Commissioners sent a letter to EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy requesting an expedited review of the barrel fill, an 8.5-acre section of a closed landfill for industrial waste barrels that contain an estimated 1.5 million gallons of hazardous waste buried underground.
“The threat to an aquifer which supplies water to two major cities and suburbs of Dayton and Springfield, Ohio is well documented, validated and known to your agency. Urgent decision making and action would preclude and prevent a disaster similar to those (with the Gold King Mine in Colorado and Flint, Michigan),” Commissioners Rick Lohnes, John Detrick and David Herier wrote.
Local officials and People for Safe Water believe hazardous waste is leaking from the site, which could affect drinking water for 82,000 customers around Clark County. It’s currently listed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency as a Superfund Alternative site.
If left in its current state, the site could be a risk to public health decades from now, officials have said.
The federal EPA was expected to move forward with a $56 million plan, Alternative 4a, to remove all hazardous waste from the barrel fill. However, in 2011, the federal agency issued its final decision, the $28 million Alternative 9a, which called for barrels containing industrial waste to be dug up and then reburied on-site in a lined landfill.
Officials and local citizens want the clean-up plan reverted back to Alternative 4a.
The EPA is spending $10,000 to have the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers evaluate additional cleanup measures at the barrel fill.
A final draft of the report from the Army Corps was expected at the end of March, according to the EPA.
EPA officials did not return calls seeking comment about the report.
Richard C. Karl, director of the EPA’s Superfund Division, told county commissioners in a letter that the EPA is working to determine how best to move forward with cleanup of the site.
He also told commissioners there’s no immediate threat to the aquifer.
“At this time, there is no information to suggest that the area’s deep drinking water aquifer has been impacted by site contaminants, nor is there information suggesting the existence of a threat of an adverse impact for many years,” Karl wrote.
Karl said the Ohio EPA collected groundwater samples in and around the site in December 2014 and the results show “no significant impact to the upper aquifer.”
Clark County Combined Health District Commissioner Charles Patterson said he’s not surprised by the EPA’s response.
He said the EPA took a limited number of samples and more testing is needed for a definitive evaluation.
Patterson also said he appreciates the commissioners efforts to put pressure on the EPA.
“I’m concerned about getting it right … The more pressure that can be put on the U.S. EPA to come around to the view of the public the better,” Patterson said.
Patterson said the water crises in Michigan and Colorado show the public that the EPA can make mistakes and “we need to err on the side of caution when we choose the remedy that we choose.”
Lohnes said the “mishaps” that occurred in Colorado and Michigan should warrant a review and an expedient review.
Detrick said he’s optimistic the EPA will commit more money toward the barrel fill cleanup.
He said the additional funds toward barrel removal could “guarantee safe water supply for the next thousand years to all of southwest Ohio.”
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