Genesis Products Incorporated - There is a Better Way

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Manufacturing Today features Genesis Products

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The idea came from our work in Sustainability planning and with our association with The Sustainbaility Coalition. As part of our sustainability plan, we looked at the impact of our operations on the natural system (of which we all are a part of)

We looked at four areas:

- Materials extracted from the earth’s crust
- Our use of man-made chemicals
- Degradation of natural systems such as forests
- The ability of people to sustain themselves

Company President Jon Helmuth at the Genesis project site in Goshen Indiana.

The principles of Sustainability involve the shared goals of improving the environment, benefiting people and creating profit. The Genesis Project is a collaboration of representatives from non-profit, government and industry joining together to forward these goals.

At the corner corner of Wagner and Sixth streets in Elkhart Indiana is a vacant industrial site. Once a roundhouse for the rail industry, this polluted Brownfield site is now owned by the City of Elkhart and has been vacant for more than 50 years.

In May of this year, volunteers staying at Faith Mission of Elkhart planted approximately 6500 poplar trees on this site. These Poplar trees will clean the soil of heavy metals and volatile organic compounts over time and provide a beautiful scenic upgrade to the abondoned lot. Once the wood is ready for harvest it will be used to supply regional industries with timber.

The Genesis Project Partners:

- Genesis Products

- EPA

- Elkhart County, County Soil & Water and Elkhart Environmental Center,

- US Forestry Service and poplar expert, Dr. Jud Isebrands

All costs were shared among the partners:

- Wagner Street property is a Brownfield site and is owned by the City of Elkhart

- Early research and the trees were contributed by Genesis Products

- Initial site preparation and ongoing maintenance is managed by the City of Elkhart and Faith Mission, a local non-profit located near the Wagner site

- Planning and technical assistance- including recruitment of an expert in hybrid poplar cultivation, was coordinated by the Delta Redevelopment Institute with funding from the US EPA Office of Brownfield and Land Revitalization.

What is Phytoremediation?

Extensive research has shown that certain plant species are adapted to growth in soils contaminated with heavy metals (such as nickel, lead, zinc and copper) and organic contaminants such as trinitrotoluene (TNT), trichloroethylene (TCE). An alternative clean-up technology that uses the action of plants and their associated microbes to alleviate hazardous soil contamination, this type of remediation is natural and powerful. The trees we carefully selected are some of the best plants on earth to remove heavy metals and volatile organic compounds, leaving the soil significantly cleaner.