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Tag: Contaminants

EPA Finalizes $19.5 Million Plan to Upgrade Groundwater Treatment System and Maximize Removal of Contaminants at the Fair Lawn Well Field Superfund Site, New Jersey

 

NEW YORK, NY - Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) finalized a $19.5 million cleanup plan for the Fair Lawn Well Field Superfund site in Fair Lawn, New Jersey. Previous industrial and commercial activities at the site contaminated the soil and groundwater with chlorinated volatile organic compounds. EPA will expand and enhance the system that extracts and treats the contaminated groundwater at the site.

 

“EPA’s groundwater cleanup plan complements the state’s work to control the source of contamination and reflects years of thorough scientific studies and collaboration with our state and local partners,” said EPA Regional Administrator Pete Lopez. “By upgrading the groundwater treatment system, we are maximizing the removal of contaminants and ensuring the protection of people’s health.”

 

"I don't want any parents in Bergen County, in the Fifth District, or anywhere in New Jersey to have to worry if the water their children are drinking is safe. It’s important for the EPA to move forward and clean up the Fair Lawn Well Field Superfund site, removing harmful groundwater contaminants and making sure the site is monitored over the long term. We need to work together to ensure every North Jersey family has access to clean, safe drinking water," said Congressman Josh Gottheimer (NJ-5).

 

EPA held a public meeting in August 2018 to explain its cleanup proposal, discuss the other cleanup options that were considered, and to solicit public comments. To read the EPA’s selected cleanup plan, visit: www.epa.gov/superfund/fair-lawn-wellfield  or view a direct link to the EPA’s Record of Decision at https://semspub.epa.gov/src/document/02/550183

 

Background:

Most of the contamination at the Superfund site comes from the Fair Lawn Industrial Park, which contaminated the groundwater and some municipal wells with volatile organic compounds (VOCs), including 1,4 dioxane. The impacted municipal supply wells are currently not used for the public water supply but the groundwater is being treated to remove contaminants and discharged to Henderson Brook. The Westmoreland Well Field treatment system will be upgraded to also address 1,4 dioxane. To ensure that the public is provided with a clean, secure drinking water supply, Fair Lawn is relying on other sources of water until the cleanup plan can be implemented.

 

Previous cleanup actions by the potentially responsible parties included investigation of soil and groundwater, removal and disposal of contaminated soil, long-term monitoring of groundwater quality, and payment to the Borough of Fair Lawn for the installation, operation, and maintenance of the groundwater treatment system at the Westmoreland Well Field.

 

Groundwater treatment is ongoing and preventing the contaminated groundwater from spreading, while efforts by the State of New Jersey are addressing the sources of contamination. EPA’s cleanup plan will upgrade the groundwater treatment equipment at the Westmoreland Well Field and it will remove the contaminant 1,4 dioxane.  Additionally, the two other municipal wells at the Westmoreland Well Field will be re-started, if feasible, to further control the contaminated plume. EPA’s cleanup plan includes long-term monitoring and measures to restrict the use of untreated groundwater from the site. Throughout the cleanup, monitoring, testing, and further studies will be conducted to ensure the effectiveness of the cleanup.

 

The Superfund program has been providing important health benefits to communities across the country for more than 35 years. Superfund cleanups also strengthen local economies. Data collected through 2017 shows that at 487 Superfund sites in reuse, approximately 6,600 businesses are generating $43.6 billion in sales and employ 156,000 people who earned a combined income of $11.2 billion.

 

Under the Trump Administration, the Superfund program has reemerged as a priority to fulfill and strengthen EPA’s core mission of protecting human health and the environment.

 

On the one-year anniversary of the EPA’s Superfund Task Force Report, EPA announced significant progress in carrying out the report’s recommendations. These achievements will provide certainty to communities, state partners, and developers that the nation’s most hazardous sites will be cleaned up as quickly and safely as possible.

 

EPA’s “Superfund Task Force Recommendations 2018 Update” is available at: https://www.epa.gov/superfund/superfund-task-force-recommendations-2018-update.

 

Follow EPA Region 2 on Twitter at http://twitter.com/eparegion2 and visit our Facebook page, http://facebook.com/eparegion2.

Pilot Project Advances EPA’s Cleanup of Gowanus Canal Superfund Site in Brooklyn, NY

Contact: Elias Rodriguez, rodriguez.elias@epa.gov, (212) 637-3664

 

NEW YORK, NY - This week marks the one-year anniversary of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Superfund Task Force Report. The Superfund Task Force was commissioned to provide recommendations on how EPA could streamline and improve the Superfund program. EPA has made significant progress in carrying out the report’s recommendations. The Agency also finalized its plans for completing all 42 recommendations by the end of 2019, which are outlined in a new 2018 Update to the Superfund Task Force recommendations.

 

“EPA has improved the health, living conditions, and economic opportunity of thousands of people living near Superfund sites over the past year as the Agency worked to implement the Task Force recommendations,” said EPA Acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler. “I am proud of the accomplishments achieved by EPA’s hardworking staff, and we will continue to engage directly with stakeholders and communities near Superfund sites to accelerate cleanup and promote economic revitalization. Our plan to complete Task Force recommendations by the end of 2019 will ensure this work continues as one of EPA’s highest priorities.”

 

“Tremendous progress has been made at this site, and what we are learning here will be applied to the overall clean up the Gowanus Canal,” said EPA Regional Administrator Pete Lopez. “This pilot project is serving its purpose – to show us what works best and what may not work as well under real-world conditions as we move toward full-scale cleanup of this highly-contaminated canal.”

 

Today, EPA Regional Administrator Pete Lopez, Dan Wiley, Congresswoman Nydia M. Velázquez’s District Director for Southwest Brooklyn, other dignitaries and community members looked on as the dredging and capping pilot project at the Gowanus Canal Superfund site in Brooklyn, N.Y. enters its final phase. Under EPA oversight, approximately 17,000 cubic yards of contaminated sediment have been dredged from the Gowanus Canal’s 4th Street turning basin. Work is currently underway to cap the bottom. The project will inform the overall engineering design that will lead to the dredging and capping of the Gowanus Canal. The pilot study began in October 2017 and is expected to be completed later this fall.

 

Under the pilot project, steel sheet piles walls were installed along the sides of the canal to allow dredging work to be performed safely and sediment was removed and taken off-site for treatment and disposal. In the final phase, layers of sand, clay, and activated carbon-absorbing materials will be placed on the turning basin bottom to create a clean canal bottom.

 

Background: Overall Gowanus Canal Cleanup

 

More than a dozen contaminants, including polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), and heavy metals, including mercury, lead, and copper, are present at high levels in the sediment in the Gowanus Canal. PAHs, PCBs, and heavy metals were also found in the Canal water.

 

The cleanup plan for the Gowanus Canal Superfund site includes dredging to remove contaminated sediment from the bottom of the Canal, which has accumulated because of industrial and combined sewer overflow (CSO) discharges. Following dredging during the full-scale cleanup, dredged areas will be capped. In addition, certain areas of the native sediment that contain mobile liquid tar will be mixed with cement and solidified to prevent the migration of the tar. The cleanup plan also includes controls to reduce CSO discharges and other land-based sources of pollution, such as street runoff, from compromising the cleanup. The design for the cleanup of the upper canal is to be completed in spring 2019. EPA expects that the implementation of the final cleanup will be covered by a future agreement with, or order by, the EPA. Full-scale dredging of the remainder of the Canal is expected to start in 2020. The estimated cost of the cleanup is $506 million.

 

To learn more, please visit: www.epa.gov/superfund/gowanus-canal

 

EPA’s Superfund Task Force web site: https://www.epa.gov/superfund/superfund-task-force

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