A new way to help control sediment build up in Cleveland’s shipping channel is saving and making money for the port.
Sediment flowing to the channel can mingle with pollutants near the port. If it is then dredged, it must go to a confined disposal facility.
There's one such facility now, and it's filling up. Building another could cost $200million. So, the port and its partners are heading off the problem by capturing sediment upriver.
Port Vice President Jade Davis says, because the sediment is clean, it can be sold for all sorts of uses.
“Everything from road construction to the land bank (which) has used some of it to fill basement for homes that were torn down. One of the biggest projects for which the sediment was used was the off and on ramps for the George Voinovich Bridge.”
The Ohio EPA has determined that the sediment from up river is clean enough to be repurposed. It's been battling the Army Corps of Engneers over its plans to dump the dredged material in open Lake Erie.
