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Show 5 ' Kl , iSSSli Bui. Approves Air Product Plant By GARY R. BLODGETT BOUNTIFUL Final approval was given by the Bountiful City Council last Wednesday night to open the door for construction of a $ 1 7 million air chemical and products plant to be located on a 20-acre site on the Bountiful-Centerville boundary near Pages Lane. THE PROPOSED site, similar to the sketch above, is located half in Bountiful and half in Centerville. The plant will be constructed about 480 feet west of 200 West and east of the Interstate Highway frontage road, according to officials of Air Products and Chemicals, Che-micals, Inc., of Allentown, Pa., who will build and operate the plant. Ross Steckel, real estate agent for the chemicals plant, said that although the plant will be located on a site jointly shared by Bountiful and Centerville, the plant and most of its operational facilities will be located in Bountiful. THE CITY council unanimously approved the re-zoning re-zoning of 9.4 acres of Residential-3 land to Manufacturing Manufac-turing -2. Property located in Centerville is already zoned commercial, he said. He assured residents of the area, some of whom have protested the construction of the plant at this site, that the plant will not create a safety hazard. "THE PLANT'S operation is not a safety threat in any way," he said. "There is no more danger of fire.. explosion or release of toxic gases with this plant, than any light industry." George Baker, plant operations manager for the Pennsylvania-based firm, told the council that Air Products plants had operated 4 million man-hours without a loss-time accident and the company's drivers driv-ers had driven chemical trucks 43 million miles without with-out a reportable accident. "SAFETY IS foremost in our program and minds of our employees and drivers," he stresses, noting that management personnel participate in quarterly safety training programs. He said the local plant will utilize 15 trucks daily but, with rare exception, the trucks will use the Interstate Inter-state Highway and will not travel on city streets except to make local deliveries (such as to the hospital). hos-pital). IN RESPONSE to a question from a concerned resident, Mr. Baker emphasized that Pages Lane will not be used as a regular route for the trucks and will be used only for local deliveries. "We will use the frontage road and the Interstate Highway," he emphasized. THE PLANT will be operational 365 days a year and in continuous operation around the clock. There will be 28 employees at the plant, about 26 of whom will be hired locally. "We will bring in a plant manager and a terminal manager," said Mr. Baker. "Otherwise, all person- ,. nel, including truck drivers, will be hired locally and trained by our plant training personnel." THE PLANT'S operation will be to "break down" components of outside air into three components: oxygen, nitrogen and argon, which will be "packaged" "pack-aged" for commercial sale. "We will not release any toxics or odors into the air," said Tom Gari, in charge of the physical layout of the plant. "There will be no odors or pollutants. In fact, the air released after use will be as pure as when it was taken into the plant." THE AIR products are separated at high pressure and processed at temperatures of minus-250 degrees, or more, it was explained. The plant will use an enormous amount of electrical electric-al power in its operation estimated to be 30 percent of the total power used in all of Bountiful. All of this power will be purchased from Bountiful Power and Light Company, providing a substantial source of revenue, officials noted. MR. GARI said about 94 percent of the plant's physical structures (operation) will be within Bountiful Bounti-ful city limits with only six percent being located in Centerville. Air Products officials also stressed that the east and south borders of the site will be landscaped with burns and trees, both for beauty and for sound resistance. |