FORT SMITH -- Halfway through a mandated cleanup of a hazardous chemical spill, Whirlpool Corp. says it has made progress over the past year at its closed Fort Smith plant and a neighborhood to the north.
"We have accomplished a great deal in 12 months, and we have 12 months to go," Whirlpool spokesman Jeff Noel said Thursday.
The company and its consultant on the project, Environ International Corp. from Little Rock, submitted its 2014 progress report Thursday to the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality. A Remedial Action Decision Document the department issued in December 2013 ordered Whirlpool to choose methods to make "substantial reduction" in the level of trichloroethylene on the company's property in two years.
The report states that 79 percent of the monitoring wells in the neighborhood north of the Whirlpool property showed little increase or some decrease in the level of trichloroethylene in the groundwater. The chemical migrated from the company property through the groundwater into the neighborhood of homes and businesses.
One well at the far northeast corner of the plume, on Brazil Avenue, showed an increase in the chemical's concentration. The plume under the neighborhood, discovered by the company in 2000, extends about 1,000 feet from the Whirlpool property.
Noel said tests show that the plume of contaminated groundwater is stable and not moving.
The Department of Environmental Quality disagrees.
"Based on our review of the data, it is ADEQ's opinion the chemical concentrations appear to be decreasing in the [chemical oxidation] injection areas," according to comments the department made in an email Thursday. "However, it is equally apparent the actual size of the plume as a whole has increased."
Noel and Environ head Mike Ellis are scheduled to make a quarterly progress report to Fort Smith city directors Jan. 27. Environmental Quality Department officials will not attend, spokesman Katherine Benenati said Friday.
City Director George Catsavis said Friday that it appears Whirlpool is continuing to make progress based on the reports he's seen.
But he questioned the size of the trichloroethylene plume as earlier described to officials, given the chemical was discovered under the Boys and Girls Club property northeast of the closed plant in mid-2014.
City Director Keith Lau said it appears that Whirlpool is complying with the state's requirements for the trichloroethylene cleanup and is relying on the Environmental Quality Department to keep track of Whirlpool's performance.
In the past year, the company, according to the report, injected 42,200 gallons of chemical oxidant into wells on the northwestern end of its property to neutralize the heaviest concentration of the chemical in the soil and groundwater.
The injections were made in March, the end of May and beginning of June, and the end of October and beginning of November, according to the report.
The sites were a drainage ditch off the northwest corner of the main manufacturing building where the chemical was used to clean metal refrigerator parts from 1967 to 1981; under the parking lot between the plant building and northern property line; and just across Ingersoll Avenue, which separates Whirlpool property from the neighborhood.
The report states that the level of trichloroethylene in the soil and groundwater in the drainage ditch area was reduced by 50 percent, and the two other sites showed the chemical levels were reduced by 55 percent.
"These treatments are working," Noel said. "They are having an impact, and they are accelerating what Mother Nature is doing what she does best and that's to clean up the site."
Noel said Environ performed calculations and determined the total amount of trichloroethylene in the groundwater and soil is, at most, 10 gallons. The report states the estimated amount in the plume under the neighborhood, estimated to be an area of about 500,000 square feet, is about 1 to 2 gallons. The amount under the Whirlpool property is 2 to 8 gallons.
Noel said a large amount of oxidant was necessary to treat the tricholorethylene, measured in micrograms or millionths of grams, because of the vertical and horizontal ground it has to reach.
Noel said one benefit from the oxidation treatment has been a separation of the most concentrated part of the plume near the plant building from the plume that seeps north into the neighborhood.
The section of the chemical plume under the parking lot that was treated has been called the neck because the plume narrows at that point, Noel said.
The theory has been that separating the heaviest concentration of the contaminated groundwater from the rest of the plume would hasten the decomposition of the chemical under the neighborhood.
The Environmental Quality Department's decision document calls for the trichloroethylene under the neighborhood to be treated by restricting access to the contaminated groundwater and allowing it to decompose naturally.
In addition to the chemical oxidation treatment, the report states, the company volunteered to remove highly contaminated soil from the drainage ditch area. The report states that a contractor drilled 19 4-foot-diameter holes up to 30 feet deep and removed 200 cubic yards of dirt. The holes were filled with limestone gravel and concrete.
The contaminated dirt was disposed of in November and last month at the Fort Smith landfill and at a disposal facility in Waynoka, Okla., according to the report.
City Director Mike Lorenz said he was not satisfied with the "small amount of soil that was removed." He said he believes a large amount of soil should be removed to reduce the downstream spread of the chemical from that location.
Whirlpool also discovered last year that the trichloroethylene in the groundwater had migrated northeast from the plant property and seeped under property owned by the Fort Smith Boys and Girls Club. The well where the contamination was found is separated from the Boys and Girls Club buildings and fields by a site Fort Smith is developing into the Ingersoll Avenue street extension.
Noel said the company will continue to monitor the contaminant level in the well.
Last month, U.S. District Judge P.K. Holmes III rejected a request to form a class of property owners in the neighborhood in a lawsuit against Whirlpool. Holmes also rejected a proposed preliminary settlement Whirlpool was offering the property owners to compensate them for the contamination.
The lawsuit was filed for two owners of property in the neighborhood, but another attorney representing 19 property owners in a separate lawsuit filed objections to the class certification and the proposed settlement.
Noel said Whirlpool does not see the ruling as a setback.
"We very strategically wanted to pursue the class option so we could as quickly as possible be transparent of what it was we are offering to do for the property owner," he said.
Lorenz said he believes Whirlpool should purchase the property at the market value before the chemical contamination became public.
Whirlpool proposed to pay property owners who joined the class and whose parcels are over the plume the amount the property was devalued by the county assessor in 2013 because of the contamination. They also would be paid 33 percent more to cover the anticipated legal expenses of the lawsuit.
Those who decided to join the class who were outside the contaminated area but whose property was close enough to be devalued by the assessor would receive $5,000.
The total cost of the settlement to Whirlpool was estimated at $3.9 million.
As part of the settlement, the property owners who accepted the settlement would agree to deed restrictions against drilling water wells and allow Whirlpool to install monitoring wells if it chose.
Noel said Whirlpool will continue settlement discussions with attorneys in both lawsuits.
Noel also said Thursday that crews were completing this week the drilling of five wells to test whether harmful vapors from the chemical were percolating to the surface.
City officials had asked that the company to perform the tests in response to residents' concerns. The testing also was required by the Environmental Quality Department.
However, the company had been having trouble getting permission from property owners, many of them involved in the lawsuit against Whirlpool, to install the wells on their parcels, according to Environmental Quality Department records.
Noel said Thursday that around Christmas, three property owners gave permission to let Whirlpool put in the vapor monitoring wells. He would not identify them out of respect for their privacy.
The other two vapor monitoring wells are on Whirlpool property.
He said the vapor testing will be done in the next several weeks and the results of the tests could be available sometime in March. Whirlpool has contended that there is no risk of vapor intrusion.
State Desk on 01/18/2015