MTO: What's that smell?

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What's that smell?
In Macon, the answer is mostly pulp, industry

By Eric Velasco
The Macon Telegraph

New noses notice it quickly in Macon.

The smell. On a cloudy day, when the wind is blowing just right, the odor permeates parts of town. It smells like a huge pot of cooking greens or something ripening in a swamp.

Actually it doesn't come from just one source, although the paper mill at Riverwood International is one of the main contributors.

"You never know exactly what the source is," said Tim Perry, a massage therapist who once wrote an Internet missive about Macon's malodor.

"Sometimes we get an odor that smells like the paper plant," Perry said. "Sometimes it's a sewage smell. Sometimes it's a petroleum smell. It's not always the same. You just never know."

Riverwood's contribution comes from the process of converting raw wood into pulp, from which the plant's coated paperboard is made. A by-product of the process is hydrogen sulfide, which can give off a sulfurous, rotten-egg smell.

"It's a necessary part of the process of pulping raw timber," said Brian Rood, director of the environmental science program at Mercer University. "They need chemical agents to break down the wood. And working with raw timber gives off the most smell."

Earlier in this decade, when the Mead Road paper plant was an Australian-owned entity named Macon Kraft, the stacks would spew a yellow smoke, with a stench noticeable for miles.

But in 1994 the new owner, Riverwood International, spent $90 million to install a state-of-the-art scrubber and boiler system to reduce the offending emissions. Another $10 million was spent in 1997 on the effort, according to Steve Claytor, vice president and resident manager of Riverwood.

"It has decreased emissions over 90 percent," he said. "We're not done yet. We've continued doing smaller projects to decrease emissions, especially emissions that can be noticed in the community."

Riverwood's moves have earned praise from local leaders, and admissions by longtime residents that the smell is much better than it was just a few years ago.

Last week, a visitor standing next to the 300-foot boiler and scrubber at Riverwood did notice a pronounced odor. It was cinnamon and raisins from the nearby Keebler plant.

How's the weather?

These days, certain weather conditions are needed to spread the smell. It takes winds from a "back-door front," said Gene Holcomb, executive director of the Macon Water Authority.

That's when winds blow from the south, shooting the smell up Broadway and into downtown.

Under those conditions, warm air topped by cold air pushes the clouds closer to the ground.

"When you notice the smell, you know it's about to rain," Holcomb said. "It's a good weather forecaster."

Concentrated hydrogen sulfide is toxic. It is more dangerous, for example, than hydrogen cyanide. But hydrogen sulfide is detectable long before it becomes a health hazard.

"You can't smell cyanide until there's a large enough dose to hurt you," said Mercer's Rood. "But our noses are exquisitely sensitive to sulfur compounds like hydrogen sulfide."

Hydrogen sulfide is detectable in parts per billion. That's why minute amounts of sulfide compounds are mixed with natural gas, so any leaks in the home will be immediately noticed.

The state threshold for hydrogen sulfide emission safety is five parts per million. Riverwood's output tends to run about a half part per million, officials said.

Operating 24 hours a day and seven days a week, Riverwood constantly monitors emission levels in the scrubber and boiler unit on a bank of computers, said Greg Hollod, the company's vice president for health safety and the environment.

The scrubber and boiler doesn't wash out - much less receive - all of the hydrogen sulfide produced at Riverwood.

A small amount of "fugitive emissions" also escapes in the plant, such as where the wood is cooked into pulp, said Jonna Manes, a spokeswoman for Riverwood.

And there's only so much Riverwood can do to cut the smell - economically and technologically.

"There will be technology (in the future) that could eliminate all that's going out," Rood said. "But I don't think there's any technology now that can get you down to zero discharge."

Smell of money

Of course, odor is almost always associated with industry. Many of the plants that dominate the south Macon industrial area are no exception.

That can create difficulties for people who live nearby - from the Lynmore Estates community that abuts the industrial area to the booming south Bibb area.

"Sometimes, I get this cloud that smells and feels greasy - like petroleum gas," said Perry, the massage therapist, who lives on Hartley Bridge Road. "That's not the paper mill."

Some say Macon's odor is the smell of money - like the 545 jobs and $30 million payroll at Riverwood. Others say it's a smelly stain on Macon's image.

"There are times when I'm coming home from working in Dublin," Perry said. "When I hit the (Ocmulgee) river, I can smell a funk. At least you always know when you're home."

Some also blame the Macon Water Authority's Rocky Creek treatment plant, which sits near the south Macon industrial area.

While admitting that "there are odors associated with a water treatment plant," Holcomb doubts it is a major source, even though it treats waste water from the industrial park, including Riverwood.

"We have two (treatment plants) - one at Rocky Creek and another on Poplar," Holcomb said.

"If you have odors coming from one, you would have odors coming from the other."

The Poplar plant also gets industrial waste water, including that from the Cagle's chicken-processing plant.

"If we had odors associated with (industry), we would be hearing complaints about Poplar as well as Rocky Creek," Holcomb said. "But we don't."

Holcomb gives Riverwood high marks for reducing its smokestack emissions, as well as for pre-treating the water it sends to the Rocky Creek water plant.

"I hardly ever smell the mill," he said. "They've done a good job working on a problem they inherited. They've come a long way."

Riverwood has spent a total of $600 million to improve the plant, the biggest investment the company has put into any of its locations, Claytor said.

"We've made a commitment to Macon," he said. "We are proud of what we've done here, not only for improving the environment, but also converting the mill to make our coated-board product."

And what's noxious to one person may be nostalgic to another.

"My dad owns two paper mills," said Rood, the environmental scientist. "I have to say the smell doesn't bother me. It reminds me of my dad."