Kraft Heinz failed to report spill from Muscatine, Iowa plant for years

Kraft Heinz Foods Co., the maker of Kraft Mac & Cheese, Lunchables and Jell-O, has agreed to pay an $8,000 fine after Iowa officials discovered its Muscatine plant failed to report pollution it discharged into a tributary of the Mississippi River for three years.

According to the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, the publicly traded company, with headquarters in Pittsburgh and Chicago, failed to report to the state its monthly treated discharge into Mad Creek, a tributary of the Mississippi, from January 2021 through December 2023, in violation of its National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit.

Kraft Heinz, which did not acknowledge wrongdoing under the state’s administrative consent order, did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday. The Muscatine plant makes condiments such as ketchup, mustard and barbecue sauce.

The state Environmental Protection Agency discovered the reporting gap during a compliance audit, which companies like Kraft Heinz undergo every three to five years, Terry Jones, senior environmental expert with the Iowa DNR, said Friday.

The reporting violation was not recorded in the state database because the plant reported it was closed, Jones said. He said the state knew that was not true and the company conducted an investigation, which revealed that there had been insufficient reporting.

Kraft Heinz agreed to pay the administrative fine, according to the Iowa DNR’s consent order. The state fined the company $3,000 for profiting from the violation; $3,000, for the severity of the violation; and $2,000 for failing to comply with permit requirements.

In November 2020, the state notified Kraft Heinz that discharge monitoring reports showed the company had exceeded numerous discharge limits from mid-May 2018 through September 2020 — and that it had failed to test its wastewater as regularly as required under its federal wastewater discharge permit. The state ordered corrective action.

Jones said Kraft Heinz believed the three-year gap in reporting was due to a change in personnel. The company reported that it earned $2.85 billion in its last fiscal year.

The state’s administrative fines are capped at $10,000. The Iowa DNR could have imposed higher fines — up to $5,000 per day of violation — by taking the matter to the Iowa Attorney General’s Office.