Fmc

A malfunctioning scrubbing system at a South Baltimore chemical plant yesterday released a cloud of hydrochloric acid that was sucked into an office ventilation system, sending seven company employees who inhaled the fumes to area hospitals.No evacuations were ordered outside of the plant, according to city Fire Department officials.The fumes, which are irritating to the lungs, escaped about 1 p.m. from the top vent of the 20-foot-tall scrubber inside a smoke stack at the FMC Corp. in the 1700 block of Patapsco Ave.The scrubbing system is designed to neutralize the acid by circulating it through a tube 36 inches in diameter with a solution that turns it into harmless salt, explained Eugene O. Reynolds, a senior processing engineer at the chemical company.

It's time the government did more to compensate people such as the 130 FMC Corp. employees who found out last week they're losing their jobs to globalization. Either that, or risk a political backlash that slows the pace of globalization. There's no question which alternative presents America with the bigger problem. Plus, providing relief to U.S. workers hurt by the world economy is the right thing to do. FMC's Baltimore plant is the story of U.S. manufacturing writ small. For decades it made pesticides, herbicides, rocket fuel and other chemicals on the city's waterfront.

FMC Corp. will shutter its Baltimore plant over the next 10 months, putting 130 workers out of jobs. The Philadelphia-based company, which makes insecticides and other agricultural chemicals, has decided to move its Curtis Bay operations to Asia because it's cheaper and closer to sources of raw materials. The plant makes ingredients for various products and faces growing worldwide competition from generic brands, Frank Siwajek, director of North American operations for FMC Agricultural Products, said yesterday.

FMC Corp. will shutter its Baltimore plant over the next 10 months, putting 130 workers out of jobs. The Philadelphia-based company, which makes insecticides and other agricultural chemicals, has decided to move its Curtis Bay operations to Asia because it's cheaper and closer to sources of raw materials. The plant makes ingredients for various products and faces growing worldwide competition from generic brands, Frank Siwajek, director of North American operations for FMC Agricultural Products, said yesterday.

A month after an accident that rattled a nearby neighborhood, FMC Corp.'s plant in southern Baltimore has received preliminary approval for the renewal of its permit to store and treat hazardous waste, Maryland Department of the Environment officials said last night.The announcement came last night during a public hearing in Curtis Bay on the permit, which expired in 1994. FMC filed for a renewal on time, but a lack of staff at MDE delayed the renewal process for four years, officials said.

FMC Corp. has agreed to a consent decree that requires the company to re-evaluate its process for manufacturing Command, a popular herbicide.The consent decree represents an agreement between FMC's 92-acre South Baltimore plant and the Maryland Department of Environment that will stop state enforcement action.The decree signed last week stems from a May 15 accident in which a poorly calibrated flow meter caused a batch of Command to overheat, sending 600 pounds of gas into the air. Residents of nearby Wagner's Point said they saw a gas cloud and complained of watery eyes, bloody noses and sore throats.

The state has fined FMC Corp. $30,000 for an accident last year at its plant in southern Baltimore that pumped 600 pounds of a popular herbicide into the air.The state Department of the Environment also required FMC to buy and retire $30,000 worth of nitrogen oxide pollution credits for this summer because of the air-quality violations. The credits allow manufacturers to release more pollutants into the air than they normally would be allowed to. Retiring them will keep six tons of the nitrogen oxide, which contributes to ozone pollution, out of the air this summer, said department spokesman Quentin Banks.

South Baltimore's heavily industrial Fairfield peninsula has always seen plenty of out-of-town visitors: ship captains bringing in cars, truck drivers carrying oil, railroad engineers taking out chemicals.And now, the Central Intelligence Agency.In the past 18 months, CIA operatives - along with intelligence analysts from the Defense Department, the armed services and the National Security Agency - have become quiet, regular visitors to the FMC Corp. chemical plant here. Their mission is to learn more about chemical plants and how facilities designed to produce agricultural pesticides might be converted to make chemical and biological weapons by countries such as Iraq and India.

FMC Corp. agreed yesterday to stop selling a crop pesticide in Maryland and nine other coastal states that has been blamed for the deaths of more than a dozen bald eagles in the Chesapeake Bay region.The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency negotiated a total ban on sales, effective Sept. 1, in Maryland and other areas where there are breeding grounds and crucial habitat for bald eagles and migratory birds.The company negotiated a settlement with the EPA that calls for a three-year phasing out of the use of carbofuran granules nationwide.

State safety inspectors investigating a chemical explosion two months ago in Fairfield found no evidence of negligence, but angry residents have called a meeting tonight at the fire station to complain that they are not adequately protected.The Fairfield/Wagner's Point Neighborhood Coalition is calling on FMC Corp. and other chemical companies to provide more public information on hazardous materials and for copies of emergency response plans to be made available.The University of Maryland's environmental law clinic has compiled a report on behalf of the residents saying the 270 people who live in the area are not properly informed by companies and are "dangerously unaware" of what to do in emergencies.

FMC Corp. said yesterday that a weak economy and global competition is forcing it to consolidate operations at its Curtis Bay plant and lay off between 60 and 65 employees. The Philadelphia-based chemical maker is combining three facilities that make herbicide and pesticide ingredients within the Baltimore plant so that they can be operated as one. The changes will begin in early January and are expected to be completed by April. "We're struggling like many other chemical companies in the weak economy, and we are competing on a global basis, and in order to compete we have to look at ways to become more cost-competitive," said plant manager Michael Sheffield.

Restructuring and other charges recorded in the fourth quarter left financially troubled RailWorks Corp. with a quarterly loss of $19.8 million, or $1.29 per share, compared with $6.6 million, or 43 cents a share, in the corresponding quarter the year before, the company reported yesterday. The charges amounted to $15.3 million, or $1 a share, at the Baltimore County company that provides rail industry products and services. Revenue for the quarter that ended Dec. 31 was $170.1 million, up 19 percent from the corresponding quarter in 1999, when revenue was $142.

Wagner's Point's two largest chemical manufacturers, each of which suffered a serious industrial accident last year, have quietly made a joint offer to help relocate residents of the tiny enclave and two smaller communities next to their plants in the Fairfield peninsula.Herbicide maker FMC Corp. and detergent ingredient producer Condea Vista delivered the proposal Friday to attorney Peter G. Angelos, who is representing Wagner's Point residentswithout a fee.Angelos is scheduled to brief residents tonight at the Community Environmental Partnership office in Brooklyn.

The state has fined FMC Corp. $30,000 for an accident last year at its plant in southern Baltimore that pumped 600 pounds of a popular herbicide into the air.The state Department of the Environment also required FMC to buy and retire $30,000 worth of nitrogen oxide pollution credits for this summer because of the air-quality violations. The credits allow manufacturers to release more pollutants into the air than they normally would be allowed to. Retiring them will keep six tons of the nitrogen oxide, which contributes to ozone pollution, out of the air this summer, said department spokesman Quentin Banks.

FMC Corp. has agreed to a consent decree that requires the company to re-evaluate its process for manufacturing Command, a popular herbicide.The consent decree represents an agreement between FMC's 92-acre South Baltimore plant and the Maryland Department of Environment that will stop state enforcement action.The decree signed last week stems from a May 15 accident in which a poorly calibrated flow meter caused a batch of Command to overheat, sending 600 pounds of gas into the air. Residents of nearby Wagner's Point said they saw a gas cloud and complained of watery eyes, bloody noses and sore throats.

South Baltimore's heavily industrial Fairfield peninsula has always seen plenty of out-of-town visitors: ship captains bringing in cars, truck drivers carrying oil, railroad engineers taking out chemicals.And now, the Central Intelligence Agency.In the past 18 months, CIA operatives - along with intelligence analysts from the Defense Department, the armed services and the National Security Agency - have become quiet, regular visitors to the FMC Corp. chemical plant here. Their mission is to learn more about chemical plants and how facilities designed to produce agricultural pesticides might be converted to make chemical and biological weapons by countries such as Iraq and India.

About 185 workers are striking FMC Corp.'s Baltimore plant over policies that they say force them to work excessive overtime, union officials said yesterday.Members of United Steelworkers of America Local 12517 walked off the job at 12: 01 a.m. Sunday when their three-year contract with the Chicago-based chemical company expired. The plant, near Curtis Bay in Fairfield, employs about 380 people.Bob Falk, president of the local, said FMC forces employees to work too much overtime and penalizes them severely if they miss work.

FMC Corp. workers voted yesterday to end an 11-day walkout and accept a three-year contract, without resolving differences concerning overtime that force some to work 75 hours a week.The Chicago-based chemical company and the United Steelworkers of America Local 12517 agreed to form a joint committee to solve their overtime differences by Sept. 1."People were out on the street," said Bob Falk, the local's president. "We could have gotten bogged down for weeks on this."Falk added that some workers used the strike to grab a precious commodity: a few days off with their families.

Responding to a chemical accident last month, the Maryland Department of the Environment has ordered FMC Corp.'s south city plant to stop producing one of its herbicides and to take several steps to prevent future spills.MDE's order, delivered to the company in a letter dated June 19, suggests that FMC could be fined as much as $75,000, but does not make clear under what circumstances such a penalty would be imposed.In the May 15 spill, an incorrectly calibrated flow meter heated an herbicide mixture to 350 degrees, creating so much pressure that the mixture spewed from a broken expansion joint and two vents, FMC officials said.

A month after an accident that rattled a nearby neighborhood, FMC Corp.'s plant in southern Baltimore has received preliminary approval for the renewal of its permit to store and treat hazardous waste, Maryland Department of the Environment officials said last night.The announcement came last night during a public hearing in Curtis Bay on the permit, which expired in 1994. FMC filed for a renewal on time, but a lack of staff at MDE delayed the renewal process for four years, officials said.