Green Plant of the Year: Keystone Potato Products Takes Sustainability to New Levels

The company didn’t need to invent a process, but the process used to clean the water to potable levels has changed, says Michael Peichert, executive vice president of strategic development, for Masser Family of Companies, who oversees Keystone Potato Products.

“We were able to remove iron and manganese with our original sand filters, but it was horribly costly,” Peichert says. “In 2014, we expanded our water treatment plant to be able to better remove iron and manganese.”

The water goes through a series of cleaning steps, and the iron and manganese (the primary metals in the water Keystone uses) precipitate out with the addition of a chemical additive. Keystone uses that drinkable water in its plant, then sends it to its on-site wastewater treatment plant, and the cleaned water is discharged into the local watershed.

“Ultimately, we clean impaired mining water that would otherwise degrade the environment, use it to process food, then treat it again before discharging it,” Peichert says.

Pushing progress

Keystone believes it has the “greenest” food processing plant in the eastern U.S., but that hasn’t prevented the company from continuing to make the plant even “greener.” The iron and manganese that Keystone’s process removes from the mine water are caked and currently sent to landfill — but Peichert hints toward future sustainability-based solutions.

“We’re in the Chesapeake Bay watershed and regulated by the Susquehanna River Basin Commission, so we’re seeing if we can provide that iron/manganese cake to farmers or fertilizer companies to use to bind phosphorus into the soil,” he explains. “One of the leading contributors to Chesapeake Bay issues is phosphorus leaching, so we might have another value-added way for this facility to help the environment.”

Peichert says Keystone is investigating ways to use the methane from its own wastewater facility to generate electricity for the plant, taking it 100% off the grid. Currently, the company flares that methane but would like to put it to a more sustainable use, if possible. On the production side, Masser says, dehydrating the last little bit of potato peel waste the company still sends to cattle feed will be a major win.