Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Frutarom Fined for Odor Nuisances in Haifa Bay

In mid-February 2009, the Haifa Magistrates Court convicted Frutarom Industries Ltd. of causing severe odor nuisances, in violation of the Business Licensing Law and the Abatement of Nuisances Law. Frutarom is a private company situated in Haifa Bay which produces raw materials and flavor and fragrance extracts for the food industry.
Following a plea bargain agreement, Frutarom was fined a million and a half shekels and signed a financial obligation to refrain from a similar offense in the sum of 3 million shekels for three years. In addition, the plea bargain agreement calls on Frutarom to regulate all odor nuisances in its bounds and to plan and implement a program for the reduction of air pollution and odor nuisances, which will include, inter alia, compliance with best available technologies (BAT), implementation of leak detection and repair (LDAR), and monitoring and sampling. The company is expected to invest millions of shekels in the implementation of the program.

The Ministry of Environmental Protection brought an indictment against Frutarom in March 2008 following numerous complaints from residents of the area regarding odor nuisances from the plant. The ministry's investigations, including the dispatch of odor assessment teams to the plant, confirmed the findings. Odor assessment teams defined the odor originating in the plant as considerable and unreasonable, in contravention of section 3 of the Abatement of Nuisances Law, 1968. In addition, the plant did not comply with business licensing conditions which required it to install facilities for the prevention of odor nuisances.

Attorney Zohar Shekalim, the Ministry of Environmental Protection's legal adviser on air quality, expressed the hope that the conviction will bring to an end to the difficult odor nuisances from which residents of the area have suffered for years.

Monday, February 23, 2009

Saturday, February 21, 2009

What an interesting odour

How do you tell someone that they smell?

And I don't mean good, I mean bad. Really, really bad.

I blogged about this at my LJ a few months back... but the problem lingers still.

I like this person. He's, good people and good company. He just SMELLS so bloody bad. There have been times that I've breathed too deeply, and had to bite back my gag reflex.

And he's pretty clean. He seems to wash his hair more often than I do. I'm pretty sure it's an environmental thing. Meaning that his clothes cohabitate in a small apartment with various animals.

Enclosed spaces, and lots of people/creatures tend to do that to you.

I'm torn. do I just leave it alone, or do I bring it up "yo, dude. you stink"

What do you think?

Friday, February 20, 2009

cat urine odours -

If you are a cat owner then you will probably be aware of the problem of how to clean cat urine and removing cat urine odours. It’s not just a question of mopping it up and going over it with some warm soapy water, this may seem to clean it up but it is just a quick fix and you will soon have that cat urine smell coming through again.

The main problem of removing cat urine odours and the cat urine itself (especially on soft furnishings and carpets) is that it is usually not detected right away. It’s often not until you get that familiar cat urine smell coming through that you realise that your cat has not been using its litter box, but has been urinating where it should not.

If you do not find any places where your cat has urinated straight away then this is when the problem of that awful cat urine smell begins. If cat urine is allowed to dry it starts to form into crystals, these crystals are what makes the removal of the cat urine smell so difficult. You may think that you have done a good clean up job, but as soon as these crystals become damp or moist then they start to release that smell again. This is why it is so important to know how to clean cat urine thoroughly.

For one way of how to remove cat urine from small or light patches you can make an effective potion using one part distilled white vinegar mixed with two parts warm water. After blotting up as much of the cat urine as possible with paper towels, scrub the affected area with this mixture. Once it has dried go over it again this time with just warm water and then allow to dry thoroughly.

For cleaning old or heavily stained areas where your cat has urinated more than once, (this is very likely, as cats can smell where they have messed before even when you think you have done a good job cleaning it up, and they will urinate there again and again.) I would recommend renting a wet-vac machine from a tool hire store. These machines work like a vacuum cleaner, they force clean water through the carpet and then suck up the dirty stained water back into the machine.

When it comes to how to clean cat urine from upholstery you will have to be a bit more gentle. Dab the affected area with paper towels or a soft cloth to remove as much of the urine as possible. Using another soft cloth go over the area with your vinegar water mix gently rubbing in a circular motion working from the outside inwards. Again rinse with plain warm water and then dry gently with a hand held hairdryer.

Once any soiled area has been thoroughly cleaned and dried, I would recommend using a good quality pet odour neutralizer which you can buy from your local pet store. Follow the instructions carefully to avoid any damage to your carpets or furniture.

These are just a few easy steps to take on how to remove cat urine, and removing cat urine odours. A lot of these accidents could be avoided by potty training your cat, this may sound an obvious answer but you will be surprised just how effective and easy cat potty training can be. Just following a few simple training techniques could save you a fortune on cleaning materials, and of course you will no longer have to put up with that lovely cat urine smell.

Thursday, February 19, 2009

Upgrade Odour Control

Dominic Flanagan, project manager for Scottish Water Solutions, the company carrying out the work, said: "The existing odour control system is water-based ...

more.............

Easy DYI install of of an affordable odour control application

As used by BHP

Click

http://anotec.com.au/anojetmanual.html

UTS CRICOS Provider Code: 00099F
DISCLAIMER: This email message and any accompanying attachments may contain confidential information. If you are not the intended recipient, do not read, use, disseminate, distribute or copy this message or attachments. If you have received this message in error, please notify the sender immediately and delete this message. Any views expressed in this message are those of the individual sender, except where the sender expressly, and with authority, states them to be the views of the University of Technology Sydney. Before opening any attachments, please check them for viruses and defects.

Think. Green. Do.

Please consider the environment before printing this email.

EPCOR looking for some "Nosy" Edmontonians

We provide them with a rating guide of how to rate the odour." ANOTEC has been doing this for 18 years, and Craig says a customer survey shows about a 93 per ...

Water to be pumped into smelly Loveday Basin

We're not wasting the water like that. We're just using it to cap the odour and in doing that it's actually cleansing the affected muds at the same time."

affordable odour control anotec

McDonald's exhaust making us sick, underground parkade workers say

"The odour from these vents … was obnoxious," the report states. "In addition, grease smoke and conceivable other compounds formed from the cooking process ...
more

Anotec can solve this odour issue

"Indoor" Air Pollution? (The Westerly Sun)

Chiropractor Dr. Chris Kerszko of Westerly reveals some indoor air pollutants that may be getting you down this winter. [News Source]

Supreme Court: odour unit supplier engaged in misleading conduct

A $675,000 odour control unit installed at a Peerless Holdings Pty Ltd rendering plant was intended to showcase the technology but instead led to a Vic Supreme Court finding the supplier should pay Peerless at least $1,536,480 in damages after misleading and deceptive conduct. Justice Hartley Hansen this month found equipment supplier Environmental Systems Pty Ltd had breached the terms of its contract with Peerless Holdings Pty Ltd and engaged in misleading and deceptive conduct. The judge held Peerless was entitled to additional damages for “the lost benefit” it could have derived from buying an alternative type of afterburner, with a hearing slated for June 23 on this. Peerless had opted to replace the existing afterburner at its large Laverton North rendering plant in part because the old afterburner was struggling to handle increased capacity. The company opted for the regenerative thermal oxidiser (RTO) proposed by Environmental Systems to control odours because it expected the RTO would have a larger capacity, lower NOx emissions and far lower energy costs.

Commissioning of the RTO began in Oct 1998 but by June 2001 Peerless had abandoned efforts to get it working, at one point bemoaning that the EPA “are living here” because of odour complaints. It launched legal action against Environmental Systems later the same year and now controls odour using a biofilter and the old afterburner. Both Peerless and Environmental Systems agreed the RTO had failed because fats stuck to part of the unit, bypassed the combustion chamber and were then stripped off by warm exhaust gases and discharged to the atmosphere. However, Environmental Systems submitted Peerless had breached its responsibility to ensure the airstream entering the RTO was essentially free of fats. It also argued Peerless had not adequately advised it of the presence of fats in the airstream entering the RTO. But Justice Hansen was not convinced. “In my view, it is clear that [Environmental Systems] representations as to the suitability of the RTO for the plaintiff’s operation and as to its capacity to destroy odour amounted to misleading and deceptive conduct,” he ruled.

The judge did not accept an Environmental Systems’ claim that Peerless had refused its request for a thorough analysis of the airstream. “It was always open to the defendant to require further information,” the judge said. Environmental Systems “knew all that it needed to know to determine whether to offer an RTO and, if so, on what terms or whether, before making an offer, it should require further information to better assess the suitability of the application,” he said. “It did not have to offer an RTO but I find it did so partly under a desire to achieve the first application of the RTO in Australia.” Environmental Systems is a subsidiary of The Environmental Group Ltd, which declined to comment.

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

envrionmental video blog

Hello

this place is where you can find information on environmental industrial problems

click here

http://www.environmental.pseudotube.com/

Sunday, February 15, 2009

What does your marketing program smell like?

What does your marketing program smell like?

If you have difficulty answering that question, you need to get up to speed on the powerful impact that’s possible by activating your customers’ olfactory nerves. (Web-only marketers won’t have to worry about this yet, but retail marketers and even those who use print media, direct mail, and the like can read on.) We started thinking about this topic while perusing Emotional Branding by Marc Gobe. This book was published in 2001 - before neuromarketing had become a buzzword - but has plenty of insight into brand strategies that tap into the subconscious. When it comes to smells, Gobe thinks every brand should have one. He points out the success of firms who incorporate scent into their branding approach to build a deeper emotional bond with the consumer. Thomas Pink, a London-based shirt seller, scents its stores with “line-dried linen.” Even individual spaces, like sections of a department store or individual displays, may get a scent boost.

Gerald Zaltman, in How Customers Think, notes that, “Olfactory and other sensory cues are hardwired into the brain’s limbic system, the seat of emotion, and stimulate vivid recollections.” Once a scent is embedded in an individual’s brain, even visual cues can cause it to be resurrected and even “experienced,” according to Zaltman: “A TV commercial showing a person savoring the aroma of freshly brewed coffee can trigger these same olfactory sensations in viewers.” Zaltman sees scents as serving in several ways. The can be “memory markers” that help a person recall familiar brands more than unfamiliar ones. They can also change the way we process information; a lemon aroma, for example, can make us more alert. Zaltman speculates that scents of that type could be helpful when introducing a new product.

The Proust Effect. The relationship between sensory stimulation and memory was immortalized by the French novelist Marcel Proust, who described a memoir-long flood of memories being triggered by the sensation of a madeleine dunked in tea. At another point, a bathroom smell brings back another set of recollections. Martin Lindstrom, author of Brand Sense, is an enthusiastic advocate of incorporating the sense of smell into as many aspects of a firm’s marketing as possible. He notes that a study showed that 80% of men and 90% of women reported having vivid, emotion-triggering memories evoked by odor.

In our book review, we described Rolls Royce’s attempt to duplicate the unique aroma of a 1965 Silver Cloud and how they install this smell on the undersides of the car’s seats. Lindstrom ranked firms for excellence in sensory branding, and the top-ranked firm was Singapore Airlines. This relatively small airline has consistently led customer preference surveys, and Lindstrom thinks that is due in part to their consistent sensory branding efforts. They actually had a custom fragrance developed and use it in areas of customer contact. When customers encounter the slightly exotic fragrance, it should evoke memories of past (good) experiences involving the airline.

Scents can affect perception in other ways, too. Lindstrom describes an experiment in which two pairs of identical Nike shoes were evaluated by consumers, one in a room with a floral scent and one with no scent. Fully 84% of the subjects evaluated the sneakers in the scented room as superior.

Bad Smells. All sensory experiences aren’t positive. Lindstrom recounts the results of a sensory survey of U.S. McDonalds customers that found that a third of them thought that the restaurants smelled like stale oil. 42% of British McDonalds customers thought the same, and both groups indicated that this smell diminished their enjoyment of the food. The survey found that other customers liked the smell, and that it made their mouths water. Nevertheless, in the smell category, Burger King consistently outperformed McDonalds. It’s interesting that while usually bad smells are situational and fleeting - scorched coffee, burned food, a rest room that needs attention - in the case of McDonalds, the consistency of the stale oil smell had reached the point of becoming a brand association.

Olfactory Marketing

There are several ways marketers can use the sense of smell to reach customers. The first, and perhaps most significant, is branding. The keys to olfactory branding are consistency and uniqueness. No doubt one reason for Singapore Airline’s sensory branding success is that they developed a unique scent, and then used it consistently for many years. Regular flyers learned what the airline smelled like; more importantly, they unconsciously associated this scent with the rest of the Singapore Airlines experience - lovely attendants, impeccable service, and so on. A brand’s scent need not come out of a spray can - Barnes & Noble has a fairly consistent scent that included crisp new books and Starbucks coffee brewing.

Olfactory product marketing is a bit more straightforward but is still important. In today’s supermarkets, is there any doubt that more rotisserie chickens are sold because of the enticing aroma of roasting chicken that wafts around that area of the store? In that same environment, though, there may be many other aroma marketing techniques in use, either intentionally or not. The coffee section may have a grinder that lets the coffee bean aroma out as it crushes the beans. The cheese department may place samples out where the can tempt both the palate and the nose. Non-food items can benefit from aromas, too - think linen scents in a bedding store, leather scents in clothing and furniture environments, etc.

In any retail setting, controlling the olfactory environment is important. People will associate smells with the store and products. Do you want to be known for stale oil or something else unpleasant? Don’t forget the Nike shoe study in which a pleasant smell entirely unrelated to the product (floral scents and running shoes seem quite disconnected) dramatically increased consumer preference.

Olfactory Dangers. In scents, a little goes a long way. We’ve probably all had the experience of sitting near an olfactorily-challenged septuagenarian who applied a more shots of perfume than were necessary, and it’s not a pleasant experience. Similarly, a fresh-smelling hotel room is a plus; one that seems to have been doused with gallons of air freshener is not only unpleasant, but it begs the question, “What are they covering up?” Some individuals are quite sensitive to fragrances, and may find strong scents very disturbing. In Got Smell? Ads Target Customer Noses, we reported on the abortive effort to sell milk by placing cookie-scented ads in bus shelters. The ads lasted only a day before city authorities forced their removal. The official reason was the objection of the “environmental illness community.”

Scents should be subtle and appropriate to their environment. The smell of fresh-baked chocolate chip cookies would be wonderful in a bakery or coffee shop; in an outdoor bus shelter, the same aroma is rather suspect. Consumers’ brains will process that same information differently. In the bakery, that smell is processed as “real,” while in the bus shelter it’s pegged as “artificial.” Another location-dependent example would be “musty books” - the smell of old paper, dust, and foxed pages would be quite awful for Barnes & Noble or Borders, but might be just the thing to get book collectors and academics salivating at an antiquarian book store.

Summary

Think smell. Check out your products and selling environments, both by direct observation and customer queries. Chances are you have one or more “default” smells, even if you are doing nothing - determine if your default smell is something to build on or something to eliminate. Consider a branding strategy that includes aroma - that may not be appropriate for every situation, but think outside the box. Follow through into both the product and customer contact environment - what do these smell like now, and can they be improved in appeal and/or consistency? Finally, never overdo any kind of scent-based marketing - the customer backlash will outweigh any benefits.

Khar taps spew dirty water

SUKHADA TATKE, TNN

MUMBAI: When 33-year-old Khar resident Tarana Masand noticed a strange smell in the water she was drinking, she thought it was a temporary problem. It was only when the odour started getting stronger and the water started tasting unpleasant over several days that she realised something was seriously wrong. Masand, a resident of Alka building on 15th Road, Khar (W), has been purchasing cans of mineral water for the past two days.

But she is not the only one in the locality faced with this problem of turbid water. Over 50 buildings spread across 12th, 15th, 16th and 17th Roads in Khar have been facing this problem on and off since the beginning of this year. Residents allege that, despite several complaints to the ward office, the civic body has not acted promptly.

"The water is unfit for human consumption. It emits a very strong odour and tastes dirty. Even boiling the water does not help,'' said Masand. "At first, we thought it would not last long and we started buying mineral water. But as the days went by, the water started getting worse. It is impossible to even brush our teeth with it. I am worried about the health of my two little children,'' said Masand.

Just as the residents were trying to get over the taste and smell, the water has suddenly become oily and greasy. "The water looks pretty clear and transparent. It is not brownish. But it has a metallic sort of a taste as if there is acid in it,'' said paediatrician Alka Upadhyaya who lives in the same building. "We know our building tanks are clean and they are well maintained. The problem has continued for too long and it is not possible to keep buying mineral water every day,'' she added.

Grocery stores in the neighbourhood confirmed that almost all houses were buying mineral water. "I have had to increase my stock of Bisleri and Aquafina as the demand for these bottles and cans has suddenly increased 10 times,'' said a shopkeeper.

Local councillor Ashish Shelar said he had been raising the issue in the ward office and the civic general body meeting but officials kept giving excuses. "There is some sort of leakage in water pipelines but the water department is unable to detect it. Each time I ask them about the repairs, they tell me they are trying to find the leaks. Over 500 residents are suffering,'' he added.

An official from the water department of the H-West ward office said he had received complaints and admitted there was a delay in addressing them. "We are seeing what the problem is. We are detecting the leaks. Meanwhile, we are sending water tankers,'' he said.

Can love change the way you smell

Can your unique 'smell' — what your body smells like — change naturally? And when would this happen? I thought maybe when you were a baby and maybe puberty, but would it change if you were in love too?
—Lara

If love really does change everything including body odour, women are more likely to sniff it out than men.

Our personal odour is as unique as our DNA — in fact, our 'odour print' is determined partly by a group of genes on the sixth chromosome related to immune function which are known as the major histocompatibility complex.

But while our genetically-founded odour print remains unchanged through our lifetime, our scent has other layers of complexity and people emit different odours as they age.

Anyone who has spent time around active teenage boys will agree that hormonal changes play a big part in the way we smell.

"Diet also influences the way we smell," says Dr Charles Wysocki, a behavioural neuroscientist at Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia, USA.

Vegetarians smell different to meat-eaters and eating dairy products also affects your body's odour.

Emotional experiences also influence our body odours short-term, with some research showing that subjects who have watched movie clips that made them fearful or anxious have had changes in their body odour that was recognised by other people.

"What we don't know, is whether a person will become anxious or fearful if they smell an individual who is anxious or fearful," Wysocki says.

"Love is another emotional experience. When a person is in love, does the body odour change? That hasn't been tested, but given what is known about changes in body odour, if an individual encounters their loved one, I suspect that their body odour might change," he continues.

But beware, women looking for the man of their dreams should lay off the perfume because it hides their true scent from their ideal genetic partner, according to recent research by Wysocki and colleagues.

However, women are still likely to recognise a potential mate's natural scent through any aftershave or other fragrance that a man might slap on before a hot date.

"We found that using different fragrance materials to reduce the impact of a man's body odour will work on the nose of other men — but won't work on the nose of women," says Wysocki.

"A woman's nose seems to be much more tuned into ... body odours. We can find fragrances that reduce the impact of body odour from women on men," he says.

"We think that, from an evolutionary perspective, that's because women need to gain as much information as possible about potential mates because they have a very limited number of times that they can have successful pregnancies."

Subjects asked to select a prospective date from the smell of a T-shirt they had worn usually preferred the scent of a person whose immune system was genetically quite different to their own, Wysocki says, giving potential offspring optimal protection.

"Whether this goes part way to explaining the chemistry behind physical attraction, we don't know, but it may be going on at the subconscious level."

Dr Charles Wysocki was interviewed by Fran Molloy.

Odour Courses concern

Odour causes concern

ROSANNA DALIBOR

CONCERN and annoyance about an unpleasant odour believed to be emanating from the Busselton Wastewater Treatment Plant off Queen Elizabeth Avenue has prompted a Busselton resident to seek action to remedy the problem.

Ian Robinson, who lives on Rendezvous Road, about 300-400m from the plant, told the Mail he and his neighbours had experienced a “foul smell” on and off on a daily basis since before Christmas and wanted the problem to be addressed.

He believed the problem was an “overloaded” sewage volume, caused by the influx of people and housing growth in the last few years, as well as holiday visitors, in combination with the summer heat.

He said the smell usually occurred in the early morning, around noon, in the evening when he was having dinner, and at night. It wasn’t nice to spend time either inside or outside on his property, where he’s lived for 16 years.

In recent weeks Mr Robertson has been in contact with Vasse MLA Troy Buswell’s office, the shire council and the Water Corporation about the issue, and a local Water Corporation representative visited Mr Robertson on January 26 to discuss his complaint.

In 2005, Mr Robertson organised a petition signed by 44 residents of not only Rendezvous Road, but nearby residential areas, and approached the council, Mr Buswell and the Water Corporation about “concerns and annoyance over the irritating and continual noise and smell created by the sewage plant”.

The Water Corporation obliged and took measures to reduce the odour by installing a network of odour suppressant sprayers.

Mr Robertson would like to see an odour investigation carried out and the alleged problem fixed.

The Water Corporation’s regional business manager Scott Moorhead said there had only been one complaint received this year, that from Mr Robertson.

He said the plant had sufficient capacity to cater for current wastewater flows and any odour impacts varied according to weather patterns and often increased during spells of hotter weather. Nevertheless, planning was advancing for the next upgrade required to cater for future growth.

Odour lingers in medieval bottle of scent

Odour lingers in medieval bottle of scent

When the tiny stopper is delicately eased free, a mere wisp of scent imprisoned for over 650 years is released.

In a unique experiment, scientists at the L’Oreal perfume institute in Paris tried to analyse the ingredients of a perfume whose precious container survived the Black Death, which annihilated a third of the population of Europe.

The young Jewish woman who wore the pretty silver bottle dangling on a chain at her waist was probably murdered or driven out of Erfurt, the ancient capital of Thuringia, east of Frankfurt, a victim of savage pogroms as communities sought somebody to blame for the unstoppable march of the plague.

There was too little left to analyse the components of the perfume, though the scientists proved the wadding packed into the bottle was cotton, not wool or flax. — © Guardian Newspapers Limited, 2009

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Men Smell of Cheese and Women of Onions

Swiss Study Picks Out Gender Differences in Body Odor

By ANDY COGHLAN

Little girls may be made of sugar and spice and all things nice, but their armpits smell of onions. And while free of slug or snail odours, men's armpits pack a powerful cheesy whiff.

Photo: Men smell of cheese and women of onions

A team of researchers found marked differences in the sweat from men and women. "Men smell of...

(ABC News Photo Illustration)

That's the conclusion of research in Switzerland that involved taking armpit sweat samples from 24 men and 25 women after they had spent time in a sauna or ridden an exercise bike for 15 minutes.

The researchers found marked differences in the sweat from men and women. "Men smell of cheese, and women of grapefruit or onion," says Christian Starkenmann of Firmenich, a company in Geneva that researches flavours and perfumes for food and cosmetics companies.

The team found that the women's armpit sweat contained relatively high levels of an odourless sulphur-containing compound -- 5 milligrams per millilitre of sweat versus 0.5 milligrams in men. When the researchers mixed this compound in the lab with bacteria commonly found in the armpit, the bugs turned it into a thiol - a previously discovered odour from armpits that is akin to onion.

"The more sulphur precursor we added, the more intense was the malodour," says Starkenmann, whose team's results appear in Chemical Senses. Bacterial enzymes turn the otherwise odourless precursor into the malodour.

The men, meanwhile, had relatively high levels of an odourless fatty acid which turned into a cheesy odour when exposed to the same types of bacteria.

The balance of oniony to cheesy precursors in women's sweat made it smell worse than men's as rated by independent smell assessors.

Next, the team hope to develop new ingredients for deodorants that fight the smells. "We could make inhibitors that neutralise the precursors, or block the bacterial enzymes that do the conversion," says Starkenmann.

Some researchers are sceptical that gender is the main deciding factor, arguing that the patterns found in Swiss volunteers might not apply to other populations with different diets and genetic backgrounds. "Other factors include what you eat, what you wash with, what you wear and what genes you inherit," says Tim Jacob of Cardiff University in the UK.

news story at abcnews.go.com

Saturday, February 07, 2009

NY state says sewage plant is a rotten neighbor

By MARCUS FRANKLIN Associated Press Writer The Associated Press

NEW YORK - A sewage processing plant that nearby residents say produces a stench variously described as raw sewage, feces, manure and burning flesh was sued Thursday by the state attorney general.The odors emanating from the privately run New York Organic Fertilizer Co. in the Bronx violate state air pollution laws, according to the lawsuit filed by Attorney General Andrew Cuomo in state Supreme Court. The lawsuit seeks to force the company to stop the smell."The stench has plagued the community, making simple activities like opening windows, walking to school or enjoying a local park not only unpleasant but an actual health risk," Cuomo said in a statement. "NYOFCo's owners have blithely allowed the facility to continue to spew noxious odors into the community."The plant and its parent company, Houston-based Synagro Technologies Inc., on Thursday denied violating pollution laws, describing the plant as a "good neighbor.""The facility has taken, and will continue to take, proactive measures to ensure that it is in compliance with its permits and applicable law and is a good neighbor in the community," they said in a statement released through lawyer Christopher J. McKenzie.For years Hunts Point residents have blamed the odors for their headaches, vomiting, nausea, and asthma attacks."By treating South Bronx as its own private dumping ground," resident Cerita Parker said, "NYOFCo has denied our community the basic satisfaction of enjoying a walk in the park, a Sunday backyard barbecue or even a summer's breeze from an open window."Parker, a member of Mothers on the Move, which filed a nuisance lawsuit in 2008 with the help of the Natural Resources Defense Council, hoped the odor would be eliminated with the "weight of (Cuomo's) office behind our cause."The sewage processor, which opened in 1991, accepts sludge from the city's sewage treatment plants and turns it into fertilizer pellets, which are sold to out-of-state agricultural operations.On Tuesday, state Department of Environmental Conservation officials announced they were trying to tighten controls at the Bronx plant by amending its air pollution permit, said Suzanne Mattei, a DEC regional director.The DEC's proposals include testing additional chemicals coming from the plant's stack and putting tougher standards in place for the plant's pollution control equipment.The public has a month to comment on the proposals.

http://anotec.com.au

Residents' complaints net convictions, $80,000 fines

Complaints from Musselman's Lake residents three years ago have resulted in convictions and more than $80,000 in fines for two companies.John Bolender and his company, Oakridge-Terra Inc., pleaded guilty to charges of operating a waste disposal site without a certificate of approval and must pay more than $50,000 in fines. Mr. Bolender and his company also pleaded guilty to charges of discharging/causing/permitting the discharge of a contaminant, namely an odour, into the environment that causes or was likely to cause an adverse effect."I guess it's illegal," Mr. Bolender said. "I pled guilty to these charges because I didn't have the money to fight it."The co-accused, Turtle Island Waste and Recycling Inc., was also charged with, and pleaded guilty to, the same offences, as well as failing to comply with the company's own certificate of approval. Turtle Island was slapped with more than $30,000 in fines.The pleas were accepted into Newmarket provincial court on Jan. 21.Although Turtle Island pleaded guilty, the company has yet to decide if it will pay the fine or appeal the decision.The fines and charges stem from complaints made by Musselman's Lake residents in 2006. That summer, area residents had the sweet summer smell of roses and freshly cut grass replaced by the strong putrid odour of rotting food from a property on Hwy. 48 just north of Vandorf Road. It was illegally accepting food waste, court was told.The smell was so bad, residents from as far as 1.5 km away were unable to sit outside in their yards, according to court documents.Residents believed they knew the source of the odour but called in Whitchurch-Stouffville Councillor Phil Bannon, who represents that area, and bylaw officer Linda Mainprize to investigate.What the pair uncovered was an illegal dumpsite located at 14547 Hwy. 48, the Bolender and Oakridge-Terra property.Because the situation was beyond the scope of the municipality, the Ministry of the Environment, along with the Lake Simcoe Region Conservation Authority were called in to investigate.What they discovered was that between Jan., 30 and Aug., 3, 2006, Mr. Bolender and his company allowed 190 truck loads of food waste, fill and grey waste from Turtle Island to be deposited onto the property. Each truckload contained two to three tons of waste."We were under the impression it was being brought to a licensed facility," Turtle Island co-founder Louis Anagnostakos said this week. "(Our staff) assumed because our competition was going there, it was OK."Turtle Island was contacted by Mr. Bolender, who offered to take the company's food waste onto his property, according to Mr. Anagnostakos, who also noted first contact by a waste facility is standard protocol when seeking out dump sites."Our staff didn't do due diligence in requesting to see documents the owner was a licensed operator," Mr. Anagnostakos said. "Procedures have been put in place to minimize any such future occurrence."Oakridge-Terra was also convicted for an offence under the Conservation Authorities Act because some of the illegal dumping was into the wetland. As a result of the conviction, Mr. Bolender has been ordered to conduct remediation work on the site."It was never our intention to harm the environment at all, we just wanted to substitute our meal ticket," Mr. Bolender said, also admitting he did not know enough about composting, which was what he was trying to do, to reduce the smell and environmental effects.In October 2005, Mr. Bolender did apply for a permit to allow waste disposal for composting. "It turned out the application was so incomplete we returned it and it was withdrawn," said Gary Miller an investigator with the Ministry of Environment.According to Mr. Miller, Mr. Bolender had until June 2006 to re-submit the application. One was never received by the ministry.

http://anotec.com.au

Friday, February 06, 2009

Mayor: New York's maple syrup mystery smell solved

Mayor: New York's maple syrup mystery smell solvedT

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A mysterious, maple syrup-like odour that has periodically wafted over New York City since October 2005 has been linked to New Jersey fragrance processing plants, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said on Thursday.

Fragrance and food additive factories in nearby New Jersey where fenugreek seeds are processed are the "probable source" of the odour, Bloomberg told a news conference at City Hall.

The odour has attracted media attention and hundreds of complaints from city residents.

"Given the evidence, I think it's safe to say that the 'Great Maple Syrup Mystery' has finally been solved," Bloomberg said.

The city had assured residents that the odour was not harmful, but it was not able to explain its source until now.

The mystery was solved after city agencies matched complaints by their geographic location against information about winds and atmospheric conditions.

"The health department confirmed that the odour does not pose a health risk, but I am pleased to know that our ... smelling sleuths got to the bottom of this mystery," Bloomberg said.

(Reporting by Edith Honan; Editing by Eric Beech)

Massive lawsuit over for company's operations which created foul odours that were an ongoing nuisance

Massive lawsuit over for CVRD

BY SARAH SIMPSON, THE CITIZEN

A Supreme Court judge has dismissed a $100 million lawsuit against the Cowichan Valley Regional District.

In 2002, Westcoast Landfill Diversion Corporation had filed suit against the District alleging it and a trio of its directors illegally interfered with business at their Herhof in-vessel composting facility in the region's South End.

It was clear to neighbours that the company's operations created foul odours that were an ongoing nuisance and that Westcoast's actions interfered with neighbours' ability to enjoy their own properties.

More than 194 complaints from residents and tourists were received by the CVRD and by the Ministry of Environment, where they were met with an open ear and a shared concern.

For years the CVRD has maintained that neighbours had every right to be concerned about the safety of their water supply and about environmental contamination -- something which the CVRD's staff took steps to rectify.

But Westcoast's statement of claim alleged the CVRD tried to destroy their business through media attacks, abuse of public office as well as the failure to negotiate an appropriate waste supply contract.

Westcoast cited negligent misrepresentation, breach of contract, unlawful interference with economic relations, and general negligence. The company wanted punitive damages because it alleges that the CVRD acted in bad faith.

The company was after a return of its $5 million initial investment, the additional $1.5 million estimated to dismantle the Fisher Road plant, and $10,870,000 for the loss of future revenue.

They won't be seeing any of that money.

On Jan. 30, after nearly six years in court, the Honourable Mr. Justice Shabbits of the Supreme Court of British Columbia dismissed the case, clearing the CVRD of any wrong doing, saying in his written judgment that the company's claims of negligence were without merit.

In his judgment Justice Shabbits said that the "CVRD had legitimate community and environmental concerns that were the result of Westcoast's actions," and "CVRD's actions were not high-handed nor vindictive nor oppressive," as claimed by Westcoast.

Justice Shabbits concluded the actions of the CVRD were appropriate and that although it had welcomed Westcoast to its area, it did so thinking the facility would be of benefit to its residents. He went on to write that the steps the CVRD and its staff took to deal with pollution and odour concerns were measured and appropriate.

The final decision has been a long time coming for the CVRD.

"The CVRD is exceptionally pleased with the decision," said CVRD Chair Gerry Giles in a release. "This is a significant decision in favour of the CVRD and all of the residents who live within our community... This is a monumental day for the region, its staff and the directors involved in the matter."

Giles said she was pleased with Shabbits's mention of the hard work CVRD staff had undertaken in their attempts to serve their community.

"In his judgment, Justice Shabbits is highly complementary of the measured steps taken by the staff of the CVRD to represent the interests of the community and I would like to extend my appreciation to them," she said.

The entire text of Justice Shabbits's decision can be found online at:

http://www.courts.gov.bc.ca/jdb-txt/SC/09/00/2009BCSC0053.htm

Wednesday, February 04, 2009

How humans discern between distinct smells

| By Sindh Today |

(ANI): Using neural mapping, Harvard scientists have taken a step towards uncovering the secret behind how people can differentiate between tens of thousands of distinct smells. Although there are striking aromatic differences between coffee, peppermint, and pine, a new mapping of the nose's neural circuitry has revealed a haphazard patchwork of the receptors for such disparate scents. It was also revealed that the seemingly random arrangement is faithfully preserved across individuals and even species, with the cells that process the same scent located in precisely the same location on the olfactory bulb, the brain's first processing station for odours. Researchers suspect that the deliberate randomness in rodents' odour maps is likely also found in humans, which have only one-third as many receptors but are capable, in some extreme cases, of discerning tens of thousands of distinct smells. And it was Harvard University neuroscientists who described the crazy-quilt map of odour-processing neurons on the front lines of the olfactory system. 'It had been thought that the layout of the olfactory bulb was variable from individual to individual, but followed a chemotopic order where cells handling similar odor responses are near each other. Here we show that the layout is actually very precise — the same from animal to animal — but doesn't appear to follow any chemotopic order whatsoever,' Nature quoted Markus Meister, the Jeff C. Tarr Professor of Molecular and Cellular Biology in Harvard's Faculty of Arts and Sciences, as saying. For the study, Meister and colleague Venkatesh N. Murthy, worked with mice and rats and recorded neural responses to several hundred distinct odours, including anise, beer, cloves, coffee, ginger, lemon, orange, peppermint, pine, rose, and even fox pheromones. The neuroscientists found that across individuals and even across the two species, bundles of neurons from a given type of odour receptor — known as glomeruli — were found in almost exactly the same spot on the olfactory bulb, a sensory structure measuring some four to five millimeters across and located at the very front of the brain. 'Glomeruli from different receptors line the surface of the olfactory bulb like an array of close-packed marbles. Across individuals the location of a given glomerulus varies by only one array position. Compared to the size of the map, this represents a remarkable developmental precision of one part in 1,000,' said Murthy. Later, the researchers analysed whether nearby glomeruli detect similar odours, such as those with similar chemical structures. In earlier studies, neuroscientists have hypothesized axes of similarities along which odours might be classified. 'One might expect that nearby glomeruli should have similar odour sensitivities, but we were surprised to find this was not the case. The odor response spectra of two neighboring glomeruli were as dissimilar as those of distant glomeruli,' said Meister. This seemingly haphazard layout of sensory properties stands in marked contrast to other brain maps, such as those governing vision, touch, and hearing. Fro the above three cases, our brains represent the outside world using ordered maps — such as when neighbouring points in visual space activate neighbouring points on the retina. 'That sort of arrangement makes sense, since most brain computation is local, relying on short connections between nearby cells. This is necessary because the connections between neurons occupy most of the volume available to the brain, and long-distance connections require more of this volume,' said Murthy.

The study was published in the recent issue of the journal Nature Neuroscience. (ANI).

http://anotec.com.au