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EPA REACHES $ 8 MILLION SETTLEMENT AT NYANZA SUPERFUND SITE

Release Date: 05/21/1998
Contact Information: Alice Kaufman, EPA Press Office, (617) 918-1064

Boston - The U. S. Environmental Protection Agency reached a settlement with four parties at the Nyanza Chemical Waste Dump Superfund Site in Ashland, MA totaling $8 million in past and future costs and natural resources damages. The settling parties to this agreement are: PQ Corporation, Nyacol Products, Inc., Robert M. Lurie, Thomas L. O'Connor.

The consent decree that was filed in U.S. District Court in Boston allows for the $8 million to be paid in three installments over two years, plus interest from the date of lodging of the decree. The court document also protects the defendants from future lawsuits for past and future cleanup costs or costs incurred to restore natural resources.

"The government has spent $36 million so far to clean up contamination at the Nyanza Superfund Site," said Pat Meaney, director of EPA's Office of Site Remediation and Restoration. "This settlement recoups some of those costs and includes a share for repairing damaged natural resources."

The settlement proceeds will be shared by EPA, the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection, and the federal and a state Natural Resources Trustees (which includes the Department of the Interior and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, as well as the state agencies.) According to the terms of the settlement, the EPA will receive $5,661,538; the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection will receive $1,415,385; the federal and state Natural Resources Trustees will receive $692,308 for damages caused to natural resources; and $230,796 will go to the Commonwealth Trustee for groundwater contamination. The money allocated to the Trustees must be used to restore or replace resources that have been damaged by pollution. The public will have an opportunity to comment on the proposals for natural resource restoration.

Nyanza, Inc., which went out of business in 1978, was the principal polluter at the site. Earlier settlements with one successor to Nyanza and with the estates of the individuals who owned and operated Nyanza resulted in payments totaling $4,765,000, which also covered a portion of the government's cleanup costs.

Corporate History

PQ Corporation is the parent company of Nyacol Products, Inc. Nyacol Products, Inc. is a current operator at the site and is the successor to Nyacol, Inc. Nyacol, Inc. was a former operator at the site. Mr. Lurie and Mr. O'Connor were former Nyacol owners and directors.

Site History

Between 1917 and 1978 a succession of interrelated companies manufactured textile dyes on the site, producing large amounts of toxic wastes and contaminants. Nyanza Inc., the last of this succession of companies, owned and operated the site from 1965 until it went out of business in 1978. During that time it disposed of large quantities of contaminated sludges that contained mercury, chromium and lead. Other chemicals disposed of included organic chemicals such as dichlorobenzene, chlorobenzene, aniline, and nitrobenzene contaminated groundwater both on the property and off. In addition, mercury from the site has been found in sediments and fish tissue in the Sudbury River.

The site was named to the National Priorities List in 1983.