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MOP-UP.CMP
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1990-09-18
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-- START OF TEXT --
An extensive $30 million cleanup of 16 inactive waste lagoons at
Louisiana Army Ammunition Plant is virtually complete. And plant officials
are deeming the environmental mop-up - which took $10 million less than first
estimated - a proud success. Still soil and water sampling continues at six
smaller plant sites, and around the lagoons, to pinpoint the extent of
contamination there. But the 16 one-acre lagoons, which once - like most of
the other sites - were dumping grounds for explosives-tainted washwater, were
apparently the worst spots. "I think the progress so far has been a great
success," Capt. Carl Ehler, the plant's executive officer, said this week.
Some 108,160 tons of watery soil have been scraped from the manmade
lagoons, incinerated at 850 degrees or more to remove virtually all
impurities, then returned to the pits. The lagoons have also been capped with
at least two feet of thick clay-type soil. All that remains of the lagoon
work begun last year is surface grading to ensure rainwater runs off, not
leak through, the caps and into underlying groundwater. A towering high-tech
incinerator used to burn the soil here has already been dismantled to be moved
from the plant. "The grading work should be completed by October 30," Ehler
said. "That is the goal."
A barbed wire fence will also be placed around the former lagoon
sites. All completed and ongoing work is part of a negotiated agreement
between the Army, federal Environmental Protection Agency and state Department
of Environmental Quality. Funding for the cleanup is coming from the Army's
Defense Environmental Restoration Account. The next phase includes completing
soil borings and drilling 28 additional monitoring wells at the six other
sites scattered across the 15,000-acre government-owned contractor-operated
plant opened in 1942. The Army-funded studies should continue through late
1991, followed by Army recommendations on what, if any, clean method is
necessary.
Preliminary tests at each site last year found some tainted soil
and/or groundwater, though not as extensive as the lagoons. "We want to
determine the extent of contamination and possible risk to human health and
the environment," says David Burroughs, the plant's manager of environmental
quality. He notes the tests have already indicated contaminants haven't
drifted outside the areas or affected drinking water wells at the plant or
nearby Doyline. The cleaned-up lagoons and several of the other sites - all
abandoned by the 1970s - were disposal grounds for water used to wash away
explosive residue or dust generated by ammunition manufacturing.
Any recommended cleanup of the other sites must be approved the EPA
and DEQ. "I think this cleanup effort has been an outstanding example of
cooperation between the Army and regulators," said Paxton Willis,
environmental coordinator at the plant. Studies may show the other sites are
not a significant environment threat and require no action. Or a cleanup
could be ordered. Among possible cleanup actions are injecting organisms into
the water to kill the contaminants or pumping water from the sites and
treating it. "There is no way of speculating on what might be required until
studies are completed," Ehler said.
*** From The (Shreveport) Times, Shreveport, LA ***
-- END OF TEXT --