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State Environmental Agency Difficulties


CBDCo

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Hello,

We are far a long in the planning process for our distillery which will be located in South Texas.  I started my DSP application, still has been ordered, and boiler was just about to be ordered.  Here is a little background about our project.  We are located in Beeville TX, a small town located in the coastal bend of Texas.  We purchased a 3.5 acre tract of land outside the city limits thinking that we would be able to escape the bureaucracy of the city building inspector etc.  The distillery site is located outside of city services, so we knew that we were going to have to drill a well and to install a septic system.  A couple of weeks ago, our civil engineer tells us that if we plan to use a well, it would have to be a public water utility.  This means we would have to have all the equipment that a municipality would have including a water operator.  We were aware that we would have to have the water tested and use RO for our proofing water.  The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) stipulates that if we plan on serving more than 25 people every sixty days, we would have become a public water utility and are not able to allow our waste water to drain into our septic system.  They stipulate that we either have to store it in an underground tank and have it hauled away as if it were a hazardous chemical.  Those of us in the industry know that the chemicals are all food grade and that they are heavily diluted with water and pose no problem to the environment.  My question is this, has anyone run into this type of issue with the TCEQ or state equivalent?  If so, how were you able to get this issue solved?  I have had to hire a lawyer who understands all the state regulations and if we have to treat the water as a hazardous chemical, this could be a deal-breaker for us and we would then be forced to sell the property and move to the city.   Any advice or help would be much appreciated. 

 

Thanks

Travis 

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  • 3 months later...

I never saw this post originally so sorry for late reply. I briefly had to deal with this same issue, and argued (successfully) to the point that that law (at least here) referred to, if a well served over 25 residences, not 25 people who may be getting a drink from it in a day, that then it was a municiple well.  Pm if you'd like any more conversation on this. Good luck. 

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I had found a work around for the water issue, then we ran into waste water issues.  We ended up purchasing another property within the city with municipal services and have been able to get started with demolition/ construction.  Thanks for following up! 

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This was an issue that may be specific to Texas.  The TCEQ (Texas Commission on Environmental Quality) had certain regulations with what we could do with our cleaning water.  Even though the chemicals are all food grade, pose no threat to the environment, and are heavily diluted with water and posed no threat at all.  The TCEQ in its infinite wisdom wanted us to build our million dollar facility and store our water until we could send them a sample, and then and only then they would tell us what we could do with it.  We were trying to use a retention pond and reuse the water for irrigation or dust control.  The threat was there that we would have to have it hauled off and disposed of like hazardous chemicals if the chemical composition contained certain things ( I am not sure what it was, they did not say).  Simply put, we did not want to invest in the project without knowing what exactly we were going to have to do with the waste water, so we decided to purchase a property in the city where we could use city water, and sewer. And as an added bonus we can use natural gas instead of propane.  We wasted a lot of time spinning our wheels and money.  Hopefully this is something that you will not have to deal with.  Many in Texas have not done this, and face fines and other regulatory issues.  It wasn't until one of our engineers brought this up, that we knew it would even be an issues.  Many do not have this luxury and build not knowing what they would have to do.  The problem (that I see) is that the state is lumping us with any type of alcoholic producing firm, waste from wine, contains grape skins and do pose other issues.  We were going to store our spent grain and sell or give it away to farmers.  You could build your building and run the risk of not having issues with the TCEQ, we did not since the TCEQ was already aware of our project and would most likely come for a "surprise" inspection.  I don't have any further details, but today I heard from another attorney there was another distillery that was able to get around all the red tape, but he did not have any specifics.  I hope this helps and would be more than happy to discuss it more if you have more questions. 

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It looks like I may have a local path through this issue.  Montgomery County has a Departmnet of Environmental Health Services which oversees On-site Sewer Facilities.

http://www.mctx.org/departments_d-k/departments_e/environmental_health/on-site_septic_facility_(ossf).html

So, I won't be dealing directly with the TCEQ, but the County instead. If I get a permit through them, then I should be good to go.

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