Massachusetts Town Revisiting Lake Village Contamination

By: Nathan Lamb

Lost Lake is the centerpiece of a tight-knit community in Groton, Massachusetts, but that arrangement is thought to have created long-term water quality issues for that nature resource.

At issue are high levels of phosphorus and fecal coliform bacteria in the lake that have raised concerns about protecting water quality in the neighborhood, which relies on private wells.

The problem was outlined in a 2012 environmental notification form filed with the state by a Selectmen-appointed advisory committee. Compiled by environmental consultants, the report noted that wastewater disposal has been an issue at the neighborhood for at least 40 years due to “antiquated on-site wastewater disposal systems” with “high failure rates”.

A sewer system would alleviate the problem, but that $12.9 million proposal was rejected by town meeting voters in January, according to this story from the Lowell Sun newspaper. 

Aside from cost, the primary objection at the town meeting was a perceived lack of information about where the contamination was coming from. The Board of Selectmen responded to the vote by appointing a new group to revisit the issue and provide more information for residents.

Meeting again on March 6, the reconfigured group’s discussion focused on gathering baseline data—compiling an inventory of neighborhood wells and speaking with experts involved with the last process. The group also discussed options for determining the contamination’s source; speakers at the town meeting listed nearby streams as possible culprits.

Lost Lake was originally a seasonal cottage community that has since evolved into a full-time residential community. In addition to poor soils, the area is dominated by small lots—with more than half the lots one-quarter of an acre or smaller.

According to the Environmental Protection Agency, phosphorus is an essential nutrient for plants, but in high levels it can spur a population explosion of weeks and threaten natural resources. Fecal bacteria is generally associated with human or animal feces, and can carry a variety of disease-causing bacteria and viruses.

Controversy Surrounds Army's Plans for Munition Plant Cleanup

Author: Duane Craig

The State of Wisconsin is reviewing the U.S. Army’s plan for continuing to clean up the Badger Army Ammunition Plant near Baraboo, Wisconsin, according to an article in the Baraboo News Republic. So far though, the state is not going along with the Army’s plan to shut down a pump and treat system that has removed and treated about 20 billion gallons of groundwater since it was installed in 1991.

The watchdog group, Citizens for Safe Water Around Badger, is also not thrilled with the Army’s plans to abandon the groundwater pump and treat system. The organization’s concern is that the environment may be further endangered and those who rely on their wells will be put into a financial hardship if they have to abandon them later.

According to a report prepared by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, the BAAP currently poses no “apparent health hazard because current exposures to site-related contaminants do not exceed health guidelines for chronic exposure.” The agency also found that the groundwater recovery and treatment system had reduced the contamination and the potential for the contamination to spread. The State of Wisconsin, however, is concerned that the plume of contamination may continue to extend beyond the boundary of the plant, so it wants the wells to continue to be monitored quarterly for chloroform, carbon tetrachloride and trichloroethylene.

The BAAP has a long history of processing weapons materials and operated from 1942 until 1975. There were 1,400 buildings at the facility, and propellant and deterrent processing was carried on in most of those buildings. Besides that, there was a coal burning power plant. In one area of the facility, nitric acid was made from ammonia, and nitric oxides were routinely released from the rooftop vents. Sometimes when there were thermal inversions, where cooler air trapped warmer air close to the ground, the area would be bathed in a brown haze. There was also elemental sulfur that was converted to sulfuric acid and other derivatives at another part of the facility, and the coal burning power plant released its un-scrubbed, thick, black smoke into the air over the region.
Other common practices included disposing of waste in landfills, ground set aside for burning, and discharge areas where wastewater was disposed of. At the propellant burning ground, waste propellants and waste process chemicals were burned. At the deterrent burning ground, benzene and nitrocellulose were burned.

Since 1988, at least 260 monitoring wells have been following the spread of contaminated groundwater. The contaminants of main concern are carbon tetrachloride and chloroform. Volatile organic compounds have moved past the southern boundary of the plant, and a plume of sulfates has moved past the eastern plant boundary.

The Army’s new plan is to shut down the water treatment system and simply continue monitoring the contaminants with the expectation that they will naturally break down sometime in the next 30 years. The cost of that plan will be about $40 million. Another option the Army is considering is continuing to treat the groundwater and continuing to monitor the contaminants until they break down naturally. That course of action is expected to cost $80 million. Another idea is to use naturally occurring organisms to treat the water and to continue monitoring the contaminants until they break down naturally. This plan would cost about $61 million.

Lake Michigan Contamination Investigation Leads to New Potential Sources

By: Duane Craig

Where Milwaukee meets Lake Michigan there is human sewage in the water, and there has been for years. What is new, though, is that the sewage might be coming from sources not previously investigated, and those sources might help to explain similar sewage contamination across the country.

The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Water Institute is studying the possibility that sewage along the city's waterfront is coming from residents' lateral sanitary sewage connections and not from overflows of the wastewater treatment plant, according to this article in WISN.com.

Milwaukee water contamination source still unknown

Crews are investigating the lateral lines that run from homes to the main sewer line to try to see if there are significant leaks at those locations. There are about 3,000 miles of those lines, though, so the city is requesting that residents flood their lawns with water, hoping that if there are leaks in the lateral lines, the fresh water will show up in the system near those lines that are leaking.

Residents, however, are not keen on the whole plan but stopped short of saying why, other than saying they did not see the sense in it. If the lateral lines are the source of the leaks that are contaminating the waterfront, then they would have to be repaired at homeowner expense because they are the responsibility of the homeowners. There is a possibility, however, that if the problems are widespread enough the city might be on the hook for the tab.

Problems Arise With Southern Cap On Burlington's Pine Street Canal

By: Duane Craig

Barges in the Pine Street Superfund Site.

Pine Street Canal Superfund site still active.

Old, cleaned up or contained contamination sometimes resurfaces to create new problems. The Pine Street Canal in Burlington, Vermont, was once home to a coal gassification plant. For almost 60 years "plant wastewaters and residual oil and wood chips saturated with organic compounds were directly discharged or disposed of in the Pine Street Canal wetland.
During the 1960s and 1970s oily material seeping to the surface alerted authorities and tests showed high levels of polyaromatic hydrocarbons, benzene, tuolene, xylenes and other volatile organic compounds related to coal tar. At that time the concern was these contaminants would make their way into Lake Champlain, the community's source of drinking water, according o the EPA's background on the site.
Site wide cleanup activities followed emergency cleanup efforts and the record of decision listed capping and sealing contaminated sediment in the canal, the turning basin and adjacent wetlands. Administrative controls rounded out the plan. By 2009 though, the original cap was not holding back seepage of the contaminants at the canal's south end so a second cap was proposed. That cap will also fill up, so at the same time passive recovery wells need to be drilled to catch contaminates that can be pumped and treated.
According to a report in Bloomberg Bussinessweek, the EPA is amending its plan to cap the southern end of the canal by also adding an underground vertical barrier and it is looking for public comments on that new plan. This cleanup started in 1985, nearly 20 years after the contamination was discovered.