KMB 2009 Award Recipients
The President's Plaque Award:
BASF Corporation,—Fightin Island Restoration (Wyandotte)
BASF Corporation and its predecessor companies have owned the 1572 acreFighting Island since 1918. The southern three-quarters of the island was divided into three settling beds which served as the final disposition for alkaline byproducts from the manufacture of soda ash and other lime-based products from 1924–1981. With a goal of revegetation and reforestation, thousands of bales of straw, alfalfa and leaves were laid down to increase the organic material in the soil. BASF has planted more than 200,000 seedlings of poplar, Russian olive and berry bushes on the island. Turkeys and ring-neck pheasants have been introduced. The island has been certified as a Wildlife Habitat since 2002 and has increasingly won many international awards for environmental, educational and conservation-related impact on corporate, private and public land.
