MEAD, Neb. — Years of private efforts to clean up wet cake pollution from a Nebraska ethanol plant that turned pesticide-coated seed corn into fuel inched in recent weeks toward resolution.

Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen on Tuesday visited with Mead residents to tout the state’s progress in working with six seed companies now running the former AltEn ethanol plant’s cleanup, the AltEn Facility Response Group.

Pillen told locals who have fought for state attention that he is proud of the work that removed a roughly 165,000-ton “mountain” of mixed material that included about 84,000 tons of contaminated byproduct. Work continues to clear polluted lagoons and groundwater. Nebraska tried regulating AltEn into compliance but eventually shut it down in February 2021, filing a separate state-led lawsuit that year against the plant that is still being negotiated for settlement. A wastewater spill followed days later. Seed companies that had been working with the company took over cleanup.

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