Inland Environmental Resources, Inc

Inland Environmental Resources, Inc. (IER) is a distributor of magnesium oxide and magnesium hydroxide products and other innovative environmentally-friendly process water and wastewater treatment chemicals and equipment. Based in Pasco, WA, IER primarily services the Pacific and Inland Northwest. However, because of our unique technologies offered, IER also provides services to customers worldwide.

IER’s philosophy is to listen to and observe our customers to identify potential environmental solutions that can optimize performance and minimize costs associated with process water and wastewater treatment. In most cases, the environmental solution to a problem is also the most cost-effective solution. To aid in this process, IER offers more than 100 years of combined experience in the areas of municipal and industrial wastewater and process water treatment.

IER is the Pacific Northwest distributor of Magnesium Hydroxide with facilities located in Pasco, WA. with additional plant locations in Sioux City, Iowa; Hills, Iowa; Panhandle, Texas; Heyburn, Idaho and Forest Grove, Oregon. The use of Magnesium Hydroxide, also known as “Milk of Magnesia”, is growing rapidly as the needs increase for safe and inexpensive chemistry, sodium-free wastewater acid neutralization, improved solids settling, and sludge volume reduction.

In addition, IER is a proud distributor of innovative environmentally-friendly technologies for:
- chemical-free odor control for municipal lift stations, land application systems, aerobic digesters, and lagoons
- extremely low-energy method to generate high concentrations of dissolved oxygen in water
- low-cost and low-energy cavitational air flotation equipment
- extremely low-backflush volume, media-free filtration
- process water recycle/reuse methodology

Dick Handley, CEO / Chairman

With over 30+ years of water and wastewater treatment experience, Dick is both an expert in the field and an entrepreneurial investor. Until recently, Dick was the owner of three small companies that operated under the umbrella of Inland Aqua Technologies (Inland AquaTech). These three companies focused on 1) traditional boiler, cooling, and waste water treatment, 2) water and deposit analytical services, and 3) environmental water and wastewater equipment. Finding the routine aspects of his business unfulfilling, Dick decided to divest from traditional water treatment and analytical services, as his energies were being drawn to more innovative, environmentally-friendly technologies for water and wastewater treatment. Therefore, in 1997 Dick created Inland Environmental Resources to be his primary focus, and the other business interests were sold. Since that time, Dick’s entrepreneurial spirit has been rekindled with the desire to bring environmentally-friendly technologies to industry that can result in process water that is safer for the foods in our processes, and wastewater that has soil-building value as it is returned to our environment.

Doug Kelley, IER President and Technical Director

After graduating in 1990 with his Ph. D. in Inorganic Chemistry from Iowa State University, Doug went immediately to work for Nalco Chemical Company, the world’s largest industrial water treatment company. Working in the laboratory, Doug was responsible for patenting new chemical compositions and methodologies for applications as diverse as boiler water oxygen-scavenging and cooling water silica scale inhibition. Doug is an expert in the areas of scale formation, corrosion control, microbial control, and wastewater treatment. However, it is difficult within a large corporation for an entrepreneurial spirit to remain strong while constantly battling to bring new technology from the idea stage to product fulfillment. Doug discovered IER while Dick was in the midst of selling his boiler, cooling, and waste water treatment interests to Nalco. They rapidly developed a friendship that resulted in Doug leaving Nalco to help Dick build the foundation of what IER is today – a leader in innovative, environmentally-friendly, cost-effective technologies for process and wastewater applications.