SAUGUS — At an emergency meeting of the Board of Health Tuesday evening, called in the wake of an equipment malfunction at the WIN Waste Innovations facility that resulted in a loud noise that residents likened to a jet engine, Chair Bill Heffernan indicated that his board is ready and willing to take action against the company.
While Heffernan did not lay out any specific penalties to be levied against the company, he said “nothing was off the table” after the noise resulted in widespread confusion, frustration, and, for some, fear in the community. Company officials were in attendance at the meeting to explain what exactly happened at the waste-to-energy plant that caused the loud noise, and to reassure community members that there were no threats to safety during the incident, which lasted roughly 20 minutes.
Senior Vice President of Operations Peter DiCecco spoke on behalf of the company during the meeting Tuesday evening, which drew a crowd that spilled out of the Community Room at the town’s library and into the hallway. He offered an apology and a detailed explanation of what took place that led to the incident.
According to DiCecco, at around 8:18 p.m. Monday, staff at the facility performed a routine weekly test of the turbine main steam stop valve, which he said prevents steam from entering the main turbine. During the test, the valve shut completely rather than closing slightly and opening back up as it was intended to. As a result, all the steam that was supposed to go to the turbine was redirected to the drag valve and the silencer. When the main stop valve malfunctioned, the drag valve did not open automatically, as it should have, causing the boiler safety relief valves to open and the steam to be vented through safety relief valves for each boiler.
The loud noise was caused by a significant amount of steam exiting the boiler at a high velocity, he said. Plant personnel manually opened the drag valve as the plant was taken offline, and the valve was opened after 22 minutes, at which point the noise abated. The steam silencer was installed in 2021, he said, and there have been many instances when steam was vented through without being audible — as it was designed.
In the wake of the incident, a valve contractor responded to the site Tuesday morning to determine the root cause of both issues — why the test failed and why the drag valve did not open. The issue with the main stop valve was determined to be a failed solenoid, which was replaced, tested, and deemed back to normal. No issues were found with the drag valve or silencer, with the issue stemming from the valve being closed for a length of time that prevented it from coming freely off the valve seat, according to DiCecco.
To ensure incidents like the disturbance Monday evening don’t reoccur, the company is set to perform preventative maintenance on the valve once a month and conduct the regular testing that precipitated the incident during the day instead of at night. Later, at the request of Heffernan, DiCecco committed the company to performing that preventative maintenance on a biweekly basis.
“Last night’s event was completely unexpected considering how often this routine test has been run, and the number of times the silencer and drag valve has worked,” he said. “I don’t expect this explanation to make anyone who was inconvenienced by the situation last night change their opinion. … I’m extremely disappointed that we inconvenienced the community last night.”
DiCecco also vowed to do “whatever it takes” to ensure the plant operates as efficiently and safely as possible.
WIN Waste Innovations Senior Director of Communications and Community Mary Urban echoed DiCecco, saying in a statement that the company would “continue to take the necessary steps to avoid a recurrence.”
Heffernan and other board members hit DiCecco with myriad questions about the incident and the general safety of the plant. Heffernan, a resident of Precinct 10, the closest area of town to the facility, described the incident as a “catastrophic failure” on the part of the company.
DiCecco emphasized that there was no risk to public safety as a result of the incident, a point Heffernan pressed him on repeatedly, asking how the company could know for certain that was the case. In response, DiCecco pointed to the fact that the safety valves operated as designed.
“I’ve been in this profession for 30 years, I’ve never seen a safety valve fail and these safety valves work according to design, so that’s how I can tell you that the public was not at any harm at any time whatsoever,” he said.
Heffernan suggested that the board have multiple third parties examine the impact of the event that took place Monday on safety.
DiCecco also sought to assuage any concerns that the steam emitted from the plant during the event may have been contaminated, saying that if it were condensed back into water it would be akin to drinking water from a faucet.
Director of Public Health John Fralick said he was particularly concerned about the secondary and tertiary impacts of Monday’s incident, saying he believes panic is a public-health issue. Fralick suggested the board look into amending the town’s bylaws to allow the board to respond more directly.
The board heard reports from both Police Chief Michael Ricciardelli and Fire Chief Michael Newbury, who emphasized that public-safety officials in both departments had difficulty communicating with the plant and its staff during the incident.
Ricciardelli said the dispatch center received so many calls — roughly 400 — that two officers had to be pulled away from other tasks to help answer phones. He said his primary concern was that the high volume of calls related to the incident could have delayed responding to a call for an urgent medical issue or a serious crime. Newbury added that fire companies responding to the plant had difficulty contacting staff at the scene, but that once they were able to contact WIN employees they offered a thorough explanation of what took place that satisfied the department.
The board heard roughly 90 minutes of comments from residents of both Saugus and Revere, including several elected officials — among them members of the town’s Board of Selectmen and state Rep. Jessica Giannino, who represents two of the town’s 10 precincts.
Among those who spoke was Jackie Mercurio, a longtime opponent of WIN who was a member of the subcommittee tasked with negotiating a potential host community agreement with the company. Mercurio suggested the company set up a reverse 911 or robocall system to alert residents about incidents at the plant to help abate some of the panic that set in Monday evening.
Selectman Michael Serino, who lives less than a mile from the facility, said he was a “nervous wreck” when the plant began emitting the loud noise. Serino called for the plant, the oldest of its kind in the nation, to be shut down and rebuilt, and called on the state to take action on regulation of solid waste.
Giannino noted that in her 30 years living in Revere, she had never once heard noise emitting from the facility and said she was horrified to learn that the plant, which is more than 3 miles from her home, was audible from that distance. She suggested that the company may have violated noise ordinances in both Revere and Saugus, and called on the board to hold the company accountable.
Heffernan, who has chaired the board for more than a decade, said he would not be afraid to use the board’s “wide authority” to ensure the company is held responsible.
“This is something that affected the entire town,” he said. “This is not going to go away, we will hold WIN accountable, we will require upgrades.”
“This board will act,” Heffernan continued.
