The South Valley received some national attention
– and better yet, some federal funding – for its effort to clean
perchlorate from tainted wells and underground aquifers.
???h Valley received some national attention – and better yet, some federal funding – for its effort to clean perchlorate from tainted wells and underground aquifers.
The U.S. Senate approved Thursday, on a vote of 65-28, $1.75 million to help restore clean water to homes affected by the nearly 10-mile plume of perchlorate that originated from the Olin Corp. site in Morgan Hill.
“We saw this opportunity for federal money a few months ago,” said Mike DiMarco, a spokesman for the Santa Clara County Water District. “Any way to get money into the South Valley is going to help.”
The funding was part of the $373 billion omnibus spending bill already approved by the House, nearly $2 billion of which will go to California. The bill, which funds much of federal government operations plus some local and state programs such as the perchlorate clean up, was signed into law on Friday by President Bush.
The area was represented in Congress by Santa Clara County representatives Richard Pombo, Mike Honda, Zoe Lofgren and Anna Eshoo, with support from Senators Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer.
“From the beginning we have asked elected officials for help,” said Sylvia Hamilton, leader of the Perchlorate Citizens’ Advisory Group. “And they really stepped up to the plate to help.
The grant was offered to the water district from the federal Environmental Protection Agency and can only be used to further the effort of restoring clean water to families affected by the contamination – not to reimburse the district for money already spent. The water district has spent an estimated $2 million on perchlorate in the last year.
The money also will not be used to actually clean up the contamination, since Olin Corp. has been ordered by the state’s Regional Water Quality Control Board to pay for that.
DiMarco said the Perchlorate Working Group, which is represented by Morgan Hill, Gilroy and county interests, will discuss uses for the grant money in its meeting Feb. 5 in San Martin.
“Right now we’re waiting on clarification from the EPA on what we can use this for,” DiMarco said.
One idea for the grant money is to take part in testing home water filtration devices. So far, several companies have come forward with devices they say filter perchlorate out of water, but more testing needs to be done to obtain state certification.
“That was one proposal, internally at least,” DiMarco said. “Helping them get state certification so they can get them on the market.”
The filters, which would be attached underneath a sink and use so-called “reverse osmosis” technology, have yet to be tested for their effectiveness against the controversial chemical.
“It would need a special filtration system to catch perchlorate ions,” he said. “It takes a lot of technical expertise, and that’s what we have at the water district. We’re willing to share that expertise with the industry if the grant allows us to do that.”
DiMarco said he also hoped the money could be used to help families with the cost of purchasing and installing the units – possibly through a rebate system – with the remaining money.
Just over a year ago, the Santa Clara Valley Water District and the Central Coast RWQCB announced that perchlorate from an abandoned safety flare plant on Tennant Avenue had leached into the underground water table. Today, the toxic plume of rocket fuel ingredient stretches roughly 10 miles south all the way to north end of Gilroy.
The contamination has triggered class action lawsuits, calls for scientific testing and treatment plans costing millions. It has also united – and in some cases divided – those with health, real estate and agricultural interests.
The chemical is known to cause thyroid-related and other significant health problems in human beings and, possibly, animals though a safe level has not been determined. The state has not met a mandate to set a minimum parts per billion level by Jan. 1, 2004. Dr. Marty Fenstersheib, Santa Clara County’s health officer, said this is a consequence of the new California government.
“The new governor put a moratorium on all new regulations,” Fenstersheib said.
Over the course of the Tennant Avenue plant’s 40-year life, the chemical had spread in a southeasterly “plume” through southern Morgan Hill and into San Martin polluting as many as 450 wells.
The contamination caused Morgan Hill to turn off its Tennant Avenue well and temporarily shut down several other municipal wells northeast of the site or origin, causing a near water supply crisis during the summer hot spells. While Olin Corp. has begun reimbursing the city for the cost of digging a replacement well for Tennant, it has paid nothing to cover other costs resulting from its pollution, nor has it installed treatment facilities on any city well.
Olin has not yet taken responsibility for the chemical showing up in any well north of Tennant Avenue, though it recently published a report acknowledging that perchlorate-contaminated water might travel north.
Because of the extra $1.4 million Morgan Hill will have spent by June 2004 drilling wells, installing treatment plants and monitoring perchlorate levels, (and expects to spend an additional $3.2 million by June 2007), the City Council recently approved a perchlorate 5 percent surcharge to begin in April.
GILROY WATER
By spring 2003, perchlorate was detected by a City of Gilroy monitoring well and showed up in a private well off Holsclaw Road, south of Gilman Road. The plume did not trickle much further over the next several months, contaminating just a handful of private wells in the northeast section of town.
Nonetheless, it brought immediate action by Gilroy officials concerned that the city’s drinking water supply – eight wells all within a mile of the contaminated sites – would soon be next. As of December 2003, perchlorate had not been found in any of the city’s drinking water wells.
Already Gilroy has authorized spending $200,000 to buy land around some of its wells where ion exchange treatment systems will eventually be installed. It is unclear if the recent federal grant can cover any of the cost.
Gilroy estimates it will cost roughly $1.5 million to purchase an ion exchange system and $90,000 a month ($1.08 million a year) to maintain and operate. In addition, the city will have to spend $600,000 prepping sites – pouring the concrete and laying the pipes – for the filtration system.
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