Businessman faces toxics trial.

Byline: Winston Ross The Register-Guard

NORTH BEND - The owner of a local company that makes formaldehyde will stand trial next September on charges that he illegally dumped thousands of tons of hazardous waste at a ranch his company owns in Central Oregon.

It is one of the biggest cases they've ever seen, state environmental officials said, based on the amount of material involved.

Dennis Beetham of North Bend owns a company called D.B. Western, which has designed and built 29 formaldehyde and resin plants for clients around the world, according to its Web site. The company describes a plant it built in Houston, Texas, as the largest formaldehyde facility in the world, capable of making 1.2 billion pounds a year. Formaldehyde has a variety of uses, from textiles to wood products.

Earlier this month, a federal grand jury indicted Beetham on felony charges that he illegally dumped more than 3,500 tons of waste from his factories, shipped in from plants as far away as Minnesota, on a 500-plus acre ranch in Powell Butte, near Prineville.

"We're looking forward to the trial, so we can get the facts out," Beetham said Monday.

Beetham's Powell Butte property, known as the Cinder Lakes Ranch, includes a large cinder cone. Between 2005 and 2007, according to the federal government, Beetham's company shipped 265 tons of hazardous waste, 241 tons of industrial waste and 3,000 tons of solid waste - including a drum containing nitric acid - to the ranch. He ordered employees to dump that material into the cinder cone, bury it or burn it, the federal government said.

In addition, according to the indictment, Beetham had components filled with formaldehyde from various company facilities shipped to the ranch and stored there over a period of several years, all without a permit.

Formaldehyde is classified as a hazardous waste when discarded because it can threaten groundwater and cause various respiratory ailments when ingested, said Brett McKnight, hazardous waste and spills manager for the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality. It also has been linked to cancer.

"It's a site of great concern because of the scope of activity," said Brian White, a spokesman for the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality. "Our investigators are still trying to get a handle on how much is out there, and what the level of contamination is."

McKnight called it "one of the largest cases we've been involved in," based on the amount of material.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Superfund program is now involved in the cleanup, although the site has not been given that federal designation. The federal government inspected the facility in North Bend where Beetham may have received some of the waste, McKnight said, but it's not known what was found there.

"Cleaning up this site as quickly as possible is our top priority," said Mike Boykin, EPA's project manager for the cleanup, which is scheduled to be completed next month. "Hundreds of tons of material have already been removed, but some hazardous waste is still waiting to be disposed of, and some areas have yet to be thoroughly sampled and cleaned up."

Winston Ross can be reached at [phone] or [e-mail].