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Show 2 HILL TOP TIMES Friday, November 9, 1984 bit- '- drn I. 11 - , , Mlliliiiiiiii iiiiilii liiiiiill mmmmmmmmFmmm liiftlpiwlli , lmllllllflllllVliWi illllllilM mmmm Landfill No. 4, former sanitary waste disposal area covered with imperme- - derground slurry wall. Bill Taylor, environmental engineer, 2849th CE able bentonite layer to keep out precipitation. (Left to right) Ron Demars, Division, samples treated water pumped from Landfill No. 4. Water will geologist, 2849th Civil Engineering Division, measures water level at Land- - be used for irrigation on east side of the base, fill No. 4. GeoCon, Inc., Pittsburgh, Pa., completes construction on the un- - 1 LA fll ffRfl IL IL l o Because of corrective actions to prevent a leaching problem, a former sanitary waste disposal area used by Hill AFB during 1967-197should no longer pose environmental problems, according to base officials. Initiatives by base civil engineers in 1981 through the Department of Defense's Installation Restoration Program identified Landfill No. 4 as the base's number one environmental corrective problem and resulted in a three-folincluded Action or plan. "capping" covering the landfill, constructing an underground slurry wall, and pumping and treating existing water. site with an impermeaCovering the ble layer involved using specified natural soils, refined bentonite, and seeding the top with natural dry-lan- d grass. The covering will lower the water and keep out rainfall which is estimated to be responsible for about 80 percent of the underground water entering the landfill. The 35 to deep, approximately one mile long slurry wall was contracted June 1984 and was completed this week. Purpose of the wall is to stop lateral migration of underground water which in the landfill area generally flows from south to north. Pumping will eliminate the remaining ground water and will also indicate if the slurry wall is holding or if the water is coming from somewhere else. After being treated by an activated carbon system, the water will be used for irrigation on the east side of the runway. The Base Bioenvironmental Engineer has e been regularly sampling an springs near the landfill since early in 1982. Testing by 3, d 37-ac- re 50-fo- ot off-bas- Installation restoration project completed with $ 2.4 million spent on construction the state and the base on the seepage showed the polluted water contained detectable quantities of organic solvents, but the small levels were never considered a threat to public health. The corrective actions for Landfill No. 4 were designed to stop the leachate from leaving the base. The IRP is the DOD's program to identify possible sources of environmental pollution and d corrective action. This program includes: Phase I, Records Search; Phase II, Engineering Survey; Phase III, Technology Development, and Phase IV, Corrective Action. Problems with the landfill were first noticed e in 1975 when springs adjacent to the landfill became discolored. Shortly afterwards, in 1976, the Air Force Occupational and Environmental Health Lab studied the area and published a report covering its history with recommended corrective actions. An additional outside engineering consulting firm with expertise on these type problems, Research, Inc., Huntington Beach, Calif., was contracted to develop possible solu-- . tions. They recommended covering the landfill with an impermeable material to prohibit precipitation from entering. The Environmental Protection Agency has rated the landfill groundwater problem here as a 49.94 severity on a scale of 0 to 100, with 100 being the most severe. Although all federal sites were eligible for inclusion on the EPA's National Priorities List in 1983, DOD has its own clean-u- p fund and thus is not eligible for any from the "Super Fund." money off-bas- e four-phase- off-bas- Cal-scien- ce DOD's fund, the Defense Environmental Restoration Program, was established last year and $1.3 million was allocated to Hill AFB to correct the problem at Landfill No. 4. Before that time, Hill AFB spent $1.1 million on projects to correct the problem, making the to. tal spent $2.4 million. Under the IRP, the base. is aggressively for similar treatment. One studying other-areaof those, Berman Pond, has been identified as needing corrective action and a contract has been awarded to construct a bentonite cap similar to the one at Landfill No. 4. Preliminary work begins this fall and the main construction next spring. Jim Vining, chief, Environmental Planning, base civil engineering, states that corrrective actions at Landfill No. 4 thus far are good. "We're happy with the initial results which appear positive, and feel confident the other sites being studied will be handled with the same professional concern and results," he said. s Ongoing checks at Landfill No. 4 will be threefold: periodically checking the groundwater monitor wells; visually inspecting e springs to detect water flow reduction, and performing chemical analysis. off-bas- Story and Photos by Jean Williamson OO-AL- C Public Affairs Office |