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EPA Proposes Plan to Clean Up Chromium Contaminated Ground Water in Puchack Well Field

Release Date: 07/26/2006
Contact Information: Ben Barry, (212) 637-3651 or [email protected]

(New York, NY) The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is proposing a plan to treat the chromium contaminated ground water at the Puchack Well Field Superfund site in Camden County, New Jersey. The proposed cleanup plan, which will be discussed at a public meeting tonight, calls for injecting nontoxic chemicals into the ground water to decrease chromium levels to below New Jersey’s ground water standard. EPA will also continue to monitor the ground water over the lifetime of the remedy. The Agency is taking public comments on the plan.

“Contaminated ground water is always a challenge, and chromium can be a tricky contaminant because it is persistent and this plan puts us solidly on the right track,” said Regional Administrator Alan J. Steinberg. “By reducing the amount of chromium in ground water, EPA is protecting people in the surrounding community.”

Ground water contamination was first detected at a limited number of wells in the well field in the 1970s. Subsequent testing in the early 1980s found contamination in additional wells. By 1984, the well field was no longer used as a source of drinking water. The site was added to the Superfund National Priorities List of the country’s most contaminated sites in 1998.

EPA, the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection and the United States Geological Survey conducted field investigations in 2001 in order to identify the extent of chromium contamination in the ground water at the site. In addition, EPA completed a study in June 2006 to determine the possible methods to clean up the site.

Tonight’s public meeting to discuss the proposed plan and all of the cleanup alternatives for the Puchack Well Field Superfund site will be held at 7:00 PM in the Fine Arts Building, 314 Linden Street, Room 110, at Rutgers University Camden Campus. Written and oral comments on the proposed plan will be accepted at this meeting or written comments can be sent to Jon Gorin until Monday, August 7, 2006, at the following address:

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
290 Broadway
19th Floor
New York, NY 10007-1866.

For more information on the Puchack Well Field site: epa.gov/region02/superfund/npl/0204096c.pdf

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