I made it to the EPA meeting tonight. Most of the same people but a very different setting than the last one. This was a formal presentation by Luis Flores of the EPA followed by a Q&A session. In a nutshell, he reviewed the key findings of the studies that have been done and presented the alternatives for remediation of the downstream waters, along with the EPA's recommendation.
Here's an overview:
The Site is divided into 2 "Operable Units" - Operable Unit 2 is the actual Ward site that was discussed last time and is undergoing treatment now. Operable Unit 1 is the downstream areas. Today's presentation focused on Operable Unit 1.
The data had not changed since the last meeting. Same fish and soil contamination measurements.
- Contaminated soil samples begin at the Ward site near 70 and 540, follow some unnamed feeder creeks to Little Brier Creek along 540, into Brier Creek reservoir (near the Airport), into Brier Creek, into Lake Crabtree. No soil contamination has been found beyond Lake Crabtree.
- Contaminated fish have been found as far as the Neuse - some 30 miles downstream. The fish contamination levels are high enough at Brier Creek Reservoir to warrant a no consumption advisory (do not eat), but Brier Creek reservoir is largely unfished/inaccessible. Fish contamination in Lake Crabtree and Crabtree Creek are high enough to warrant a Do Not Eat warning for carp and catfish, and a one meal per month for other fish. Crabtree Creek to the Neuse warrants a one meal per month warning for all species. Signs have been posted and Lake Crabtree County Park is going above the advisory by enforcing a catch and release policy on park grounds.
The remediation alternatives, their cost estimates and the EPA recommendation were the new news. The 5 alternatives included:
- Alternative 1 - no action (required by EPA to include in every analysis). Would include 5 year reviews of the remedy for a period of 30 years. Cost $336K
- Alternative 2 - Institutional Controls. This includes education and outreach, posting of signs and the 5 year reviews. Cost $476K
- Alternative 3 - Monitored Natural Recovery + Institutional Controls. All of the above plus annual monitoring of sediment and aquatic biota (fish, shellfish). Basically letting nature take its course, with frequent monitoring of the progress. Modeling indicates that it may take more than 30 years before the PCB levels in the fish would drop to acceptable levels for consumption under this plan, based on the levels present in the watershed. Cost $2.2M
- Alternative 4 - Excavation and off-site disposal of contaminated sediment in the upper reaches of the unnamed feeder creek and Lower Brier Creek, plus Monitored Natural Recovery for Brier Creek Reservoir, Lake Crabtree and Lower Crabtree Creek. (In re-reading the document, the terminology changed here to add "Lower" to Brier Creek and Crabtree Creek. I'm going to have to go back and review or ask the EPA folks for clarification). Basically they would re-sample the upper creek areas and wherever they come up with a 1ppm measure of PCBs they would excavate. By reducing all of the source areas to below 1ppm, their models indicate that that the fish in Brier Creek Reservoir would be edible in 14 years and Lake Crabtree in 9 years. Cost $4.9M
- Alternative 5 - Excavation/Dredging of everything through Lake Crabtree. Cost $540M. (don't need to say much about this one - nobody stood up with a half-billion dollar check...). This option yielded about a year faster to get to edible fish after the work was completed, but by the time they got done planning it would up being years longer than #4.
The EPA is recommending Alternative 4.
This is the beginning of the open comment period which runs through October 4 (I believe - the docs say September 4, but they mentioned in the meeting that the comment window had been extended).
If anybody wants a copy of the report they can find it (and everything else related to the Ward site) at the North Regional Library on Harps Mill Rd. in Raleigh. Or you can contact either of these folks to receive one by mail:
Luis E. Flores, Remedial Project Manager
(404)562-8807,
flores.luis@epa.gov
or
Angela Miller, Community Involvement Coordinator
(404)562-8561,
miller.angela@epa.gov
(I'll post some more in a reply)