Plan to address whiskey fungus complaints in Mineville

State, WhistlePig agree to larger radius for house cleaning 

By Gwendolyn Craig

WhistlePig Whiskey will wash building exteriors impacted by whiskey fungus within more than triple its original cleaning radius, according to a corrective action plan the state conditionally approved.

The Vermont-based whiskey distiller maintains it is not responsible for the fungus growing on the homes, cars, stop signs and fence posts in the Mineville area near its storage warehouses in the Moriah Business Park. But the compromise reached with the state thus far has led to at least a dozen more neighbors’ homes cleaned at WhistlePig’s expense with more likely in the future.

Ahren Wolson, director of operations at WhistlePig and its subsidiary Moriah Ventures, did not respond to the Explorer’s request for comment. 

The Explorer received the corrective action plan and communications between Wolson and the state Department of Environmental Conservation through a Freedom of Information Law request. Wolson’s original response to the DEC’s order for a corrective action plan was to suggest the company would clean more homes, but did not provide specifics and deflected responsibility. The DEC was not satisfied, but now WhistlePig’s second iteration has more details and is already in place.

In the corrective action plan, WhistlePig increased its house-cleaning radius to 960 yards from 300 yards. Within that radius, the company will pay for one house cleaning by a private contractor per year. WhistlePig has also created a community liaison position for residents to contact for cleaning services.

Brassard has noticed more houses being cleaned in the neighborhood, however, and he hasn’t received as many complaints as when he first took office in January.

“I think they’re finally starting to come around and realize it’s better for the community,” Brassard said. “The least they can do is to offer pressure washing.”

Despite the lack of posting, Wolson told the DEC on July 29 that he had “received an influx of 13 new requests within this 960-yard radius: 7 of those residences have already been washed, 5 more are in process to be washed in the very near future, and 1 has ultimately decided not to have their home washed.”

Records show the DEC wanted WhistlePig to clean homes in an even greater radius– 1,400 feet –  in order to encompass even the furthest home it had tested and found whiskey fungus on Plank Road. 

In an email to the DEC, Wolson said the company has agreed to the 960-yard radius “despite our belief that any fugitive ethanol emissions from our warehouses would dilute quickly downwind” and that “in the absence of objective evidence, we are not yet willing to extend the radius that far.”

WhistlePig has hired an engineering firm to conduct air dispersion models “to determine a principled and objective boundary distance for which impacts would be expected to occur,” Wolson wrote the DEC.

The DEC said it conditionally approved the 960-yard radius but expects the air modeling to be shared by Aug. 30. DEC will determine if the radius should be expanded.

Mike Stoddard, whose garage is covered in black spots and is in view of WhistlePig’s warehouses, said he’s watched three neighbors’ houses get cleaned the week of Aug. 11. He hasn’t yet asked for his house and garage to be washed.

“It seems reasonable enough,” Stoddard said of the compromise, “unless something is proven that it’s an air quality thing.”

The DEC and state Department of Health have said there are no public health concerns with whiskey fungus.

Records delays

The Explorer requested the corrective action plan through a Freedom of Information Law request on June 20. Wolson had labeled the plan as “not for disclosure under Freedom of Information Law.” The DEC alerted Wolson of the Explorer’s records request and told him it would be releasing the information unless he could provide reasons it might be exempt from disclosure.

Wolson said industry competitors do not incur house washing costs. He worried that competitors could encourage residents to seek WhistlePig’s cleaning services.

He also felt releasing the plan “would erroneously create the impression that Moriah Ventures is impacting the public” and would hurt the company’s image.

On July 24, the DEC determined that nothing in the plan constituted a “trade secret” or “confidential information” that would prevent its disclosure. The DEC said WhistlePig “could not reasonably expect” that its “public plan would be confidential.”

The department also noted if any competitors in New York are causing similar whiskey fungus impacts, “those competitors are likely to bear similar compliance costs.” The department gave WhistlePig time to appeal, which appears it did not, before providing the plan to the Explorer.

A growing fungus problem

The plan resulted from complaints the DEC has received about the fungus since at least 2020 and more recently after state-conducted tests in November 2023. 

Residents who have lived in Mineville for decades watched the fungus growing shortly after WhistlePig Whiskey moved to the area in 2017 and began erecting more than a dozen barn-red warehouses to age its whiskey. Permits with the Adirondack Park Agency, which oversees public and private development in the park, show the company plans to store more than 200,000 whiskey barrels there. 

The Explorer reported on residents’ concerns in November 2023 and has followed the state’s handling of its first documented instance of whiskey fungus since. 

Wolson has stressed that whiskey fungus, scientifically known as Baudoinia compniacensis, is naturally occurring in the environment and did not think the state had proved the fungus was linked to WhistlePig’s operations.

The DEC, however, said in March its survey of the Mineville area determined it was “in greater quantities than what is naturally found in the environment. … In this case, the survey determined the WhistlePig facility is the likely source given the location and the amount of fungus present.”

The APA has issued multiple permits to WhistlePig Whiskey and Moriah Ventures. A spokesperson for the agency said the companies are not in violation of their permits.

Asked if the DEC will require any air emissions controls at the warehouses, the department said “DEC requires WhistlePig to either neutralize emissions or mitigate the effects of whiskey fungus.” 

Wolson had told the Explorer previously that air filtration “is neither needed nor possible. In addition to the well-established safety of these emissions the EPA (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency) also acknowledges that no reasonably available control technology exists.” Wolson cited a nearly 30-year-old report from the EPA on distilled spirits emissions.

The DEC and the EPA have been in touch, records show, over the federal Clean Air Act and ethanol emissions. In March, an EPA spokesperson told the Explorer the agency is reviewing the Clean Air Act “in response to recent citizen concerns and complaints across the US regarding mold contamination potentially caused by these facilities.”

The DEC said in August it remains in contact with the EPA.

Top photo: A stop sign near the WhistlePig facility in Mineville photographed in March 2024 shows black staining. Photo by Eric Teed