Residents of a Nebraska village are outraged after environmental regulators admitted that a local ethanol plant has been contaminating the area with pesticides for years.
The widespread contamination in Mead, a village of nearly 600 residents, was made worse by periodic accidental spills and leaks from the AltEn LLC ethanol plant.
The environmental problems, which residents had suspected for years, came to light earlier this year after media reports exposed the problems and the plant eventually shut down, according to a report
in The Guardian.
Although Nebraska’s attorney general then sued the company for alleged environmental violations, Mead residents say the actions are too little and too late.
State regulators have found unsafe levels of water used for drinking and crop irrigation and researchers have reported the decimation of honey bee colonies as well as growing numbers of dead fish and sick geese near the plant.
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