EPA proposes capping part of Metachem site

More comprehensive cleanup schemes under consideration for the 22.8-acre plant area carried price tags of up to $100 million, according to a document recently released for public comment.

The agency's preferred, lower-cost option -- scheduled for a public hearing July 28 -- would permanently cover untreated soils deeply soaked with toxic chemicals.Contractors already have sunk walls deep into the ground on three sides of the area, as part of a series of containment and cleanup projects that already have cost taxpayers about $70 million.

Other major expenses are pending for more than 40 nearby acres tainted with chlorinated benzene compounds, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and other contaminants.

"I'd certainly want to know whether they can do more chemical treatments before they cap it, whether they can pull it up or inject something to neutralize the chemicals that are there," said Seth Ross, a Delaware Nature Society member who has followed the cleanup closely.

Metachem's former owners declared bankruptcy and walked away from the factory in 2002, leaving behind some $65 million in debts and more than 40 million pounds of waste chemicals and products. The bankruptcy forced the entire cleanup cost onto the depleted Superfund cleanup program and federal and state taxpayers.

Millions of pounds of chemicals used to make herbicides and pesticides were spilled over the years at the plant, which operated as Standard Chlorine of Delaware until 1998. The company once ranked as one of the world's top producers of chlorobenzenes.

Much of the spilled material remains in soils and sediments under and around the plant, creating cancer risks recently rated as high as nine in 10,000 for construction workers at the main production site. State and federal cleanup goals usually aim for a risk level of one in 100,000 or one in a million.

Source: http://www.delawareonline.com/article/20090722/NEWS02/907220323/1006/NEWS