All News Releases By Date

EPA Exceeds Regional Goal with 11 Mid-Atlantic Cleanups

Release Date: 10/14/1998
Contact Information: Ruth Podems (215) 814-5540

PHILADELPHIA - The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency completed cleanup construction at nine Superfund hazardous waste sites in the mid-Atlantic region and declared no further action is necessary at two others, surpassing the annual regional target by one.  

This brings to 68 the number of completed cleanups in EPA’s mid-Atlantic region comprising Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia and the District of Columbia.  Including the 68 completions, there are a total of 183 Superfund sites in this region on the National Priorities List (NPL) of the most severely contaminated sites.

A construction completion indicates that all physical cleanup activities have been performed, all immediate threats eliminated and all long-term hazards controlled.  It is a milestone in the cleanup process, and is usually followed by a monitoring period to ensure effectiveness before the site is finally deleted from the NPL.

The sites in Pennsylvania where cleanup construction was completed are North Penn Area One and Tyson’s Dump (Montgomery Co.), Cryochem, Inc. (Berks Co.), Westinghouse Elevator Company Plant (Adams Co.), Osborne Landfill (Mercer Co.), Blosenski Landfill (Chester Co.) and Publicker Industries (Philadelphia Co.)

In Delaware, cleanup construction was completed at Chem-Solve, Inc. (Kent Co.) and in Virginia at the Buckingham County Landfill.

The "no further action" sites, both in Pennsylvania, are Metropolitan Mirror and Glass, Inc. (Schuylkill Co.), where EPA spent $1 million to remove contaminated ponds, and Fischer and Porter Company (Bucks Co.), where EPA has determined a groundwater treatment system is working effectively.  A decision for no further action means that limited activities taken by EPA or parties responsible for cleanup are sufficient to protect human health and the environment.  

Nationally, EPA completed 87 NPL cleanup constructions this fiscal year.  That brings the total to 585 completions, more in the last four years than in the first 14 years of the Superfund program.  

For more specific information about each of the mid-Atlantic hazardous waste sites, visit the EPA’s web site at: https://www.epa.gov/reg3hwmd.


#


99-23