In 1992, when the site of the former Columbus Manufactured Gas Plant needed to be cleaned up, no one knew that it would revolutionize environmental policy making.
Georgia Power’s environmental affairs manager Darahyl Dennis will discuss talk about the process in “Toxic Rock: What is it? Why it is Important,” at 6:30 p.m. Thursday in the Studio Theatre at Theatre on the Park on Columbus State University’s RiverPark campus.
Dennis, who graduated in 1974 with a degree in biology from CSU, will talk about the method, which is called "in-situ solidification," was used to clean the four-acre site, which is now part of the Chattahoochee Riverwalk. This method is now used successfully all over the world.
The gas plant was operating in Columbus for almost 100 years from 1854-1931.
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Dennis will also talk about how the clean-up relates to the legal, regulatory and physical issues policymakers deal with regarding environmental contamination in the process of urban redevelopment.
The lecture is part of the environmental policy lectures presented by CSU’s Department of Political Science and MPA Program.