01/09/07 Badger Plant Site Water Woes
Badger Plant Site Water Woes
Homeowners Want Stronger Action From Dnr In Dealing With Weapons Chemical Found In Their Wells.
Wisconsin State Journal
Tuesday, January 9, 2007
RON SEELY
Residents who live near the abandoned Badger Army Ammunition Plant say the Department of Natural Resources is not doing enough to protect them from cancer-causing contaminants that are showing up in an increasing number of private wells.
Tests have shown that as many as 23 private wells near the plant are contaminated with low levels of explosives, solvents and other contaminants -- a legacy from the decades when the plant produced propellants for the military.
Officials with the DNR say the U.S. Army, which is responsible for cleanup at the plant, is adequately monitoring the pollutants and cleaning them up when necessary.
But a citizens group that has monitored the cleanup wants the DNR to order the Army to do more studies.
Laura Olah, director of Citizens for Safe Water Around Badger, said residents want more information about the threat to their wells, including more data on contaminant levels and the movement of the pollutants. She said the group is also asking Gov. Jim Doyle to intervene and tell the DNR to provide more help to residents.
"Their whole strategy is to wait and see," Olah said of the DNR. "Does that mean we just wait until somebody is exposed? We're going to end up with dozens of wells where the people can't use their water."
Olah said residents are asking for more help because the problems appear to be getting worse.
Last year at this time, she said, nine wells tested positive for contaminants from the plant. Now, she added, there are 23 and some of the contaminated wells are as far as three miles from the plant.
"All the evidence we have shows that the problem is getting worse," Olah said.
Of particular concern is a pollutant called dinitrotoluene, or DNT, a cancer-causing explosive that was used to make the propellants manufactured at the plant. While the explosive has not been detected in any of the wells at levels beyond the state's strictest health and enforcement standards, it has been found in six of the wells at a lower level called the preventive action limit.
Olah said the state's groundwater law requires action from the agency if contaminant levels exceed even the preventive action limit.
But Hank Kuehling, a DNR hydrogeologist working on cleanup at the plant, said the agency "no longer uses preventive action limits as an enforcement standard." Instead, he said, if the level of a contaminant appears to be stable or receding, the assumption is that no additional action is necessary.
If any of the contaminant levels exceeded the more strict enforcement standard, the agency would order the Army to take more aggressive measures, said Eileen Pierce, who is overseeing cleanup of the plant for the DNR.
Pierce added that, so far, those levels have not been exceeded. She said the DNR is satisfied with the Army's work at the plant.
"We're watching this very closely," Pierce said. "We are at this point satisfied with what the Army is doing."
The DNR is working with other agencies to turn the plant, which has been abandoned by the Army, into a recreation area. Olah said money budgeted by the agency to build trails and do other restoration work should be used to make sure drinking water for nearby residents is safe.
"It's not a matter of them not having the resources," Olah said. "It's a matter of where they put those resources."