550007_Pitner SiteVisit Summary email_20240620

Baker, Caroline D
From: Pitner, Andrew
Sent: Thursday, June 20, 2024 4:08 PM
To: Patterson, Sierra N; Lawson, Christine
Cc: Costner, Brandy F
Subject: Beam Dairy/Digester visit 062020204
Attachments: image000001 new marker structures along western wspjpg; image000004 pit 7 pit 8
in backgroundjpg; image000005 pit 8 pit 7 in backgroundjpg
Hi All,
Attaching a few photos from the visit that Wes Bell and I made to Beam Dairy today. There are a few more at:
G:\WQ\AP\CAFO!\Patterson\Facilities\Beam Dairy Digester\06202024_Site Photos.
From what we saw, they've addressed the digester -related issues that Sierra and Blane noted in their last
visit. They've raised the collars on pits 7 & 8 (Danny Hertz's email of 7/19/24 now shows these pits in the plan on
22301-G-110 REV.pdf). It'd be very difficult for stormwater or other material to enter those pits now. The final
grades around the digester are still steep, but appear complete, seeded & strawed. I think they adequately
explained the hoist on top of the digester during the teams call and I believe that's what's shown on G01-00735-01
Rev-A.pdf. We also saw the final collar concrete for the return pipe to the eastern waste storage pond (WSP) and
the flume and pit structures in the western WSP. They confirmed that the flume elevation is above the spillway
elevation. They indicated that their engineer is ready for the partial certification, and they expect the full
certification to follow within a week or two. From MRO's perspective, I'd say they're ready to get partial
certification whenever their engineer submits.
John Beam indicated that Michael Shepherd had visited on 6/19 and surveyed/re-installed markers for the 3
WSPs. We saw the two lower ones, and both had been pumped down so there were many feet of freeboard. John
Beam emailed those records which have been uploaded to LF. Sam Bingham is due to visit 6/21 to start coming up
with plans for managing silage leachate at two locations and to look at the stormwater/wastewater conveyance for
the calf but area. The calf but area is likely to be the harder nut to crack in this case, but John Beam indicated he
was committed to finding a workable solution. Workers were finishing up work on the milk transfer drain system,
which will route any spills back to the WSP instead of to stormwater (the drain by the loading area was complete
along with a pit and a small pump, they had dug much of the trench for the line returning it to the WSP so it wasn't
quite ready for action).
Andrew
Andrew H. Pitner, P.G.
Regional Supervisor
Water Quality Regional Operations Section
Mooresville Regional Office
Division of Water Resources
Department of Environmental Quality
704 235 2180 direct office
704 663 1699 MRO main line
704 663 6040 fax
DWR website: http://www.ncwater.org
610 East Center Avenue, Suite 301, Mooresville, NC 28115

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