COMSTOCK TOWNSHIP,Mich. — The Comstock Township Board approved a site Thursday for Enbridge to temporarily store woody debris that the company will clear during dredging operations on the Kalamazoo River.
Enbridge Spokesperson Kevin O’Connor said the approved site will be key in the Morrow Lake dredging process.
It will sit on Miller Drive in Comstock Township.
O’Connor said the company will park a large pontoon at the site with a dumpster on it.
Tree branches, bark and other debris that are cleared from the river will be dumped on that floating barge to clear the way for the dredging equipment.
The material collected at that site will stay on the barge until large trucks arrive to pick it up and take it to a landfill.
O’Connor says the woody debris will not be sitting on the ground itself.
Meantime, Enbridge continues to search for it’s last silt filtration dredge pad site to replace the one that the township denied last week.
That silt filtration site had been hotly contested by local residents and the owner of Bell’s Brewery.
Larry Bell had filed a lawsuit to stop work on the site. Last week the Comstock Township Board denied the use of that site to Enbridge.
O’Connor says they are still providing more details to the EPA on new sites that may serve as a replacement.
The EPA ordered the company to do additional dredging earlier this year, saying there could be upwards of 180,000 gallons of oil still remaining in the river from the spill although Enbridge disagrees with that number.
He says they have to work quickly to meet the EPA’s deadline to have dredging operations complete by December, 31.
