• Hidden Lane Landfill in Sterling, VA; [see previous TCE Blog coverage]
• Lusher Street Ground Water Contamination in Elkhart, IN;
• Chem-Fab in Doylestown, PA;
• San German Ground Water Contamination in San German, PR;
• Midessa Ground Water Plume in Odessa, TX. [see previous TCE Blog coverage]

The Department of Environmental Protection will hold a public meeting at 7:30 p.m., on Wednesday, March 26, in Collegeville to update residents on efforts to reduce airborne trichloroethylene (TCE) levels in that area of Montgomery County.

The meeting will be held the Perkiomen Valley Middle School East auditorium, 100 Kagey Road.

"Since releasing our January 2007 air monitoring report, our agency has worked closely with Accellent and Superior Tube to develop emission reduction strategies that would effectively reduce TCE emissions by these narrow tube manufacturers," said DEP Regional Director Joseph A. Feola. "The department has been, and will continue to be, fully engaged in this effort, and will use this opportunity to update the community on the significant emission reductions that have been achieved to date."

(read more)

Recent data from the stationary air monitor in Evansburg State Park show levels of airborne TCE are diminishing, with many days registering no measurable levels of TCE in the air. That trend is expected to continue at both the existing and planned monitoring stations given the companies' voluntary efforts to reduce emissions.

Superior Tube completed reformulation and degreaser removal projects that are expected to reduce TCE emissions by more than 50 percent this year. On Feb. 13, the company announced it is taking steps to eliminate the use of TCE from its manufacturing process completely.

The company is seeking approval from DEP to replace TCE with an alternative approved by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency -- n-propyl bromide, or nPB. Unlike TCE, nPB is not considered an air toxic.

Accellent, meanwhile, is operating the first of two carbon absorber units to control TCE emissions from the company's large degreasers. Accellent had the first unit operating on Oct. 2 and received the second unit on Feb. 8. This second unit is being installed now and should be operational by early March.

While the manufacturer for the carbon absorber equipment guarantees an overall emission reduction of 35 percent, DEP believes this is a very conservative estimate. Emission reductions of 90 percent or greater usually result from this type of installation.

Complete progress reports and other related information have been posted on DEP's Southeast regional Web page since a public meeting in February 2007. DEP created this web-based resource so area residents and local officials could obtain news and background information about Collegeville-area air monitoring and TCE emission reduction efforts.

The site can be accessed at http://www.depweb.state.pa.us/, keyword: Collegeville.

A recent addition to the Web page, "Additional Monitoring Under EPA Grant," provides a link to DEP's December 2007 work plan for additional monitoring efforts. The agency was awarded a $269,000 grant by EPA to expand its air monitoring efforts for TCE and other compounds in the Collegeville area.

This community-wide monitoring project will develop baseline references of airborne TCE concentrations to support exposure estimates. The project will track long-term measurements of air toxics following the already implemented emission reduction strategy in the area.

Residents who have questions or concerns prior to the meeting may contact DEP Community Relations Coordinator Lynda Rebarchak at 484-250-5820, or by email at lrebarchak@state.pa.us.

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[Attorney Christopher] Roe explained that across Coldstream Road from the proposed school site the Henry Company site has long been the subject of environmental investigation and clean-up under the direction of the United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA). Ciba-Geigy, a chemical company, operated there in the 1950s and early 1960s. USEPA has identified lagoons that were used for disposal in that area and are the likely source of solvent contamination in the groundwater. The lagoons were excavated in 1984, but the monitoring and clean-up of groundwater continues.

In the 1980s groundwater monitoring wells were installed on nearby properties to determine how far contaminants had spread. These off site wells included four that were installed on what is now the Kimberton Elementary School property. Two of the wells on the north northeast side of the Kimberton School property have never shown the presence of any solvent contamination. A third well, on the east side of the property along Rt.113, has shown low levels, at or below clean-up standards. The fourth well, monitoring well MW-17 –along the southwest edge of the property – has consistently shown elevated levels of solvent contamination.

Phoenixville Area School District (PASD) will not use groundwater from the property for any purpose. Despite this, PASD and its advisors met with and are working with USEPA and the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (PADEP) to insure that the presence of the contaminants in the groundwater below part of the property will not pose unacceptable risks to employees or students.

PASD is actively engaged in two steps toward this goal. First, PASD has directed that the designers of the school building follow and implement USEPA guidelines for ensuring that school buildings are protected from subsurface vapors.

Second, PASD has hired environmental specialists to install additional groundwater monitoring wells to better define the areas of the property under which contaminated groundwater may exist, including the concentrations and water elevations.

Given the history of the use of the property, another issue that PASD is having its environmental advisers fully evaluate and address is the appropriate handling of the construction debris and other fill materials, including a small area reportedly used as a town disposal area in the 1960s or earlier. PASD’s consultant will submit a plan for the handling of the fill materials that will be reviewed and approved by PADEP before actual construction work begins.

In 1981 volatile organic compounds (VOCs) were detected in monitoring wells. As a result, a series of initial clean-up actions took place including removal of drums, excavation of the lagoons, and treatment of residential wells. In 1992 a public water system was built providing water to residences and businesses around the site. Approximately 500 people live within a one-mile radius of the site. A small stream that crosses through the site is the discharge point for local groundwater. Less than one-mile from the site is French Creek, a public recreation and fishing area.

[...]

Threats and Contaminants
During routine water quality testing in 1981, contamination in a well on the site was detected. The lagoons were identified as a source of contamination at the site. The groundwater is contaminated with volatile organic compounds (VOCs), including trichloroethene [aka trichloroethylene], dichloroethene, and vinyl chloride. A tributary to French Creek was also contaminated with VOCs.

[...]

Cleanup Progress
In the past ten years, over 3,000 pounds of VOCs, mainly TCE, have been removed by the groundwater treatment system. The groundwater and surface water are regularly monitored and this information is reported to EPA. EPA completed a five-year review of the site on September 30, 2004 and found that the remedy is protective of human health and the environment. The next five-year review will be due by September 2009.

As a toxicologist who has investigated many schools built upon ground containing chlorinated solvents, this situation looks potentially dangerous to future schoolchildren whether or not a geothermal system is put in place.

The problem is that chlorinated solvents underground are degraded by soil bacteria to vinyl chloride, a carcinogenic gas. This carcinogenic gas migrates upwards, much like radon, and may accumulate in buildings on top of contaminated soil.

In one such school built in 1965 atop a trichloroethylene (TCE) dump in Marion, Ohio, I found that the leukemia rate in schoolchildren was three times that expected. Upon my recommendation, the local school board finally moved the school to another location. Obviously this unwise location caused both inestimable human trauma and great expense to the school district.

Bruce Molholt
West Chester

Superior Tube Co., a Collegeville manufacturer that has released some of the nation's highest airborne amounts of trichloroethylene, a suspected carcinogen, announced today that it is phasing out use of the chemical.

Company president Tony Jost said the TCE would be replaced with a less hazardous chemical.

The company has asked the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection for permission to modify its procedures. If approved, Jost said, the work could be completed by the end of April.

Charles McPhedran of Citizens for Pennsylvania's Future, a key critic of the company's practices, said Superior was making "a big step forward."

Company officials said the new process would be state of the art and would meet or exceed all the changes that have been vigorously sought by area residents, legislators and the environmental community.

Contaminated soil at the former Champion Spark Plug factory on Main Street is covered with a cap under a layer of asphalt, but federal officials want to determine if any chemical gases from the property made their way into nearby homes.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is expected to test two residences over the next few months for the presence of trichloroethylene (TCE), one of the chemicals that entered the soil and groundwater at the site between 1930 and 1976.

The state Department of Environmental Protection confirmed that trichloroethylene (TCE) continues to contaminate groundwater and migrate from the site of a former plutonium plant along Route 66 to the Kiski River in Parks.

Although the plutonium plant was razed, with the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission granting unrestricted release of the site in August 2004, the groundwater is still contaminated with TCE. The plant site is adjacent to a nuclear dump.

A toxic liquid commonly used as a solvent, TCE was first detected by the owners of the site of the former plutonium plant, Babcock & Wilcox, in 1991.

"The site was decommissioned, and B&W removed contaminated soils, but it did not remove TCE from the groundwater," said Helen Humphreys, DEP spokeswoman. The company was then required to monitor the groundwater for two years until the end of 2004. Since then, there has been no monitoring, Humphreys said.

"The contamination entering the Kiski does not pose a risk to people or the environment," she said. "We need to work with the company for a complete cleanup of the site." There is no cleanup deadline in place.

The 15-page technical report, commissioned by the advocacy group Citizens for Pennsylvania's Future, outlined changes that it said could reduce emissions by up to 90 percent. It came just days after Superior released a report saying its TCE emissions had been reduced by 60 percent as a result of changes made within the last several months.

Tony Jost, Superior's president and chief executive officer, said he had not yet read the full report and could not comment on it. But he said the company's current emissions "show the effectiveness of the voluntary reduction programs we've been working on. We're very happy to have exceeded our 2007 goals, and we're continuing to work hard on further reductions."

Accellent spokesman Jeffrey M. Farina was unavailable yesterday.

[...]

Although the plants had largely been operating within their state permits, residents and advocates have argued that with so much at stake - according to the DEP, the increased lifetime cancer risk from the TCE emitted is as high as 1.6 people per 10,000 - the companies and regulators are doing too little.

Superior Tube, Company Inc (Superior Tube) and Accellent, Inc. (Accellent), two narrow tube companies in the Collegeville, PA, were ranked #6 and #8 respectively, for TCE emissions in the United States in 2005. Matson & Associates, Inc. (M&A) was asked to analyze the sources of toxic TCE emissions from the two facilities and provide recommendations on ways in which these companies can reduce their TCE emissions. Pursuant to this request, M&A has identified the following three methods that when implemented, in some combination, by Superior Tube and Accellent with significantly reduce TCE emissions at their Collegeville, PA plants:

(1) Route emissions from equipment emitting significant levels of TCE to effective activated carbon (AC) systems;

(2) Install closed-loop, vacuum, or airless vacuum vapor degreasers in place of equipment currently being used to perform degreasing operations.

(3) Switch from TCE to a non-HAP formula (e.g. n-propyl bromide) in equipment currently employing TCE;

Items (1) and (2) are feasible for reducing emissions from both large and small emitters of TCE. Item (3) is best employed for small emitters. nPB is a volatile organic compound (VOC) though it is not classified as a hazardous air pollutant (HAP), as is TCE. As a VOC, it does present some safety and environmental concerns such that its release in large quantities is not desirable.

Bottled Water: This alternative provides for the Department to furnish commercial bottled water to the impacted residences. Bottled water would be delivered regularly to each residence that has a water supply contaminated in excess of the Maximim Contaminant Level (MCL) of 5 ppb for TCE. This would effectively remove the risk posed by ingestion, but would not remove the risk posed by inhalation and dermal contact.

Point-Of-Entry Water Treatment Units: This alternative provides for the Department to install carbon treatment systems on the supply line of private wells that are contaminated. The carbon treatment systems would effectively remove the risk posed by ingestion, inhalation and dermal contact. [TCE Blog note: Not entirely true, see below]

Bottled Water, was initiated on January 1, 2007, for residences with water supply contamination levels greater than 5 ppb of TCE but less than 25 ppb.

Point-of-Entry Water Treatment Systems will be provided for residences that have TCE levels greater than 25 ppb TCE in their water supply. The Department has determined by risk analysis that this level presents an unacceptable inhalation threat in addition to the ingestion threat.

The articles that you have posted on your blog are accurate. The state is investigating groundwater contamination and the state is supplying bottled water or installing carbon filtration on wells. A vapor intrusion study will be done when the contamination plume has been identified.

The Department of Environmental Protection has named a third responsible party in the contamination of the ground near drinking water sources in Lewis Run.

The Control Chief Corp. signed the agreement that it will pay a total of $110,000 to the state's Hazardous Sites Cleanup Act Fund that settles their liability in the contamination.

[...]

This is the third company the DEP has reached settlements with - the others are McCourt Label and Tronox, formerly known as Kerr-McGee.

[...]

From 1978 to 1998, Control Chief, which has its headquarters in Bradford, owned property in Lewis Run and operated an electronic equipment manufacturing facility.

When another company bought the property and an environmental assessment was conducted, chlorinated solvents typically used as degreasing agents were found in the soil and groundwater. The chemicals included tetrachloroethylene (PCE), trichloroethylene (TCE) and cis-1,2-dichloroethylene. The situation has resulted in the borough having to hook up to Bradford City water to supply its residents with safe drinking water.

Tarbell said the DEP is not actively pursuing additional responsible parties at this time.

Longtime residents of Quincy Township can remember the days when car oil, antifreeze and other liquids were simply taken out back of the garage, house or makeshift junk yard and dumped into the ground.

Those types of practices may have caught up with the township in recent months with the discovery of trichloroethylene contamination in Tomstown area wells.

More than a dozen wells have been found with TCE - an industrial degreaser and suspected human carcinogen - at levels above the maximum threshold of 5 parts per billion allowed by the federal government.

In response and as the state Department of Environmental Protection conducts an investigation of the TCE's source and migration pattern, township supervisors have amended the municipal subdivision ordinance relating to water testing for new homes.

The revised ordinance requires developers of major subdivisions to complete a more rigorous test well program and a comprehensive groundwater feasibility study.

Groundwater quality also will have to be tested for volatile organics such as TCE - a new requirement intended to catch pollutants in the future and help the township proactively combat groundwater contamination.

The state will hold a public hearing July 3 on changes to the permit for Superior Tube which will allow the plant to lower its airborne emissions of a chemical that has been linked with cancer.

The chemical in question is trichloroethylene, or TCE, and it has been found in higher quantities in the air around Collegeville and Trappe than in other areas of the state during a year-long sampling project by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection.

...

As it stands now, the hearing will be held 2 p.m. Tuesday, July 3 at the DEP Southeast Regional Office, 2 E. main St., Norristown, PA 19401 [Google map].

Written comment on the plan should be submitted to [the head of DEP's Southeast Regional Air Quality Program, Francine] Carlini at the hearing or prior to the hearing at the above address. Copies of the permit changes are also available at DEP's Norristown office.

The head of the Air Quality Program at DEP's Southeast Regional office in Norristown, Carlini said the elimination of one of the vapor de-greasers at the plant will require a small uptick in the emissions from other equipment at the plant, even though the overall effect will be a decrease in admissions. It is the uptick that triggered the need for the hearing, she said.

A high-ranking federal official has agreed to revisit and possibly reconsider a controversial decision to exempt two local tubing plants from new, more restrictive pollution regulations, according to a local congressman. William Wehrum is the assistant administrator for air and radiation with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

According to a Wednesday announcement from U.S. Rep. Jim Gerlach, R-6th Dist., Wehrum "agreed to review and possibly reconsider the agency's current regulation exempting certain industries from tough TCE standards" following a May 18 conference call in which a variety of state and federal elected officials participated.

• Congressman Joe Sestak, D-7th Dist. (read Sestak: No exemptions for 'narrow tube' plants);
• Congressman Jim Gerlach, R-6th Dist. (read Gerlach Pushes For A TCE Emissions Response);
• Congressman Charles Dent, R-15th Dist.;
• Senator John Rafferty, R-44th Dist.;
• Senator Andrew Dinniman, D-19th Dist.;
• State Representative Mike Vereb, R-28th Dist.

Governor Edward G. Rendell announced today that the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection has filed a petition for review with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit challenging the Environmental Protection Agency's National Air Emissions Standards on hazardous air pollutants halogenated solvent cleaning[sic].

[...]

"I believe the EPA did not adequately consider public health risks when establishing new air emissions standards for TCE, nor did they take into account the reasonable, economically-feasible and expedient measures that are available to the narrow tube industry to reduce emissions," said Governor Rendell, noting his reason for directing DEP to challenge this action. "Exempting these industries from more stringent emission standards fails to protect the well-being of our people, our communities and our economy."

[...]

"Contrary to the argument that reductions in TCE emissions will place an unfair burden on the narrow tube industry, we are seeing voluntary reductions by manufacturers in Montgomery County that can be realized within a year," said Governor Rendell. "That calls into question the EPA's evaluation of the facts about this industry. For the sake of our residents, I am asking the EPA to act quickly in reviewing our objections and reverse this decision."

A class-action lawsuit against Foster Wheeler Corp., stemming from a trichloroethylene contamination in Mountain Top groundwater, has been tentatively settled, according to legal notice advertisements running in the Citizens’ Voice this week.

The preliminary approved settlement requires the company to pay $1.64 million for administrative costs, attorneys’ fees and to class members, the legal notice says. More than 50 property owners could have been affected by the contamination, which was discovered in 2004.

TCE, which was used as a degreaser by the company at it’s Crestwood Industrial Park plant, has been linked to cancer as well as kidney, liver and nerve damage, according to various studies.

Homeowners in the contaminated area have fought for tax relief on their now contaminated property. The Luzerne County Board of Assessment Appeals recently gave the homeowners an abatement of a third of their property taxes through 2010.

Anyone living in the contaminated area in Wright Township from Aug. 1, 2004, to April 16, 2007 qualifies to receive part of the settlement.

Members of the class action suit did not want to comment on the case at this point. Their attorney could not return repeated phone calls to his Philadelphia-based office.

The terms of the settlement still have to be approved by the District Court at a hearing scheduled August 6.

For more information call the class action help line at 1-866-963-9976 or visit the Web site, www.martinfosterwheelerclassaction.com. The site has not worked the past two days, but should be functioning by the end of the week, administrators said.

The annual average TCE concentrations in 2005 at the Trappe and Evansburg sites were 0.26 ppbv and 0.14 ppbv, respectively. In comparison, most other Pennsylvania sites in 2005 were near or below the 0.04 ppbv detection limit. The excess lifetime cancer risk due to TCE in 2005 was 1.60 in 10,000 at the Trappe site and 0.88 in 10,000 at the Evansburg site.

• Talk of the Town: Investigative reporter Jon Goodman's blog, where, "At great risk he has sought to reveal the problem, the cause and the solution."


• Collegeville TCE Watch: Run by A Concerned Citizen who "decided to setup this blog which will be devoted to gathering information about this important issue, and getting our government representatives to fix this problem quickly."


• Concerned Citizens of Collegeville, PA: A Yahoo Groups group run by Liz D. from Trappe. She writes: I envision this site to be a place where everyone can post and read information and share their thoughts and ideas about the air quality problem in our area. A place to discuss what they've read in the paper, what public officials have told them and what they've heard at public meetings they have attended. It is also a place to discuss what progress, if any, has been made and what we can do as a community to make sure that the air quality in Collegeville/Trappe improves for us and our children.

"To discuss legal matters in executive session you must be discussing pending litigation that has been filed in court, or litigation where the threat is imminent and the only thing you’re allowed to discuss is legal strategy to deal with the lawsuit," Melewski said.

She further said the fact that the matter is the subject of a right-to-know request makes it even less appropriate for excluding the public, not more.

"If that were true, every time a citizen filed a right-to-know request, it could be cited as a reason for executive session," she said. "That’s cutting against the act itself, whose goal is making government more open, not less open."

"If I want to get legal advice from my lawyer, I’ll ask for it," said Trappe councilman Nevin Scholl, who also sits on both joint boards.

Asked if there is any litigation filed in connection with the discussion that just occurred, Mark A. Hosterman, whose Blue Bell law firm advises the Collegeville half of the joint committee, said the discussion involved a subject which "could be potential litigation."

Sandvik Inc. agreed in February to pay to connect homes within 300 feet of existing public waterlines to the water system. Engineers are in the process of verifying which buildings qualify; then the property owners will be notified before the second week of April, Sandvik attorney John McAleese said.

[...]

Some homeowners, including Scott Township resident Harry Bower, are increasingly frustrated. “I’m completely stressed out,” the former township supervisor said. “It’s been over two years now. It’s a major problem in Scott Township.”

Public water may be on the horizon for some Quincy Township residents.

Quincy Township Supervisor Chairman Bob Gunder contacted the Washington Township Municipal Authority earlier this month to ask whether WTMA is able to provide public water to “a maximum of 200 homes in the Tomstown area.”

Some Quincy residents have long condemned the prospect of public water, alleging it will only lead to unrestrained residential and commercial growth.

But the Tomstown area is at the center of a Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection investigation into well water contamination, and DEP may ultimately determine public water is the best solution to the problem.

DEP has been looking into trichloroethylene contamination in Quincy Township since last fall.

TCE, once used as an industrial degreaser and dry-cleaning chemical, is a suspected carcinogen, and the contaminant was discovered in Tomstown after water testing was conducted for the proposed Mentzer Meadows development.

“We're still trying to delineate how far the contamination goes,” Sandra Roderick, a spokeswoman with DEP's south-central region, said Friday.

Church Road residents want help

When Dan Madl moved to his Wright Township home in 1996, he knew little about Foster Wheeler, its plant in the Crestwood Industrial Park or the trichloroethylene contamination that would pollute dozens of homeowners’ wells along Church Road.

During the next several years, Madl and the other 37 homeowners on Church Road learned a lot about Foster Wheeler and the chemical, TCE, which was used as a de-greaser and cleaning solvent and has been linked to cancer as well as kidney, liver and nerve damage.

“We have TCE in the ground and it’s apparently going to be there forever,” homeowner Bill Heverly said during a Thursday meeting of the homeowners at St. Jude Elementary School.

They 37 homeowners filed a class-action lawsuit against Foster Wheeler for damages, but also are seeking tax refunds from their local taxing bodies from 2004 through 2006. The TCE contamination was confirmed by the federal Environmental Protection Agency. The homeowners say from that point their property values were greatly reduced, but they continued to pay taxes for the same value.

“I couldn’t sell my home now if I wanted to,” Madl said.

Bouncing from the Crestwood School Board to Luzerne County commissioners to Wright Township to get a straight answer, the homeowners are routinely told to go elsewhere, they say.

Within the year, a new well already drilled north of the borough can come on line providing uncontaminated public water, officials from the Environmental Protection Agency told the more than 60 people gathered in the Bally firehouse Thursday.

Then, the EPA will have to turn its attention to how it removes the chemical contamination from the water pumped from the existing municipal well, which will have to be discharged into a nearby stream.

[...]

The contamination with which the EPA is grappling comes from the former Bally Case and Cooler building in town and contains unsafe levels of several contaminants including trichloroethylene (TCE), 1,1,1 trichloroethane (TCA), 1,1 dichloroethene (DCE) and 1,4 dioxane. All three are considered potential human carcinogens by the EPA.

[...]

Kathy Davies, an EPA hydrogeologist, said the contamination of the Bally water supply is not coming from another nearby Superfund site, the former John Crossley farm in Hereford.

TCE contamination levels in the groundwater at that site, which also came from Bally Case and Cooler drums dumped into a quarry hole in the 1960s, are as high as 700,000 parts per billion. The EPA safety threshold for TCE, called the maximum contaminant level, is 5 parts per billion.

Contamination on a site to be developed by Park Ten Inc. of Lansdale continues to be a major hurdle for a 34-home development on the site at the intersection of Franklin Way, Twelfth and North Main streets in Sellersville, which is awaiting final land development plan approval.

Park Ten was supposed to appear before the borough Oct. 9 for a public meeting that would welcome comment and concern from area residents - and several residents were present for the meeting and prepared to discuss concerns about contamination from trichloroethylene (TCE) as well as water drainage issues. However, the meeting was postponed until council's Nov. 13 meeting because Park Ten still has outstanding issues on the contamination, according to Sellersville Borough Solicitor Randal White.

"There are still environmental aspects of this project that cause me concern," said White to Sellersville Borough Council at its Oct. 9 meeting.

White and Joel Bolstein, an environmental attorney with White's office, have been in constant contact with Park Ten's attorney, environmental attorney and environmental consultant.

[...]

Well Number 5 has a device called a "stripper" that is used to treat the water in that well to remove TCE. While there is currently no issue on that well or its treatment, White questions what would happen if the borough would stop use of that well in the future. If that happened, the development would continue to need treated water, and DEP has provided no information in writing as to who would be responsible to treat that water - likely either the developer (Park Ten Inc.) or the development's Homeowner's Association. White felt it was important to get this item clarified and in writing before council.

"We feel that it is prudent to have that uncertainty cleared up before final approval is given on this project," said White.

[...]

The meeting for public comment will be held Nov. 9 at 7:45 p.m. Sellersville Borough Council meets at 7:30 p.m. but will adjourn into a special meeting just to address the development issue and receive comment from the public.

With its decision to provide public water to homes and businesses where wells have been contaminated with a dangerous chemical, the state must now set a schedule for installing a water line along Route 73.

[...]

Although the source of the contamination in Gilbertsville has not yet been identified, the DEP plans to remove contaminated soil from an area just west of Douglass Street. That site is located south of Route 73, also known as East Philadelphia Avenue, and west of Route 100.

The areas that will receive public water are all east of Route 100, Harney confirmed.

Water lines connected to the Boyertown Water Authority will be run along Route 73 from Route 100 up to, but not including, the Gilbertsville Shopping Center, which already receives public water.

Public water will also be provided down the sections of Sweinhart Road and Rhoads Avenue that are south of Route 73 and east of Route 100, Harney said.

In all, the water will be provided to more than 20 residents and businesses in the area, according to a DEP press release.

That release said the agency "first learned of groundwater contamination in Gilbertsville in July 2004, while investigating another site in nearby Colebrookdale." Although officials were looking for a different contaminant, trichloroethylene, or TCE, what they found instead in the Gilbertsville wells was tetrachloroethylene, or PCE.

For the past few years, some Intercourse-area wells have tested positive for unsafe levels of [trichloroethylene]. In that time, the state Department of Environmental Protection has taken steps to make the water supply safe for the households and businesses most seriously affected. And now it has scheduled a hearing for 7 p.m. June 14 at Leacock Township Building, 3545 W. Newport Road, Intercourse, to discuss options for remediating contaminated well water in that area. Anyone concerned about the quality of their water is invited to attend.

[...]

"In the fall of 2004, we did some private well samples and found that the contamination looked widespread," DEP spokeswoman Sandy Roderick said. By "widespread," Roderick meant the contamination does not follow a vein or path in the limestone, but seems to have leeched into groundwater in all directions around the site where it first was discovered in the area north and east of Queen Road and East Pequea Lane.

[...]

DEP spokesman Arthur L. Dalla Piazza said bottled water delivery at DEP's expense already has been offered to several homeowners. For homes where contamination is even higher, unsafe levels of TCE can build up and be inhaled. For those properties, DEP will install water treatment systems.

"We ... installed treatment systems at three of the homes so far," Dalla Piazza said. "Vapors from daily water use can build up in the house. If you exceed a certain contamination level, we'll put systems on those wells to reduce that inhalation threat."

[...]

Dalla Piazza said it could take decades for the TCE to be removed from groundwater sources. Residents with questions regarding the situation or the hearing should call Roderick at 705-4931. Those who wish to offer public comment for the record at the hearing should register with Roderick before 4 p.m., June 7.

Park Ten Inc of Lansdale, owners of a 10+-acre property at the intersection of Franklin Way and Twelfth and North Main streets in Sellersville, is coming much closer to realization of a plan for 34 homes on the property.

The group went before the Sellersville Planning Commission in May seeking recommendation for final approval, but did not have the documents needed for the recommendation, according to planning commission Chairman Rachel Swierzewski.

The documents included an Act 2 clearance letter from the state Department of Environmental Protection for the cleanup of trichloroethylene (TCE) found on the property, which was a radium-processing facility from 1914 to 1917 and also served as a landfill in the mid-1900s. TCE is usually linked to previous industrial activity and long-term exposure to vapors from the substance can be a potential threat to human health. DEP began cleanup of the site in 1996 that included the removal of lead-contaminated soils and lower and higher-activity radioactive soils at a cost of nearly $6.2 million, according to DEP's Web site.

"We're just waiting for different approvals to come back," said Edmund Mullin, attorney for Park Ten. "There was pollution in the groundwater so there's no threat to anyone that lives there, because we use public water now, and in addition, it's been cleaned up."

Can I still use my well? What’s my water bill going to be? These and a hundred other questions were the type being asked last week throughout the course of a four-hour open house for those affected by water contamination along Farmington Avenue and Heather Place.

Discovered more than two years ago when a well was tested, the chemical has since been found in more than 100 wells in the region, forcing homeowners to live with bottled water or carbon filtration systems while state and local officials struggled to find a solution.

Last Wednesday night’s meeting marked what many hope is the final chapter in that struggle.

Designed to explain how public water will be brought to those with poisoned wells, the meeting featured experts from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, the Montgomery County Health Department, Superior Water and the township.

...

Dave Rinehart, a systems operator with Superior, said his firm is getting itself up to speed, having only found out the night before that the township commissioners had decided to have the company provide water for the entire project, not just part.

"We didn’t know we’d been picked until we read it in the newspaper," Rinehart said.