At the hearing, which will run from 6 to 8:30 p.m. on Tuesday, July 17, at the Marshallton United Methodist Church, 1282 W. Strasburg Rd., the DEP will "take testimony concerning the Department's intent to renew NPDES Permit No. PA0029912 to Embreeville Redevelopment GP, LLC for the discharge of treated sewage from Embreeville Complex STP to West Branch Brandywine Creek located in Newlin Township, Chester County."
According to Janie, "The old plant is a stream discharge system discharging treated sewage into the west branch of Brandywine Creek just past the canoe launch at ChesLen Preserve."
She said that "Newlin residents and environmental organizations petitioned DEP for a hearing regarding the renewal of the STP’s permit for another 5 years. Obviously, no one wants it to discharge into the Brandywine."
As I'm sure readers know, Embreeville Redevelopment is the group that bought the former Embreeville Hospital property and proposed a housing development and strip mall for the 200-acre site. After years of hearings, controversy, and protests from residents, West Bradford Township rejected the plan earlier this year.
Janie provided some key background: "The plant is in Newlin Township but was never owned or used by Newlin. It was part of the old Embreeville Hospital grounds. After the hospital was closed, it was used by the State Police barracks and the PennDOT garage until about 4 or so years ago when these folks joined in with W. Bradford’s modern lagoon/spray irrigation sewage plant just down the road from this old (1930-1940 era) sewage treatment plant located in Newlin. . . . Part of the developer’s plan was to open up the old sewage plant and use that for the development. There is no way the developer could bring the plant up to modern standards like what is available about 1/2 mile down Rt 162 in West Bradford."
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