Environment: S.M.E.LL.S. v. Smells

Trees shade the streets, there are barbecue pits in the backyards, grassy hills sweep close to the town. In short, Hartford, Wis., would seem to be a pleasant place in which to live. Unfortunately, it has one dreadful drawback. Come late summer, the place stinks.

The stink is more than just nose-wrinkling. It is bad enough to make some people retch in the street. Outdoor parties are canceled, and people retreat to their houses, shutting the windows and turning on the air conditioners.

Offensive odors are the most difficult to control of all environmental plagues. They can be overpowered with a deodorant or a perfume—a tactic that is difficult to apply to an entire town. Or they can be eliminated completely, something that can rarely be done without eliminating the source. To make matters worse, it is difficult to legislate against bad smells because no objective standards can be formulated.

The source of Hartford's stench is two lagoons to the west of the town. They were bulldozed out by Libby, McNeill & Libby, when the company found that the discharge from its big beet-processing plant at Hartford was polluting the local creek. The idea was that the two lagoons would serve as a cesspool area, where wastage could be aerated and treated until it was pollution-free.

Pig Manure. Despite treatment, the Libby wastes lying stagnant in the lagoons often smell like rotten meat. In the words of one irate citizen, the odor is reminiscent of "pig manure." Even so, the smells are seasonal, and (to most people) bearable. But last summer's wet weather produced an unusually large beet crop—and the worst smells ever. Fed up, 100 townspeople have now formed S.M.E.L.L.S. (Someone Must Eliminate Libby Lagoon Smells).

They do not have total support. The city council voted in September to halt lagoon operations if it were found that Libby could not control odors. But the mayor, realizing that Libby's 300 jobs are a major source of Hartford's income, vetoed the council's action. So now S.M.E.L.L.S. has taken its case directly to the state's two U.S. Senators and to the state department of natural resources.

Libby, meanwhile, is doing its best to snuff out the odor. It has used ammonium nitrate and other chemicals in attempts to neutralize the gases that cause the offensive beet smell. Enzymes and aerators have been put to work to help reduce the anaerobic bacteria that produce the gas. Still, the smells persist. Moans Libby Plant Manager Kenneth Schessler: "We get blamed even when there's three feet of ice on the lagoons."

Schessler and other townsmen may soon be able to breathe easier. City fathers have requested a federal grant to help build a new sewage treatment plant. If they get it, water from the lagoons will be pumped daily into the plant in the hope of eliminating the smell.