Green Knight Economic Development Corporation member observes "Synagro Slate Belt Heat Recovery Center doesn't need our waste heat"

The Green Knight Energy Center (GKEC) on Waste Management property in Plainfield Township burns landfill gas captured from the landfill, and sells electricity to the electric company.  To do this, the non-profit Green Knight Economic Development Corporation (GKEDC) had to be created, and ostensibly its mission is to:

"provide economic relief for poor and distressed local citizens"

The GKEDC has strayed from its mission, as we have seen.  Today, the emphasis appears to be on developing projects that some GKEDC board members can benefit from financially, and benefiting the poor and distressed local citizens is playing a distant secondary priority.

Enter the deceptively and poorly titled Slate Belt Heat Recovery Center.  As Synagro and Waste Management's yarn goes, the waste heat from GKEC "which was always planned to be used" will be used to dry shit in the Synagro baked goods plant, and this is great for the environment.  The truth is it was never planned to erect a crap bakery employing 12 people right next to the energy center - the original concept of nearby businesses using the waste heat on three lots supplying good jobs along Route 512 was destined for rapid failure and has been replaced by Waste Management's goal to make its landfill profitable for several decades after it closes, and GKEDC is playing along with the ruse.  Waste energy is not what will be used to fuel the ovens churning out dried shit 24 hours a day, and both Synagro and Waste Management know it.  So does at least one Green Knight member.

Synagro public relations depiction makes processing shit look playful,
like making sand castles at the shore

Synagro paid some firm to make cute graphics with trucks chock full of shit trundling over the countryside, delivering poop to the bakery, and trucks chock full of shit departing for fields lined with fluffy trees.  The truth is, the trucks of shit aren't coming in from local suppliers - rather they are coming off concrete and asphalt highways of hell from Connecticut, New York, and New Jersey, offloading crap here that those states don't want.  The same arteries delivering countless loads of toxic fill from the same states to fill quarries near your home and mine.  We'll take a look at DEP's role in the next installment.  Don't expect much from those useless assholes.  Deep pockets are the ticket to success with the DEP.

Trucks heading out will be delivering their precious cargo to local communities that don't want any part of biosolids application.  Yes, a shitstorm may be headed to your town in Schuylkill County, Carbon County, Monroe County, Lehigh County, Northampton, and points outward.  Ever seen Invasion of the Body Snatchers?

"I feel a powerful force in my ass, and it's the good stuff"

Following the July Plainfield Township Planning Commission review of Synagro's land development plan, Plainfield Township supervisor and GKEDC member Steven Hurni was chatting with another township supervisor and a resident, and this blogger has confirmed that he made the following observations:

• Synagro doesn't need our waste heat at all
• The waste heat is being used as an excuse
• They are spending a heck of a lot of money sending lawyers and consultants to these meetings - they want this very badly

Mr. Hurni has seen the light - will it spread to the rest of the Green Knights?

Mr. Hurni is an intelligent man, and he has been seen regularly at the continuum of Synagro site plan and land development reviews.  He was in attendance at the previous meeting in May, when Synagro project manager Jim Hecht acknowledged that Synagro could operate its plant profitably on natural gas alone - which is available at the site.  This was the meeting at which Lisa Perin, a relative of the creator of the landfill, stated that once Synagro is "in" they will never leave.  That after the landfill closes, "they will find another source of energy."  What Ms. Perin did not realize is that source is there today - natural gas, and it is the only reason Synagro is obsessed with this site.  At this same meeting, Synagro saleswoman and airhead Pam Racey bragged about her 30 years of experience, and proceeded to make multiple misstatements of fact.  One of them was that this is a "green project that is good for the environment".  The only green stands to be in your company's coffers, Pam.  It's shit brown for the Slate Belt and beyond.  The "distressed" citizens Green Knight purports to assist will be even more distressed.  Perhaps Mr. Hurni was previously blinded by the state of euphoric crapulence that seems to have overcome the rest of the members of Green Knights - but his eyes have been opened.

Synagro has stated it will be capable of running on multiple sources of energy - waste energy, landfill gas, and natural gas.  Landfill gas is only about 50% methane - this is another ruse.  Why use crappy sources of energy when you can run more efficiently and profitably off of the good stuff - natural gas?  

Mr. Hurni is on the scent, and it appears he is realizing something smells odd and it isn't shit.  Synagro, Waste Management and Green Knights have all participated in trying to pull the wool over the Slate Belt's eyes.  Synagro has not acted in good faith - it is wasting tens of thousands of taxpayer dollars on an application that it has known for a year requires zoning variances.  Any other company would apply for the variances.  Not Synagro - it is applying for PA DEP permits, paying a stenographer to record all planning commission meetings, running a full court press visiting towns singing the praises of shit to anyone who will listen.  Meanwhile, its engineer is acting like everything is in order, when he knows it isn't.  He admitted on May 31, 2018 that Synagro is developing inside the boundary of the pond on site, yet in August 2018 he filed a report stating that Synagro is maintaining at least a 50' setback from the existing pond in a "compliance"report.  You just could not make this shit up.