Groundwater Under Closed Salvage Yard Improving

Contaminated groundwater under a former scrap-and-salvage yard in southwest Akron, Ohio, is getting cleaner and no additional remedies are needed.

That's the word from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in a 35-page review of the federal cleanup at Summit Equipment and Supply, 875 Ivor Ave.

The Kenmore site is not a threat to neighbors or the environment, the agency said.

The review was mandated by the federal Superfund cleanup program because hazardous wastes remain on the 6 1/2 acres.

Soil at the salvage yard had been contaminated with mercury, copper and especially polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs. The PCBs came from military-surplus electrical transformers bought by junkyard owners Benjamin and Michael Hirsch during the late 1960s and early 1970s.

The groundwater under the site also was polluted -- laced with chromium, a heavy metal, and toxic chemicals.

In a cleanup supervised by the EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, most of the polluted soil was dug up and hauled away.

The contaminated aquifer is being allowed to cleanse itself naturally, and that appears to be working. The EPA said levels of chromium and five hazardous chemicals, including benzene, have been declining in water tests conducted from 1995 to 2002.

Results from water tests collected in May are incomplete.

The groundwater monitoring will continue at the site, with another federal review required in 2008.

The federal cleanup got under way in 1987, when more than 3,000 tons of contaminated scrap was removed from the site. That preliminary cleanup, including testing, cost more than $8.5 million.

The cleanup was halted in 1991 after military shells and grenades -- none of them live -- were discovered at the site.

Then, in 1995, about 972 cubic yards of soil contaminated with PCBs from the site was removed from a nearby Castle Apartments complex.

Ohio EPA spokesman Larry Antonelli said there is no evidence that the PCB-contaminated soil caused any health problems to residents of the apartments.

The main cleanup of Summit Equipment took place from September 1998 to November 2000. That $11 million project included the removal of as much as 4 feet of PCB-laced soil and debris. More than 65,825 tons were hauled away for safe disposal.

The site was managed by the U.S. Department of Defense, one of 10 parties held liable for the cleanup. The Defense Reutilization and Marketing Service was the source of 80 percent of the electric transformers that caused the PCB contamination.

The property is fenced off and only can be used for industrial purposes in the future.

The federal cleanup order also calls for making sure no drinking-water wells are drilled on or near the property. That is not expected to be a problem because Akron waterlines serve the neighborhood. Akron (Ohio) Beacon Journal