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Fertilizer Plant Proposal Worries Neighbors

Ed Williams
The site of the proposed humic acid facility viewed from a home across the street

Bernalillo County is considering a Florida company’s proposal to build a fertilizer plant near a residential neighborhood. The proposal has neighbors worried about impacts to health and traffic.

The company, Humic Growth Solutions of Jacksonville, wants to manufacture humic acid fertilizer at the site of an old paint warehouse south of Albuquerque.

The property is zoned for heavy industry, but there are homes about 100 feet away. That has neighbors like Marisol Archuleta worried.

"Because this area has a history of not being well protected it’s hard for me to trust the word of this company that gases aren’t going to be emitting, or that the groundwater’s not going to be polluted," she said.

There’s also a park nearby, and neighbors say truck traffic at the plant would endanger children playing there. The company says it will schedule traffic for off-hours, and that the facility would not pose any threat to the neighborhood.

The county could decide next week whether to approve the company’s application.

Ed Williams came to KUNM in 2014 by way of Carbondale, Colorado, where he worked as a public radio reporter covering environmental issues. Originally from Austin, Texas, Ed has reported on environmental, social justice, immigration and Native American issues in the U.S. and Latin America for the Austin American-Statesman, Z Magazine, NPR’s Latino USA and others. In his spare time, look for Ed riding his mountain bike in the Sandias or sparring on the jiu-jitsu mat.