Residents and the City of Morgan Hill have been discovering
perchlorate in their wells north of the Olin Corp. site on Tennant
Avenue for some time now and haven
’t had much help from anyone in having regular testing for the
contaminant.
Residents and the City of Morgan Hill have been discovering perchlorate in their wells north of the Olin Corp. site on Tennant Avenue for some time now and haven’t had much help from anyone in having regular testing for the contaminant.
Whether the contamination is Olin Corp.’s fault or that of some other, so far unknown cause, people need to know what’s in the wells and how much. Other possible sources tossed about include United Technologies (UTC), northeast of the city on Metcalf Road in the Coyote Valley, the old Castle VegTech site on Vineyard Boulevard, turn-of-the-century fertilizer plants that may contain perchlorate or even highway flares lying about on roads.
The Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board (based in San Luis Obispo) had ordered Olin to provide a plan on sampling those wells by last Friday. That has now been extended to Oct. 10.
The reason Olin has been reluctant to embrace the northeast wells as its problem is that the water around Tennant Avenue flows south, not north. In fact the dividing line for underground and above ground water flows south to Monterey Bay from the southern end of Coyote Valley is a bit north of Cochrane Road; water north of that point flows north into San Francisco Bay. So, you see the problem. However, there are plausible scenarios in which Olin’s Tennant perchlorate could end up in the more northern wells, according to state Regional Water Board experts and those from the Santa Clara Valley Water District.
Still, we don’t think Olin should have to foot the bill for this testing until and unless it is found responsible for the contamination. The Water District, which is responsible for managing the unground water table here, should until the responsible party is determined. Olin has behaved with reasonable integrity, taking care of residents with wells within its stipulated area of responsibility.
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