Minnesota Pollution Control Agency fines Sanimax over air permit violations

The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) will fine Sanimax USA $55,000 for several violations of its air permit that could have made it harder to determine whether emissions at its South St. Paul location were above allowable limits.

The MPCA found during a routine inspection in 2023 that Sanimax, an animal byproduct recycler, took a required piece of pollution control equipment out of service. The emissions were then routed to a different type of equipment that wasn’t permitted. The company made the change in 2019 but it wasn’t caught until last year, said Stephen Mikkelson, an MPCA spokesperson.

“These cases do take a lot of time,” Mikkelson said. “It comes down to [the] staff and resources we have.”

The company also failed to conduct air quality modeling, which would project potential emissions, before making the changes, the MPCA said.

The agency also found two other violations: one for failing to conduct daily visible emissions checks and another for failing to report large deviations of pressure drop and water flow rate readings for pollution control equipment, an MPCA news release said.

In addition to the fine, the MPCA required Sanimax to put the required equipment back into operation. The company did that in September, the MPCA said.

In a statement, Sanimax acknowledged that there was an “inadvertent procedural violation that Sanimax immediately remedied.” Becky Scherr, a Sanimax spokesperson, said the company complied with all MPCA requirements, adding that there was other equipment in use to control emissions while the missing equipment was offline.

Sanimax “remains committed to working with the MPCA,” the statement said.

Rep. Rick Hansen, DFL-South St. Paul, put out a news release last week saying he supports the MPCA’s fine, calling it a “step forward” for his constituents who had been dealing with Sanimax’s “unbearable stench” for years.

“When polluters fail to follow the law and meet expectations allowing neighbors to have a decent quality of life, the only path to meaningful change is accountability,” Hansen said in the release.