Yuengling picks up tab

Yuengling’s heady environmental controversy has finally been settled.

The Pennsylvania… Yuengling’s heady environmental controversy has finally been settled.

The Pennsylvania brewery agreed to pay a $110,000 penalty, a fine imposed on it by the Environmental Protection Agency, for violating industrial discharge limits set by the Clean Water Act.

Under the act, significant industrial users of publicly owned treatment facilities are required to limit their pollution discharge, a precaution designed to protect the plants’ treatment capacity.

But “America’s Oldest Brewery” did not do that, instead discharging wastewater with excess levels of copper, lead, nickel and zinc. The wastewater violated the limits imposed by the brewery’s mandatory pretreatment permit and, according to the EPA, threatened the efficiency of the Pottsville municipal wastewater treatment plant, which sends its water to the Schuylkill River.

Specifically, Yuengling was cited for 64 such violations in the EPA’s complaint, in addition to a citation from the city of Pottsville for 20 violations, according to a press release from the agency.

The fine was amended from the EPA’s earlier request of a $137,500 penalty.