When an MSW facility needed help to manage their odor complaints, Microbe Shield Worldwide’s products became the best solution for keeping facility odors under control.
In 2011, an MSW facility in South Florida with a transfer station and end processing station, serving a population totaling approximately 10 million, began to experience some real odor problems. Located in the middle of an industrial, residential and educational part of town, the site shares the neighborhood with offices, a college and its campuses, and houses directly across the street.
Odor Complaints
As the MSW odors became unmanageable, people in the surrounding community began to constantly complain, resulting in the state’s Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) issuing the facility a warning letter that they needed to provide a remedy for the situation. “In the beginning, we settled on an odor company after an extensive search and during their 18 months on the site, we continued to receive odor complaints, with multiple visits a month from the DEP, working its way all the way up to a warning letter,” says the facility’s Compliance Officer.
Working with the facility for all of their environmental permitting, Brenda Clark an Engineer and Environmental Consultant at HDR Engineering, Inc., explains, “I had been doing the design and permitting for the site. They had bought it as an existing facility and they were making some modifications to allow for the waste stream that they wanted to receive at that facility. We received the permits and they started operating. However, the site started getting complaints about the odors, mostly from the neighbors. That’s where I came in to help them develop the remedy and then document how they were going to do it.” Although the requirement was to keep the odor at the facility’s boundary, the main problem was that the trucks that were coming into the facility with the material were contributing to the odor as well as the operations that they were doing inside the building.
Eliminating the Odor
Through word of mouth the MSW facility heard about Microbe Shield Worldwide™, so in July 2015, the company was called in for a sample spray test. Microbe Shield Worldwide, is a turnkey Environmental Company specializing in the manufacturing, distribution and servicing of Hyper Green™ odor elimination products. Scientifically proven in the rapid elimination of malodors. Microbe Shield Worldwide’s patent pending products are non-toxic, non-corrosive, hypoallergenic and occupationally safe. As an EPA-approved establishment, Microbe Shield Worldwide is a sole source for their proprietary advanced Hyper Green ™ odor eliminators.
“Back in 2013, we were actually in healthcare and one of the projects that we took on was eliminating the odor-causing bacteria that was inside the hospitals,” says Jim Howard, Microbe Shield’s CEO. “We were actually applying our product within operating rooms, ICUs, etc. After we did that, the real test was in the bathroom; there was one that literally had 2,000 people going though it per day because it was right next to the cafeteria. The amount of ammonia as well as the odor that was in there was unbelievable. So, one early morning, we went in to apply the product as well as showing them how it worked; after 6 months there was still no odor in the bathroom.” It was through hearing about this that Microbe Shield was contacted about the MSW site’s odor problem.
Howard came to the facility and walked them through the application process. After testing it out in a leachate system for about a half-hour, there was no smell coming out of the grate where the system was located, so the next test was in a garbage truck. After spraying a front-loader truck between the blades and letting it sit until the next day, the site’s Compliance Officer sent his front-end loader division manager to smell the truck. “He didn’t smell anything, so Microbe Shield sprayed another truck that had just come in and smelled really bad; it had flies in the back of the truck, etc. In a couple of hours we went back and there were no flies, no smell, no odor, so we said let’s try it inside the building. I made arrangements for them to come in one week on a trial basis,” says the Compliance Officer.
On a Monday, Microbe Shield set up the system, which the facility ran each night for five hours in order to combat the smell when the doors were opened at 5:30 a.m. After about the third day into the trial, there was still no odor from the MSW and no complaints. However, management decided to try another vendor, but it didn’t take long for the odors to come back along with the complaints. As a result, Microbe Shield was brought back in so the facility could try out the product substantially. “They said we’ll give you a 30-day shot, so we went in and started right away,” said Howard. “As time progressed, the DEP came in and evaluated the odor system we were using, looked at the formula and the Safety Data Sheets. They really liked what we had done, so we started an odor monitoring program with them,” says Howard. As a result, not only did the odors disappear quickly but Microbe Shield was also brought on full-time in July and by August, the facility had no complaints from the DEP.
Once the MSW facility selected Microbe Shield, Clark worked with them to make sure that they were applying it in a way that they could maximize the benefits from the product. Explains Clark, “We worked closely together with both companies to develop a mechanism for spraying the area outside of the facility and where they could run the system to best prevent odors. We also evaluated this on the truck odor and the operations inside the building. It really was a very comprehensive plan that we enacted and the regulators were great. They really worked with you to find a solution and not just be a hammer.”
Odor Control Program
Currently, the MSW site has the misting system set up in their transfer building, spraying the Infinity 530 Odor Eliminator all day long, while the Infinity 555 product (the strongest) is used two to three hours in the middle of the night. They also use the Infinity 530 Plus every day in their front loader trucks—tanks are on the vehicles with hoses attached to them so that they can spray down the cans when they are dropped off at the customer. The Compliance Offer says that they are especially used inside the compactor chutes “Those cans smell, so that travels up the compactor and when someone opens it up on the floor, the smell comes out and lingers. Even our clients are enjoying the product because it’s knocking out the odors.”
Depending on the setting of the system, product refills inside the facility are between 32 to 45 days—the perimeter system is exchanged out once per month, while the interior system is changed out every 37 days and the high-grade interior system is changed out every 45 days.
Microbe Shield also checks in on a daily basis. With routes set up now throughout South Florida, Microbe Shield performs not only “odor runs”, but they also help facilities establish a neighbor-to-neighbor program. “A lot of times it is tough to go out into the communities because of the odor issue, so we’ll go out with them and tell about what we’re doing and about the product and how it works and if there are any problems, let us know. If there is a problem, we are there visiting. Ninety percent of the time it is a truck, so we’ll get in there and find out it is a bad load; we put the product in the sweeper and facility. The product does reactivate when it rains and we have more than 150 trailing scents that we can use, but for the most part they are odorless,” says Howard.
Still Going Strong
Going forward, the company who owns the MSW site are now using Microbe Shield’s product in front loader trucks with a mount wash system where they are able to spray the containers. After demoing it at another location, they loved it because they had a couple of route stops where fish smells were prominent. After spraying the containers with Microbe Shield’s product, the smell has gone away and it is working well there. Says the Compliance Officer, “Microbe Shield’s products work fantastic on the MSW sites and the front end loaders—the product stands by itself. It does what it’s supposed to.”
Says Howard, “This was our first venture into the waste industry; now we’ve got seven different companies in multiple locations in Florida and we are planning to go national. This has snowballed for us and the word of mouth alone has brought us to the next level. It is exciting to watch it grow in this area of our business; we see how important it is. It’s working well, we’re starting to branch out and grow and we are having fun with it.” | WA
For more information about Microbe Shield Worldwide, call (954) 531-6918 or e-mail [email protected] or [email protected].