The source of a sickening onion odor is shut down, at least temporarily. And in a new development, nobody except plant officials has any idea what substances have been treated at the south Fulton plant for at least two years.

Georgia Environmental Protection Division Director Carol Couch late Friday issued an administrative order temporarily suspending the Philip Services Corp. (PSC) waste treatment plant’s permit to treat solid waste.

Meantime, Fayette County has weighed in, demanding the plant be closed for good and tracking illnesses reported by Fayette residents. Fulton county is following suit.

With the shutdown, many questions remain unanswered, including why it has been two years since the PSC plant on Ga. Highway 92 near Fairburn has provided EPD with a list of waste products received at the facility.

Upwards of 250 residents living nearby or downwind of the plant have reported illnesses after smelling the odor of propyl mercaptan, an odorant added to pesticides.

EPD Administrative Order 2075 states that PSC failed to follow waste acceptance requirements detailed in its solid waste handling permit, resulting in a significant impact to the surrounding community.

“Additionally, on July 25, 2006, representatives of EPD inspected the Fairburn facility and discovered violations of state environmental rules and the solid waste handling permit. The extent of your deviation from the requirements of Solid Waste Handling Permit #060-082P(DW) and the magnitude of the subsequent impact to the surrounding communities must be addressed before you receive any additional waste,” the order stated.

The order temporarily suspends the permit and requires PSC to submit a plan to improve waste acceptance procedures to avoid a reoccurrence of events that led to the acceptance of waste containing propyl mercaptan.

The order cites five violations of the solid waste handling permit observed during a July 25 EPD multi-media inspection.

Among those were grease trap waste emanating from the side of a building onto the ground and off the property site, the operation of a 10-day hazardous transfer station at the facility, waste being pumped into a tank prior to being screened and no evidence of annual reports citing the list of waste generators, processes and quantities of the industrial sludges handled.

Commenting on the required reports, EPD Assistant Director Jim Ussery said Monday that PSC had not provided documentation concerning waste products handled at the Fairburn plant for the past two years.

Pursuant to the order, PSC’s solid waste permit is temporarily suspended, meaning that it can no longer receive waste or treat waste already received prior to being served with the order, Ussery said.

The order states that Couch will consider lifting the suspension if PSC responds to EPD’s satisfaction and provides an approved, revised design and operational (d&o) plan that includes effective odor controls, improved waste storage and containment practices, the exclusion of hazardous waste, and improved waste profiling and screening methods.

PSC must remove two holding tanks within 30 days to ensure no residual mercaptan remains on site, submit a plan to clean and decontaminate affected equipment and piping connections within five days and take all necessary measures to prevent mitigation of waste from the waste stabilization pit and solidification bays.

PSC has the option to petition a judge to appeal Couch’s administrative order, according to statements made Wednesday by EPD spokesman Ted Jackson at an intergovernmental/citizens task force meeting set up to address the various symptoms of illness endured by residents across an estimated 40-square-mile area of south Fulton and north Fayette.

Fayette County commissioners July 27 called for the PSC plant to be closed down for good.

“I want it closed permanently. None of the residents in that area should have to put up with this,” Commission Chairman Greg Dunn said.

Commissioners questioned the effect on Fayetteville and Fayette County water supplies coming in part from Whitewater Creek, which runs along the south side of the plant, stating that water should not have to be tested constantly to determine its safety.

Fayette County Emergency Management and fire officials responded in the closing days of June to residents’ complaints of an onion-like smell that some mistook for a gas leak. They tracked the smell to PSC and notified Fulton County.

After a July 19 public meeting called by Fulton County Commissioner Bill Edwards, Fayette officials added an exposure form to the county Web site for affected residents to document their symptoms and illnesses.

Also in place is an evolving map designed to track complaints of exposure. Complaints of exposure from Fulton residents received by Fayette County will be passed on to Fulton officials.

To date, Fayette officials are continuing the effort to find answers and protect residents, said EM coordinator Pete Nelms.

“We feel very confident about the action that has been taken regarding the closing of the plant and the investigation that is ongoing,” Nelms said. “We are meeting with public health officials in an effort to take the next step to determine the effects on our citizens. There is a lot of activity and dialogue on these issues and we are moving forward to develop a forthcoming plan of action.”

Fulton County commissioners, too, are putting together a response to what some are calling a public health crisis. Commissioner Bill Edwards July 19 called for the plant to be shut down, instructing county attorney O.V. Brantley to find the means to do so.

In a July 28 letter to PSC, Brantley said a June 29 shipment of mercaptan from Bayer Science, Inc. in Axis, Ala., had been improperly opened at the Fairburn facility, causing ill health effects in some residents and resulting in a health hazard during the past month.

The letter advised PSC to “cease all operations until such time as the plant and surrounding areas are cleared of all evidence of mercaptan and its re-opening is authorized by Fulton County.”

In light of the plant’s pre-treatment permit held by Fulton County, Brantley cited five conditions that PSC should meet. Those included periodic sampling, testing and monitoring of air quality in and around the plant; participation by PSC representatives in community meetings and meetings with Fulton County officials; monthly reporting to Fulton County of all substances entering and treated by the plant; periodic sampling, testing and reporting to Fulton County the results of the testing of Whitewater Creek; and an epidemiological study of the impact of mercaptan on the surrounding area.

Brantley also recommended that, at a minimum, PSC should “make available to those citizens with unreimbursed medical expenses a means by which they can obtain relief from your company for the harm which it has caused.”

Such relief may be hampered, PSC Vice President for Environmental Affairs Morris Azose said last week, due to a class action lawsuit filed by some of the affected residents in Fayette and Fulton counties.

Fulton County altered the pre-treatment permit held by PSC effective July 24. That change stated, “As provided by the County’s Sewer Ordinance, PSC obtained a permit in December 2003 from the county to discharge wastewater into the county’s sewer system. That permit limited the amounts of various chemicals and metals that can be discharged into the county’s system. The modification to that permit last week prohibits PSC from receiving onto the property any products that contain n-propyl mercaptan, which is the chemical that causes the smell.”

Preceding Brantley’s letter was one issued July 27 by Fulton County Health and Wellness Director Dr. Steve Katkowsky to EPD Director Couch. Katkowsky declared the mercaptan incident to be a critical health incident due to reports of illness associated with odors escaping from the plant.

“I am requesting that your agency, as the regulating and permitting department of the state, order a full epidemiological study surrounding the operations of the plant, the incidence of the most recent complaints of illness and of the environmental toxicity and possible health effects of prolonged contact with propyl mercaptan. During the completion of that study, and until all of the data are reviewed and evaluated, it is further requested that the plant operations be halted and the plant be closed,” Katkowsky said.

At last count, more than 250 residents of Fayette and Fulton counties have reported being sickened during the past two months from the onion-like odor of pesticide component propyl mercaptan coming from the PSC plant. The true number of those affected is as yet unknown.

A PSC Waste Profile Sheet listed AMVAC Chemical Corp., also located in Axis, Ala., as the product generator for one of the shipments of the controversial “water wash” received at the Fairburn plant. The shipment was listed as containing 99.5 to 99.8 percent water, 0.009 to 0.1 percent propyl mercaptan, 0.09 to 0.1 percent MOCAP pesticide, 12 to 15 percent chloride salts and 0.09 to 0.1 percent ethanol.

EPD’s Ussery said Monday the water wash received at the plant, according to documentation provided, should not have contained levels of either propyl mercaptan or MOCAP sufficient to generate health concerns.

Yet symptoms reported by growing numbers of residents include those of exposure or overexposure to both chemicals as listed on several material safety data sheets on propyl mercaptan.

Symptoms include persistent headaches, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, breathing difficulty, kidney damage, the sense of drunkenness or incoherence, burning eyes, skin irritation and rashes. Many residents have now sought medical attention for their symptoms.

Some have reported that healthcare providers have usually been unable, and in some cases unwilling, to believe that symptoms are related to the odor that for weeks was thought to be wild onions growing nearby.

Those symptoms and others have existed in some families since late May, far longer than company documents and EPD can account for.

Multiple tube tests taken by EPD around the plant site found no propyl mercaptan registering at the 0.5 parts per million (ppm) that would pose a health risk.

Nonetheless, residents in a 40-square-mile hot zone are exhibiting symptoms listed on the materials safety data sheet (msds) for exposure to the chemical. One such MSDS lists effects of short term inhalation exposure at 0.5ppm as including irritation, lack of sense of smell, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, difficulty breathing, headache, symptoms of drunkenness, bluish skin color, lung congestion, kidney damage, convulsions and coma.

There is no information cited for long-term exposure, a fact particularly troubling to area residents who say they have been breathing the sickening air since the Memorial Day holiday.

Potentially much more troubling are the symptoms of the restricted-use pesticide MOCAP present in extremely small quantities in the wash water received at the PSC plant.

MOCAP, also known chemically as ethoprop, is poisonous if inhaled, swallowed or absorbed through the skin, according to material supplied by Bayer Crop Science.

Symptoms of MOCAP poisoning include nausea, vomiting, abdominal cramps, diarrhea, excessive salivation, headache, dizziness, weakness, blurring or dimness of vision, loss of muscular coordination, slurring of speech, twitching of muscles, mental confusion, disorientation, drowsiness, difficulty breathing and runny nose.

Ethoprop is an organophosphate sometimes used in pesticides. Organophosphates were first discovered more than 150 years ago, according to Dr. William Fruedenthal at St. Vincent Hospital Department of Emergency Medicine. Their widespread use began in Germany in the 1920s, when these compounds were first synthesized as insecticides and chemical warfare agents.