THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, October 19, 1996 TAG: 9610190294
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY KAREN JOLLY DAVIS, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CAPE CHARLES LENGTH: 56 lines
With a flash of golden shovels, the Port of Cape Charles won the race to become the nation's first eco-industrial park.
The groundbreaking Thursday evening was the high point of a workshop sponsored through Friday by the President's Council on Sustainable Development. More than 100 people from communities all over the country came to talk about the eco-industrial parks they are planning.
But the Port of Cape Charles broke ground first.
``Construction begins with that first shovel of dirt,'' said Tim Hayes, Director of Sustainable Development for Northampton County. ``All of the ingredients for success are in hand.''
Last month, Northampton County and Cape Charles bought 50 acres near the harbor for the park, with an option on 100 more. They have $1.8 million in state and federal grants to build the roads, water and sewer lines needed to get the first phase up and running.
And the park already has one committed tenant: Solar Building Systems Inc., which makes photovoltaic panels.
Port of Cape Charles officials hope their park will become the home for businesses that are not only economically viable, but environmentally sensitive and socially equitable as well.
One way to make businesses both profitable and environmentally sound is to co-locate manufacturers who use each others' waste products. A first step for the Cape Charles eco-industrial park has been a proposal to link Bayshore Concrete with the town's wastewater treatment plant.
Bayshore Concrete now pumps an estimated 100,000 gallons of groundwater each day to make its product. Big withdrawals like this - particularly from wells close to the shoreline - can cause saltwater intrusion into the drinking water aquifers. A recent study has shown that saltwater is much closer to the surface in the Cape Charles area than in other places on the Eastern Shore.
The town's wastewater treatment plant produces 150,000 gallons of cleaned water each day and pumps it into the harbor. Hayes suggested saving groundwater by connecting the two with a pipeline so that the concrete plant can use the water that the sewage plant is dumping.
Participants at the workshop for eco-industrial parks talked about creating whole webs of businesses linked to each other by their ``feedstocks'' and ``byproducts.'' One manufacturer's waste would be another's raw material.
Representatives of 15 eco-industrial parks spent Thursday and Friday telling each other about their projects. They talked about recruiting new firms, finding financing and environmental performance standards.
But at the groundbreaking, Arthur Carter, chairman of the Northampton County Board of Supervisors, reminded everyone about the bottom line.
``This is not an exercise in academics,'' Carter said. ``This is about providing jobs for our folk.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color drawing by JANET SHAUGHNESSY, The
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