Hearing on TCE contaminated drinking water in Arizona

February 12, 2008 - The Arizona Corporation Commission will host a special open meeting Wednesday to discuss two TCE contamination incidents.

Commissioner Bill Mundell called for the fact-finding meeting following an incident in mid January, in which Arizona American imposed a three-day ban telling its customers not to use their tap water for drinking and preparing food.

The ban was in response to an incident in which concentrations of TCE, or trichloroethylene, exceeded federal standards by four times.

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EPA to clean up Arizona homes contaminated with arsenic, lead and copper

January 11, 2008 - The Environmental Protection Agency will proceed with the cleanup of 15 homes in the copper mining towns of Hayden and Winkelman after soil tests revealed high levels of arsenic, lead and copper, officials announced during public hearings Wednesday and Thursday.

The soil in the yards of the homes will be removed and replaced with clean dirt, and the interiors of the homes will be vacuumed and scrubbed with special equipment, EPA officials said.

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Health and Environmental Impacts of Uranium Contamination in the Navajo Nation

December 29, 2007 - Late this year, spurred to action by a series of articles in The Los Angeles Times in 2006, Representative Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) held a hearing on “The Health and Environmental Impacts of Uranium Contamination in the Navajo Nation” in the House Oversight Committee.

The Waxman hearings led to a charge to federal and Navajo Nation agencies to determine a course of action for dealing with the aftermath of uranium mining: Identify a plan for the studies, tasks and long-term actions needed to get a handle on and deal with the contamination issues left behind, as well as a budget. Some close to the situation anticipated a multi-year plan and budget.

The agencies, however, returned with a one-year plan.

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Mesa Arizona residents fear water contamination

December 3, 2007 - ‘‘Hazardous wastes may have been disposed of on site,'' EPA staff member Paula Besson agreed in a handwritten comment added to the report in 1983. ‘‘However, the fact that a cone of depression exists in the groundwater in the area, the remoteness of the area and the depth to groundwater (500 to 600 feet), make this a low priority for follow-up.''

But in the 25 years that followed the report, growth and development encroached on the Talley site, with hundreds of east Mesa homes now within a mile of its location.

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Arizona town concerned about Superfund stigma

August 20, 2007 - Dewey-Humboldt is a small town with a big problem.

On a hill overlooking Western storefronts and modest homes about 15 miles east of Prescott is a 4 million-ton pile of mine tailings, a toxic relic of the town's mining past.

Just a few hundred yards away, across Arizona 69, is a rusting smokestack and an oily, black mountain of slag, the waste product of a long-defunct smelter.

Together, the area surrounding the decades-old piles is the first Arizona site in nearly a decade that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency wants placed on the Superfund list, the federal cleanup program reserved for the country's worst environmental hazards.

Dewey-Humboldt's 4,000 residents are divided on whether a Superfund listing would be a blessing or a bane.

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Arizona residents fear uranium contamination from past industry

August 2, 2007 - Five weeks ago, the company that used to own the uranium mill on the other side of the nearest paved road, U.S. Highway 160, reached an agreement with the Navajo Nation to test nearby wells it may have contaminated. El Paso Natural Gas hasn’t named the wells it will test yet, so Charley can only wonder if it will include the well her family has been using all these years.

The area’s troubles began when the Rare Metals Corporation started processing uranium at the mill in 1956. Off and on for the next 10 years, it processed some 800,000 tons of ore, all of it for the federal government’s nuclear weapons program. Following the federal regulations of the time, Rare Metals dumped the damp tailings, the waste product of milling, into unlined evaporation ponds on site. Unfortunately, not all the water evaporated. Much of the water seeped into the ground, taking uranium and other contaminants in the tailings with it.

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Arizona resident believes soil contamination is causing health problems

May 30, 2007 - ohn Stoddard says he was healthy when he bought 40 acres bordered by Aravaipa and Laurel creeks near Klondyke in 1995, but by 2002 he was declared disabled.

Today, Stoddard, 54, has a variety of physical ailments and wonders if the high concentration of lead in the soil near his home could be the cause of pain and stiffness in his joints and numbness and tingling in his fingers and toes.

Blood tests show he has lead and arsenic in his blood, but not at toxic levels. Stoddard said the blood tests do not indicate how much lead has been absorbed by organs in his body, and further testing is needed.

An Arizona Department of Environmental Quality report from April 25 shows that most surface soil on residential property near two mine tailings piles in Aravaipa Canyon contain high levels of lead. The report states the lead concentration is more than the remediation level of 400 parts-per-million.

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Mesa Considers Clean Up of Decade Old Contamination

" A lingering contamination site beneath Mesa’s Sixth Street service center could finally receive a cleanup.

In the 1990s, there were four fuel leaks into the ground at the city’s service center, 300 E. Sixth St., home to the city’s solid waste, truck fleet and utility division, according to city
records. " More . . .