WESTBROOK – Pike Industries is planning on doing production blasting at its quarry on Spring Street sometime between now and the end of the year, according to a copy of the blast permit application.

The application, which was approved, was filed at the Westbrook Code Enforcement Office on Nov. 15. It indicates the company estimates it would need to perform eight production blasts. The permit allows blasting between Oct. 17 and Dec. 31 of this year, but does not specify just when the company will do its blasting.

Pike spokesman Jonathan Olson said this week that the company applied for permission to do up to eight blasts, but that’s only the maximum number they can do.

“I don’t believe we’ll be doing eight,” he said.

It’s more likely, he said, that Pike would do between four and six blasts, depending on weather conditions.

“Nothing’s easy in the cold and snow,” he said.

Pike has drawn the ire of neighbors to its 645 Spring St. quarry ever since executives announced they would be ramping up operations at the quarry. That announcement came on the heels of the company saying it intended to shut down a similar operation on Main Street.

Pike has officially owned and operated its Spring Street quarry for decades, but residents have said that activity there has been virtually nonexistent all this time. The decision to begin new work in the quarry, which Pike executives indicated would include periodic blasting of rock, came as a shock to the neighborhood.

Chief among the initial complainants was Idexx Laboratories, which was planning a new, $50 million corporate headquarters next door to the site, and threatened to cancel its plans to expand because of the Pike quarry.

That led to a lengthy discussion among Pike, Idexx and the city, which ended in the fall of 2010 with a lengthy consent agreement, spelling out in detail just when and under what conditions Pike would be allowed to operate the quarry, including blasting.

When a Cumberland County Superior Court judge signed off on the agreement, Idexx proceeded with its plans to expand, but other abutters were still unhappy. Artel, a manufacturer of sensitive liquid-measuring equipment, has protested that Pike’s blasting will wreak havoc on their instruments.

The owners of Smiling Hill Farm, including Warren Knight, have also complained, filing a joint appeal with Artel and a collective association of residents of the nearby Birdland neighborhood, to the consent agreement. That appeal awaits a decision by the Maine Supreme Court.

This week, Knight called the city’s decision to allow Pike to blast “reckless.” He said he believed Pike was planning to blast too late in the year to be permitted by the consent agreement, and that the company hasn’t finished building a buffer zone designed to protect neighbors.

“I thought it was premature to be issuing a permit,” he said.

If the Supreme Court decides to declare the consent agreement null and void, Knight said, that won’t undo any damage Pike’s blasting does now.

“They’re going to dramatically alter the landscape,” he said. “You can’t put the toothpaste back in the tube.”

According to the agreement, Pike is allowed to set off no more than eight “production blasts,” or explosions designed to loosen rock inside the quarry for retrieval.

Olson said this week that the company is working with its blasting subcontractor, Maine Drilling and Blasting, to iron out a schedule for blasting work. The consent agreement requires Pike post its schedule on the city’s website two weeks prior to any blasting, and to inform neighbors well in advance, too.

“Once we know the schedule, we’ll be proceeding with those notifications,” Olson said.