalopies into Jaguars. Alliteration abounds!

The commission says the initiatives also help kickstart economic development while benefiting public health and the environment. The idea: More walkable communities encourage people to drive less and get around on their feet. This in turn reduces congestion and improves air quality while bringing people closer to their shopping needs and workplaces. And it’s been working:

Since the first LCI grants were awarded in 2000, more than 84,500 residential units, 20 million square feet of commercial space, 12,000 hotel units and 40 million square feet of office space are either planned, under construction or complete in these areas.

There’s a problem, however: This year marks the last the funds are committed to the program.

EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson presented the award to Dan Reuter, the commission’s land use division chief and LCI program manager, at the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C.

For more info on LCI’s, visit the ARC’s website.

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They’re all right here.

The Environmental Protection Agency has unveiled its online database of facilities that release toxic chemicals into the air and water. (Full database is available here.) Search it by zip, city, county or state.

(Thanks to Stacy Shelton, enviro-journalist extraordinaire at the AJC)

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