MASON CITY – The Mason City council tonight heard again from Prestage Foods and an executive told them smell should not be an issue at the new $240 million pork processing plant.
Before the council gave its first approval to zoning changes south of 43rd Street SW and north of the Avenue of the Saints for the proposed Prestage Foods pork processing plant, COO Jere Null explained how the state-of-the-art plant is designed for maximum efficiency and all potential smells are tightly contained.
As Mr. Null explained about respecting environmental concerns, he touched upon the issue of smell, something some citizens worry will impact the community.
“Most of the odors in pork plant come from a rendering building,” Mr. Null said. “A rendering building is where your inedibles and all your parts you don’t eat go” and are then transformed into mostly animal feed. There will be a rendering building on the site, but it uses negative air flow – mostly no air going out. Any air that does escape is vented through a scrubber to remove any odor.
Virtually all of the plant will be enclosed, even from the moment the hogs (10,000 processed per shift) come off the trucks (roughly 185 of them on each truck). Even a wastewater pond will have a rubber cover over it.
“We don’t believe there will be a re-occuring odor of any significance that should reach the town”.
The prospect of more private hog confinements popping up in the area – with the accompanying smells – remains a concern. Prestage will be paying competing prices to buy hogs from private farmers to supply the plant. So, the concern moving forward will be less about smells from the plant itself, but smells created by possible private hog confinements that could come to the area. However, Mr. Null says there should be plenty of hogs generally in the area market already to supply the plant.
THERE ARE NO REGULATIONS ON ODORS IN IOWA!!
Does anyone know if VI COR is in compliance with there odor problem?
I think Vi-COR left town… but there’s a strangely familiar stench they left behind
I think they were bought out. ViCor is gone but the business and smell is still there.
I see we are giving this company 10 years of free taxes but are they going to pay for the expansion of the water supply or did our leaders put that on the back of actual tax payers? If they want to come here they should pay for any and all cost associated with getting them water.
10 years @ 50% tax break … not 100%
officials say the water treatment plant has the capacity to handle the water demands… I believe Prestage won’t get a special deal on their water costs
wow…there is always areason!
DNR & EPA DOESN’T REGULATE ODORS. If the plant does or does not stink, the hundreds of inevitable confinement houses saturating the county WILL!!
This company is coming here because North Carolina put a moratorium on hog confinements. The last straw was when Prestage had a 25 million gallon manure “spill ” on top of many, many other spills & violations.
WE HAVE A WATER QUALITY ISSUES IN IOWA NOW!! WE SHOULD HAVE A MORATORIUM ON CONFINEMENTS TOO!! Not inviting MORE here!! & NO surprise, there’s Terry Branstad happy to see it, surprise (he’s behind it more than the mayor)..Remember terry brought us Jack DeCoster. .how’d that work out?
This entire County will stink of manure. .from the hog houses & the fields they dump it on. & THAT will be FAR worse than anything coming from the plant. NO PROGRESSIVE, GOOD BUSINESS WILL CONSIDER COMING HERE AFTER THIS! SO much for all the effort on the “Blue Zone”.
THEY WILL NOT LOWER YOUR WATER BILL! These places use ALOT of watero..when they max out, taxpayers will pay for expansions. Dest Moines is looking at $200,000,000 improvements to their plant…10,000 hogs a DAY killed…THEY GOTTA GROW EM FOR MONTHS BEFORE YA KILL EM!! THAT’S A LOTTA POOP!! Goin on the fields all around you folks ! Breathe deep, sell out now!
Are you getting your information from the advertisement that Iowa CCI ran?
hope I can get a job there, putting corks in the pig’s butt so it doesn’t smell
VI COR has a big problem with odor I hope this facility doesn’t do this same
I was all for this project before reading the globe today and learning that 20% of the work force will only be making 12.20 an hour and there work week is NOT 40hours but 52 Hour workweek. This plant is taking us back to the 1930’s and with working conditions like this.. Also I am concerned with why Fort Dodge turned this plant down and how this corporation conducted business in North Carolina. Not too happy with how the mayor and city council rushed this into a special meeting and first reading already before the public new some of these facts. Just makes me wonder what else are they trying to hide.
Fort Dodge didn’t turn them down. Prestage didn’t think there was enough available housing in Fort Dodge to relocate there
what about all the people out of work that are living off the working class how many do you think will apply for these job. My guess is slim to none as they like living off the government.
I’m more concerned about the smell which is going to come from the run down hovels occupied by the illegals who will be working at this facility. Not only will they import a gigantic criminal element into the city, they will be also driving them insane! (https://www.texasobserver.org/ptsd-in-the-slaughterhouse/)
I hope the increase in the “tax base” will pay for the increased police and health services which will be necessary to combat the insurgence coming to Mason City.
I believe the EPA and not the DNR has authority over air quality.
Lying Ted Cruz and Hitlery must be on the board of directors. We will see but the smell from the hog trucks will be delightful – Dreamland – it will be a vehicle to your success as the CNW rr said – 2 years later they closed shop and 200 jobs lost. I thought I read this busines was asked to leave North Carolina for enviromental concerns.
So lets have the DNR air quality people build a permanent analysis unit right on the grounds to monitor things, just like they did at the Cement Plants. It would not be an unreasonable request and if Prestage is serious it would be a welcome arbitrator. Lets call it our Law and Odor unit.
I am pretty sure no one has ever died of a bad smell. The water is my concern. How often will that be checked that we are not getting run off into the towns water supply.
Ditto: I share your concerns! Lets watch them like a hawk, the laws are on our side. These battles have been fought and won before by the public. Water Quality is a no brainer in terms of measuring pollutants, etc. and we even have a DNR water quality unit stationed right here in Mason City. Proactive efforts now will pay dividends.
Then why is the ethonol plant allowed to suck down our water supply?
Because they pay for it and we let them have it? You should be more concerned about what is leaking back INTO the water table.
@Reality Check, the DNR was not monitoring odors coming from the cement plants, they monitor particulate levels. The state of Iowa does not regulate odors.
ya, right
…of course that is what the city said when they allowed VI-COR to open up on the west-side of town…even with their new equipment, the plant still stinks