Chemtura starts offsite chemical probe
Company and Environment Ministry officials recognize contamination may have migrated east
ELMIRA — Chemtura and Environment Ministry officials have recognized chemical contamination may have migrated offsite in Elmira, after years of advocates insisting that was the case.
“It was so close to the boundary that it’s hard to imagine it didn’t go offsite,” said Dick Jackson, chair of the township’s technical advisory committee on Elmira’s polluted groundwater. “We did call this.”
According to a report from consultants GHD, groundwater and soil along the eastern boundary of the Chemtura property in Elmira tested positive for various chemicals including NDMA, chlorides and benzene beyond the Ontario Safe Drinking Water Quality Standards in June. That testing confirmed findings from 2015.
Now an offsite investigation will take place on private property on the eastern boundary of the Chemtura site on Church Street. Other than the massive plume identified in 1989 this is the first acknowledgment contamination may have migrated
east of the site.
As well, 2016 testing showed cancer-causing NDMA in some wells on the east boundary of the Chemtura site in greater concentrations than in 2015.
Coun. Mark Bauman said it has been frustrating trying to get the polluted groundwater taken seriously.
“The frustrating thing for me is the approach that has been taken,” he said. “It seems to be, ‘let’s do as little as possible to try and solve this ...’ the Ministry of Environment really has never given this the priority it deserves.”
Ramin Ansari, corporate remediation manager with Chemtura, said he can’t speak to what may have prevented acknowledgment of possible migration on the east side in the past.
But, if testing shows that has occurred, the contamination will be cleaned up.
“If there’s a problem we will work on it and remediate it,” he said.
Ansari said testing should be underway later this year or early in 2017.
If contamination is found offsite a next step would be to do more testing and determine how far. “It’s a stepwise approach,” Ansari said. Chemtura is using a pump and treat system to remove a cancer-causing chemical in the water called NDMA that closed township wells in 1989.
Chemtura’s predecessor, Uniroyal, was operating the facilities at the time. The Ontario Ministry of Environment ordered the cleanup be complete by 2028.
The test results are an ‘I told you so’ for members of the Citizens Public Advisory Committee.
The township committee previously known as the Chemtura Public Advisory Committee had warned for years that contamination was migrating offsite.
Dan Holt, a member of the citizen committee, said he welcomed the new testing but it shouldn’t have taken so long.
“You get whiplash watching them move,” he joked.
Holt said the plan for investigating offsite still isn’t sufficient for several reasons, including that it doesn’t inspect deeply enough into the ground, leaves out some crucial testing areas and doesn’t test for all the relevant chemicals.
“That’s like saying we’re going to test you to see if you have cancer and we’re going to test your little finger,” he said.
The environment ministry and Chemtura are settling the final investigation plan.
Ansari said Chemtura is making changes right now to add more test locations.
The struggle to clean up the township’s water supply has been underway for nearly 30 years.
In July Chemtura officials said computer modelling suggested there would still be some contamination southwest of the plant in 2028.
Of further concern are chemicals in the Canagagigue Creek.
Contamination levels recorded in two hot spots in the Canagagigue by the Ministry of the Environment were found to exceed the Canadian Council for Ministers of the Environment Canadian Environmental Quality Guidelines for dioxins, furans and DDT compounds.
From 1945 to 1948, Uniroyal, now Chemtura, produced up to 300,000 pounds of DDT per year.
The dioxins and furans in the Canagagigue Creek are the fallout from production of the Agent Orange herbicide at the Uniroyal plant in the 1960s.
Uniroyal Chemical Ltd. was contracted by the U.S. government to produce Agent Orange in the 1960s.
The herbicide contains the toxic chemical dioxin and was used by the U.S. government during the Vietnam War. It can cause cancer and other serious health problems.