Published in the Ocean County Observer
By DON BENNETT
Staff Writer
TOMS RIVER -- The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has no plans to force Ciba-Geigy to remove a lined landfill as part of its cleanup of toxic wastes on the 1,300-acre plant site in West Dover, a top EPA official said yesterday.
Dover Township officials have sued Ciba-Geigy's successor, Ciba Specialty Chemicals Corp., in an attempt to make it get rid of the landfill.
"We're in a tough position. It's licensed and permitted by the state. It's not leaking. How would we justify closing it?" asked Deputy EPA Region 2 Administrator William J. Muszynski yesterday.
"The drum site we are remediating is leaking," he said as the EPA and Ciba announced that the long-awaited cleanup of caches of toxic waste will begin early next year.
Muszynski said it is up to state Department of Environmental Protection officials to decide when and how the landfill will be closed.
"To pass it on to Superfund is just passing the buck," Muszynski said.
Dover Township officials claim they have evidence the landfill is leaking toxic chemicals, and that is one of the claims they have made against Ciba in a recently filed environmental lawsuit.
They also claim pollution at the former dye and plastics works reduced the value and use of the town's Winding River Park.
Peter Hibbard of Ocean County Citizens for Clean Water said it was a lack of patrols and maintenance of the park that reduced its use, not the pollution of soil and groundwater at the plant site.
"There were gay pick-up points in the park. There was a murder there a few years ago," Hibbard said.
Muszynski told about 50 people huddled under a tent at the plant site yesterday that the second phase of a two-part cleanup is about to get under way.
That is the attack on the buried toxic chemicals that continue to seep into the groundwater, contaminating it.
Ciba has been pumping and treating 2.7 million gallons of that tainted groundwater every day for years to halt the spread of the plume of contamination.
That was a holding action until a way could be found to neutralize or eliminate the toxic sources.
After those sources were identified, old dumps and places where toxic chemicals were allowed to seep into the ground, a way had to be found to eliminate the poisons. Then a system had to be designed to put the science to work.
The result of dozens of meetings with the public, company officials and regulators is a plan to dig up about 35,000 drums of waste and ship them elsewhere for disposal.
Then tiny organisms will be put to work munching on toxics in about 150,000 cubic yards to contaminated soil. The cleaned-up soil will be put back in the ground at the plant site.
That work will be done in four new buildings and one old one that is being rehabilitated.
Ciba designed the system and its contractors will operate it, but the EPA will be making the decisions and monitoring what is going on every day. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will have a man at the site every day to keep track of the cleanup.
A key concern, the release of toxic gases from the unearthed soil and drums, has resulted in one of the most sophisticated air-monitoring systems ever provided at a Superfund site, Muszynski said.
Plant neighbors and others will be able to keep track of what is going on, too. A Web site with information on the cleanup, www.Ciba-Geigysite.org is the address.
Years of acrimony over the site and its pollution finally melded into a working relationship between the EPA, Ciba, and community groups, he said.
He gave particular credit to the late Ben Epstein of Dover Township and his wife, Evelyn.
Epstein, a former OCCCW president, "worked tirelessly" for solutions to the pollution problems, he said. "They kept all of us on the track."
"All the study has been fun. Now the rubber meets the road," said David Williams, Ciba's site manager.
How committed is Ciba to the cleanup? About $292 million worth, said Douglas J. Hefferin, Ciba's regional vice president for environment, health and safety.
The attack on the chemicals in the soil will cost $92 million. The company already has spent $200 million on the site.
"We're confident we can restore the aquifer to EPA standards, although it will take many years," he said.
"We were young when this started. I hope we see it in our lifetime," said Manchester's Marianne Borthwick of the cleanup.
Published in the Ocean County Observer on October 23, 2003
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