A public hearing is planned in Huntersville tonight on Colonial Pipeline's plans to process and release treated wastewater into a creek at the site of a massive 2020 gasoline spill.
Colonial's contractors are still cleaning up from the August 2020 incident, which leaked about 2 million gallons of gasoline into the soil at a nature preserve east of downtown Huntersville.
That made it the nation's largest-ever gasoline pipeline spill on land. Colonial is seeking a permit to filter fuel and other contaminants out of the recovered groundwater on site, then release the cleaned water into the North Prong Clark Creek.
The company says that's the best alternative to trucking wastewater off site. The State Department of Environmental Quality says shipping wastewater elsewhere would require 115 trucks operating 24 hours a day for an unknown time.
The hearing begins at 6 p.m. at Central Piedmont Community College's Merancas Campus in Huntersville.