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U.S. SETTLES SUIT OVER CLEANUP OF NCR SUPERFUND SITE

Release Date: 9/4/2001
Contact Information: David Sternberg 215-814-5548

Contact: David Sternberg 215-814-5548

PHILADELPHIA - The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the United States Attorney's Office in Wilmington, Del., today announced a settlement in the case of the cleanup of the 140-acre National Cash Register (NCR) Superfund Site in Millsboro, Del.

In a proposed consent decree filed in federal district court in Wilmington, NCR Corp. and Allfirst Financial Center National Association have agreed to reimburse EPA $798,500, plus interest, for the agency’s past costs to clean up hazardous substances at the site. Site owners NCR and Allfirst are conducting ongoing cleanup at the NCR Superfund site, which was contaminated with trichloroethylene (TCE), a degreaser, and chromium, a heavy metal, from past industrial operations.

The settlement also resolves legal claims against the settling defendants by the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control, which joined in the proposed consent decree.

“We are pleased with the settlement that recovers 90 percent of the taxpayers’ cost for this cleanup,” said Donald S. Welsh, regional administrator of EPA’s mid-Atlantic office.

NCR manufactured cash registers and electronic equipment at this site from 1967 through 1980. According to the government’s complaint, filed on Friday, NCR’s degreasing and chrome-plating operations during this period resulted in TCE and chromium contamination of groundwater at the site. The First Omni Bank, predecessor to the Allfirst Financial Center, purchased the operating portion of the NCR facility in 1981.

In July 1987, the former NCR manufacturing location and adjacent agricultural property was added to EPA’s National Priorities List – a list of the most severely contaminated hazardous waste sites in the country.

NCR and Allfirst remain responsible for ongoing cleanup of the site. Past cleanup activities have included excavating chromium-contaminated sludge and removing toxic materials from concrete-lined storage lagoons, as well as ground water monitoring and treatment, soil vapor extraction, and air emission controls.

As of March 2001, the NCR site cleanup has treated over 499 million gallons of water and removed nearly 2,000 gallons of TCE from the ground water. Ongoing cleanup efforts will include continued operation and maintenance of the ground water monitoring and treatment systems, the soil vapor extraction system, and air emission controls.

The proposed consent decree announced today is subject to a 30-day public comment period and final court approval. As part of the settlement, the defendants neither admitted nor denied liability for the Superfund cleanup.