Kassel—A German court will widen its investigation into whether to extend a saline wastewater disposal permit for K+S AG, the country’s WirtschaftsWoche weekly magazine reported on March 9. The move by the Administrative Court in Kassel to extend the probe follows charges filed last week by Meiningen town prosecutors against 14 people at the company, including chairman of K+S’s Board of Executive Directors, Norbert Steiner, over alleged illegal saline wastewater disposal and water pollution (GM March 4, p. 16). The charges relate to the injection of wastewater into the Gerstungen trough between 1999 and 2007. In a statement last week, K+S said it remains convinced that it lawfully obtained the permit for the injection of saline wastewater into the Gerstungen trough for the years in question and has said previously it is cooperatively fully with the investigators (GM March 4, p. 16). The company secured provisional approval from the Kassel Regional Council in December to resume the injection of saline wastewater from the Werra plant until Dec. 31, 2016, to a limited extent, after its previous water-law permit expired at the end of November (GM Jan. 1, p. 13). This week, K+S said that up to now it hardly has had to interrupt production since the water levels of the Werra River are sufficient to be able to discharge saline wastewater. But once late spring arrives and there is less rainfall, it is possible, it warned, that it will have to halt production, at least at times. The company said it expects a final decision this summer on its application to continue injection until the end of 2021.
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