Morgan Hill – Local community leaders urged a “failing grade” for alleged groundwater polluter Olin Corporation at a Central Coast Water Quality Control Board meeting last week.
Morgan Hill Mayor Dennis Kennedy told the regional board Thursday that Olin should be held responsible for perchlorate detected in Morgan Hill’s municipal wells located northeast of the company’s defunct Tennant Avenue plant.
And, San Martin resident Sylvia Hamilton, chair of the Perchlorate Community Advisory Group, criticized what she and others see as Olin’s “do nothing” approach to cleaning up the South County’s water basin.
Olin Corp. officials have admitted that the company polluted the ground water that flows south toward San Martin, but are reluctant to take responsibility for a northerly flow.
There is one plume of contamination spreading south and northeast, Kennedy said, and only one known source of the contamination – the Olin Corporation and its operation of a road flare manufacturing facility in Morgan Hill.
“Yet,” Morgan Hill Mayor Dennis Kennedy said, “it is puzzling that the board has adopted two different regulatory approaches to what is a single problem.”
Eighteen months ago, the regional board issued a comprehensive clean up order for areas south of Olin’s Tennant Avenue plant and ordered continued monitoring of the perchlorate plume’s northeast migration.
Morgan Hill officials have since argued the two-track plan has allowed Olin to escape accountability for perchlorate detected in Morgan Hill wells.
“Frankly, we don’t understand the reluctance to amend the Cleanup and Abatement Order, or to issue a separate CAO to cover the portion of the plume north of Tennant Avenue,” Kennedy told the board. “Is there any doubt that Olin’s contamination threatens the deep aquifer from which we draw our water supply?”
According to Hector Hernandez, a regional water board engineer, the analysis of groundwater contamination in parts of Morgan Hill is proceeding at a “reasonable” pace.
“We need to review the results of the work that’s being conducted,” Hernandez said Friday. “We believe there’s northeast flow in the deep aquifer zone, under certain conditions.”
Those conditions may include when high volumes of water are pumped, he said.
During the first quarter of 2006, Olin reported the presence of 4.4 parts per billion of perchlorate in the deep aquifer – about 300 feet below the ground – at a test well 3,000 feet north of its factory.
California’s public health goal is 6 ppb for perchlorate, a chemical that can cause thyroid problems if consumed in high enough quantities.
“If all of the sudden we get very high levels and more evidence, we’ll certainly require Olin to ‘step out’ more,” Hernandez said.
At the board meeting, Kennedy took aim at Olin’s claim that the City of Morgan Hill contaminated the basin when it used liquid chlorine to disinfect the Nordstrom well.
“During the first few minutes of my presentation so far this afternoon, the Nordstrom well pumped 2,000 gallons of water and treated it with ion exchange,” Kennedy said. “In less than two minutes, it removed more than the volume of perchlorate estimated by Olin to have been introduced” in disinfecting the well.
Kennedy noted Olin used more than 150,000 pounds of perchlorate annually for decades.
“That is where the focus belongs,” he said.
Hamilton urged the regional board to reject Olin’s proposed clean up feasibility report as “incomplete” and “inaccurate.”
In a letter to the regional board’s executive officer, Roger Briggs, Hamilton lambasted Olin for preferring a “No Further Action” approach to its alleged widespread pollution.
According to state law, alleged polluters must restore the environment to its original state. Olin is arguing that determining the “background level” of perchlorate in South County may be impossible.
Regional water board staff will make a formal response to the feasibility report in the next few weeks.
“The Board was very adamant about making progress as quickly as possible,” Briggs said Friday.
Regional water board staff are continuing with an investigation of other potential sources of perchlorate northeast of the Olin site. Hernandez said the staff is currently waiting for analytical results from two investigations that are presently being conducted.
Tony Burchyns covers the county for the Dispatch. Reach him at (408) 779-4106 ext. 201 or tburchyns@morganhilltimes.
