Wednesday, April 12, 2006
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
Contact: EPA, Dave Ryan, (202) 564-4355 /
ryan.dave@epa.gov ;
ENRD: (202) 514-2007, TDD (202) 514-1888 /
www.usdoj.gov
(Washington, D.C. - April 12, 2006) As the latest in a series of partial
settlements aimed at cleaning up and restoring the Lower Fox River and Green Bay
Superfund Site in northeastern Wisconsin, NCR Corp. (NCR) and Sonoco-U.S. Mills
Inc. (Sonoco) have agreed to complete an important initial phase of the cleanup,
the Justice Department and Environmental Protection Agency announced today. The
two companies have agreed to spend an estimated $30 million on the
expedited dredging and disposal of the most highly-contaminated sediments in the
Fox River. This action furthers the already substantial progress made on
cleanup and restoration of the entire site, which is one of the largest
contaminated sediment sites in the United States.
Under the terms of the agreement, NCR and Sonoco will design and implement the
cleanup project to dredge, dewater and dispose of the contaminated sediment,
removing approximately 100,000 cubic yards of highly contaminated sediment
downstream and west of the De Pere Dam. The removal of this substantial volume
of contaminated sediments from the river will reduce exposure to polychlorinated
biphenyls (PCBs) and diminish downstream migration of PCBs to the bay. Dredging
is scheduled to begin in the spring of 2007.
"Today's settlement provides for the prompt removal of the most highly
contaminated sediments in the Lower Fox River and Green Bay site, greatly
improving the quality of the environment and mitigating the harm that the PCBs
have caused to fish and birds in the area," said Sue Ellen Wooldridge, assistant
attorney general of the Justice Department's Environment and Natural Resources
Division. "It is another important milestone in the efforts to cleanup this
site, and it underscores the department's commitment to ensuring that hazardous
waste sites are cleaned up and that the cleanup costs are borne by the
responsible parties."
"The Fox River is the biggest source of PCBs flowing into Lake Michigan," said
EPA Regional Administrator Thomas V. Skinner. "Cleaning up this hot spot is a
major step toward eventually removing the Fox and Lower Green Bay from EPA's
list of Great Lakes Areas of Concern."
The Lower Fox River and Green Bay Superfund Site encompasses a nearly 40-mile
stretch of the Fox River and more than 1,000 square miles of Green Bay.
Sediments in both water bodies are contaminated with PCBs that were discharged
into the river in connection with past production and re-processing of
PCB-containing "carbonless" copy paper at multiple facilities from the 1950s to
the early the 1970s.
Substantial cleanup and natural resource restoration work at the site has
already begun under a series of partial settlements. Between 1998 and 2000, two
major sediment removal demonstration projects were completed in discrete areas
of the river under agreements that the paper companies reached with EPA and
Wisconsin. Those projects helped demonstrate that contaminated sediments at the
site can safely and feasibly be dredged. Full-scale dredging in the uppermost
segment of the river began last year under a 2003 settlement with two of the
paper companies, P.H. Glatfelter Co. and Wisconsin Tissue Mills. NCR and
another paper company, Fort James Operating Co., are currently performing
detailed remedial design work for the downstream portions of the river under a
separate Administrative Order on Consent, under the direction of the EPA. The
paper companies also have paid more than $35 million for natural resource
restoration projects under several of the partial settlements. The money from
those settlements has been used to acquire wildlife habitat that will be
protected as state-managed natural areas, to protect and propagate threatened
native fish and bird species, and to preserve native plants and enhance bird
habitat in areas such as the Green Bay National Wildlife Refuge.
In 2003, EPA and WDNR issued
two Records of Decision (RODs) selecting the cleanup remedy for different
portions of the Site. Taken together, the two RODs would require removal of
approximately 7.25 million cubic yards of contaminated sediment at an estimated
total cost of about $400 million.
PCBs do not break down readily by natural processes. They pose environmental
and health threats to wildlife in the area and to people who eat fish from the
Fox River and Green Bay. The PCBs at the site have caused adverse health
effects and reproductive effects in fish and birds. Fish and waterfowl in the
area are subject to human health-based consumption advisories.
The state of Wisconsin was a partner in today's consent decree, which was lodged
today in United States District Court in Milwaukee and is subject to a 30-day
public comment period. The state of Michigan and the Oneida Tribe and Menominee
Tribe are also cooperating with the Untied States and Wisconsin in many aspects
of the Fox River/Green Bay restoration program but are not parties to this
particular settlement.
A copy of the consent decree is available on the Department of Justice Web site
at:
http://www.usdoj.gov/enrd/open.html
Additional information on the Lower Fox River cleanup:
http://epa.gov/region5/sites/foxriver/
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