The state’s largest biodiesel firm has been running a $1 million refinery since at least September without a required state air pollution permit, drawing the ire of those promoting redevelopment in northwest Denver.
State officials say the lack of the permit – the firm’s second such violation – leaves them with no way of knowing whether the refinery is properly handling toxic material.
BioEnergy of Colorado also failed to obtain a required zoning permit from the city of Denver before opening, and city officials deemed the refinery inconsistent with the city’s plans for the surrounding neighborhood.
Yet, the plant continues to operate with the blessing of city officials, who decided they didn’t want to close down a business that was already up and running.
The firm only recently filed an application with the Colorado Department of Health and Public Environment at the urging of a state enforcement officer.
The refinery is located near the National Western Stock Show. It’s an area zoned for heavy industry – although neighborhood groups are trying to change that. It makes biodiesel, an alternative fuel, by mixing vegetable oil, methanol and lye.
“New heavy industry is not just a damper on the future here, it’s a death knell,” said Tom Anthony, president of the Elyria Neighborhood Association, which has filed a lawsuit in Denver District Court suing Denver for giving the plant a conditional use permit until October 2007.
Thomas Foley, BioEnergy’s founding investor, said the plant has received city permission “to go to demonstration level,” but declined to give further details including exactly how that permission was given. He discounted fears of pollution.
“I wouldn’t put myself in harm’s way, and I go there every day,” Foley said. “I’m not going to do anything to put myself or my neighbors in danger.”
The plant also has attracted the opposition of the National Western Stock Show, which hopes to expand in the area, and neighborhood leaders and developers. They view the area where the plant is operating as the last frontier for riverfront development in Denver and a site that could one day be home to a National Western Stock Show museum showcasing Denver’s ties to the West.
The lawsuit contends that because no air quality permit has been granted, residents have no way of judging how the operators will handle toxic material, including methanol, which can cause neurological damage.
“Methanol also is extremely toxic to aquatic life, a grave concern given the proximity of this plant to the (Platte) river, and the fact that no discharge method has been specified,” the lawsuit charges.
Permit probe under way
State officials are investigating how the refinery opened without the quality permit that is required before construction even begins.
The state also is investigating why the company’s refinery at 56th Avenue and Broadway – which opened in 2005 – still does not have the required permit.
“We don’t know how they are disposing of their pollutants, or whether they are being properly disposed of,” said Bob Jorgen-
sen, head of the enforcement section of the air pollution control division of the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.
Foley said his firm is actively working with state and local officials to meet their requirements.
“There are growing pains in every new industry, but our intent is never to skirt any rule or regulation or cut short the need for safety.”
Denver’s Community Planning and Development Department on Aug. 3, 2003, denied a use permit for the biodiesel fuel plant, which could generate up to 3.5 million gallons of biodiesel fuel a year.
In a letter to Foley that originally denied the city permit, Inez Duran, a city zoning specialist, said the refinery was inconsistent with the city’s plans for the South Platte River area, where the city has been building bike trails and new green spaces
But Kent Strapko, a city zoning administrator, reversed that denial after receiving an Oct. 20 memorandum from Steve Gordon, the city’s development program manager. Gordon said the original permit denial did not take into account “that the biodiesel facility was already in operation.” Strapko approved a conditional use permit that will expire on Oct. 20.
Patrick Grant, president of the National Western Stock Show, said the city’s reversal rewards a firm that actually thwarted the city’s own rules and regulations.
“The city has consistently said they want to keep that space green and open and keep it as an open space amenity for Denver and its citizens,” Grant said. “For them to grant an extension to this company seems clearly, clearly contradictory to what I’ve been told.”
He added that he doubts the plant is seriously looking for other locations because Foley recently tried to acquire land from the National Western Stock Show, presumably to more firmly establish the refinery at the location.
Kerry Buckey, the assistant city attorney who handles zoning matters, said city officials think the plant’s failure to apply for the city use permit was an inadvertent mistake.
Buckey said that if the city can’t keep the plant at its current location, it will be difficult to find another city site because the current area “is the most heavily industrialized zoning classification in the city.”
Redevelopment fears
But opponents fear the plant will stall redevelopment. Mickey Zeppelin is building a $20 million office and residential complex at the site of an old parking facility for taxis about a mile away in the Globeville neighborhood. He said the area where the plant is located is poised for growth.
Zeppelin said he has sold about 60 percent of the 44 lofts he is building at his project and has architectural firms, artists and landscape firms already moving into the office space.
“If you look at Denver and around the world, it’s these old industrial areas, whether it’s London, Paris, Spain or San Francisco, that are catering to the creative class,” said Zeppelin, who said he has done about 20 other projects in the LoDo and Golden Triangle areas of the city. “That’s what Denver needs. Edgy workers and jobs and energy.”
Staff writer Christopher N. Osher can be reached at 303-954-1747 or cosher@denverpost.com.
