The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is accepting community comments about its proposed plan to remove dangerous chemicals from the Lauritzen Channel at the United Heckathorn Superfund site.
The public comment period will be open until Dec. 29. You can learn more about the proposal at an EPA open house and meeting on Oct. 21 from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the Richmond Recreation Complex.
Comments are being accepted at the meeting or by email or U.S. mail.
The EPA says it will respond to all comments in a “responsiveness summary” that will be included in the final cleanup plan.
EPA public meeting: Heckathorn Superfund cleanup
What: The EPA is hosting an open house and meeting in Richmond so residents can learn about their proposed cleanup plan and how to weigh in. (Comments will be accepted until Dec. 29.)
When: Oct. 21, 5 p.m. (open house), 6 p.m.-8 p.m. (presentation)
Where: Richmond Recreation Complex, 3230 Macdonald Ave.
Zoom registration (for those who can’t attend in person).
Email/mailed comments:
- Karen Juris, Remedial Project Manager, Jurist.Karen@epa.gov
- U.S. mail: Attn: Karen Juris, 75 Hawthorne St., (SFD-7-2) San Francisco, CA 94105
Related links:
Local environmentalists have criticized the EPA over its approach to the current cleanup — it will be the second attempt after a previous effort in the 1990s failed — and its communication with the public. So a coalition that includes the Richmond Shoreline Alliance, San Francisco Baykeeper and Sierra Club San Francisco Bay Chapter submitted its own plan last year calling for the channel to be completely drained, which it says will better eradicate contaminants.
The coalition this week called the EPA’s current plan “better, but not enough.” On the positive side, it agrees with the EPA’s plans to remove more contaminants in most areas, dredge out contaminated sediment from much of the channel and make polluters foot the $93.4 million cleanup bill. The coalition also lauded the EPA’s plans to seal leaky pipes, partially remove old wood pilings, and clean out storm drains that feed into the channel.
But the coalition did list 11 areas of concern with the plan, with the biggest red flags being: The lack of detail around sampling; the fact that future use of the site would be limited, even after cleanup; vagueness about the risks posed by sea level and groundwater rise; and what they’re calling a “rigged baseline” because the EPA plans to test already-contaminated nearby waters to set “background” cleanup goals.
Thirteen months after the coalition presented its concerns and recommendations, the EPA’s statement indicates they remain committed to their plan.
“After conducting extensive studies on the feasibility of different cleanup methods to restore the Lauritzen Channel, we have developed a proposal grounded in sound science and engineering,” said EPA Pacific Southwest Regional Administrator Mike Martucci, in a Sept. 30 press release. “Our experts are confident that this is the best remedy available to address the shortcomings of past cleanups and protect the marine environment — and the Richmond community —in the long-term.”
Why is the Lauritzen Channel so contaminated?
Past industrial pesticide processing led to widespread contamination in the upland and marine areas of the site, a shipping waterway that is part of the Port of Richmond that was created for ship building in World War II. Toxins detected at high levels in the area include dichlorodiphenyl trichloroethane (DDT) and dieldrin, both known to pose risks for humans and marine life.
The Lauritzen Channel sits in a harbor inlet not far from Richmond’s ferry terminal. It became contaminated after companies including the United Heckathorn Chemical Co. disposed of chemicals in the water for more than two decades, from the 1940s to the 1960s.
The cleanup aims to reduce contamination in local fish and shellfish, lowering the risks to humans and other wildlife who might eat it. Fishing is currently prohibited at the site.
The coalition of environmentalists would prefer to see the channel drained and all of the contaminated sediment excavated. The EPA told Richmondside via an email last month that it isn’t considering this method, noting it would cost $200 million to $400 million due to the channel’s immense volume.
“Most of the contaminated sediment volume in the channel is within water depths that are too deep to allow for dewatering of the channel,” the agency stated. “Dry excavation as a remedial alternative is typically limited to relatively shallow water areas as site preparation to enclose and dewater can be lengthy and costly compared to mechanical dredging.”
The EPA says its plan will be the “most effective” over the long-term; will reduce human health and ecological risks; improve surface water quality; and reduce dependence on institutional controls.
The 1990s cleanup was found to have failed by 2016 because, the EPA said, there were still contaminants in parts of the sediment that were not removed in the channel, shoreline and embankment. The EPA also noted that there are more recent sources of contamination coming from city and Levin-Richmond Terminal Corporation stormwater management systems.
In 2022, a follow-up study showed that sediments at the central part of the channel had up to 3,800 times more DDT than their target goal in the 90s. DDT is a cancer-causing pesticide that the federal government banned in 1972.
“Why not do a complete removal, especially since the prior cleanup failed?” said Janet Johnson, a coordinator with the Richmond Shoreline Alliance, in an interview with Richmondside in September.
Another concern is that the channel will remain vulnerable to sea level and groundwater rise, Johnson said.
Surging seas will increase flood risks for hazardous sites in Richmond and other overburdened cities along U.S. coasts, according to scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, China’s Nanjing University and Climate Central, a nonprofit science organization. Their findings were published last November in the journal Nature Communications.
The EPA told Richmondside by email that its Focused Feasibility Study, some of which is excerpted here, references sea level rise and says its plan design “will be required to account for specific factors, such as sea-level rise, to ensure the long-term effectiveness of the chosen remedy.”
learn about community’s cleanup plan
It said an armored carbon cap will be installed in the part of the channel that can’t be dredged to prevent any remaining contamination from going back into the channel and would include an engineered barrier, like a sheet pile wall, along the site’s shoreline.
The coalition is also concerned that the EPA plans to base its remediation goals by looking at how contaminated it is compared to other bay waters, a tactic they claim will serve to “sidestep more appropriate, rational, and meaningful cleanup goals.”
They say because the Lauritzen Channel has been dredged extensively for decades, with dredged materials deposited at other bay disposal sites as far as the Carquinez Strait, those chemicals have already been distributed beyond the channel, meaning a true baseline for what’s acceptable can’t be determined.
The EPA told Richmondside that it doesn’t normally set cleanup levels lower than human-caused background contamination levels because of “cost-effectiveness, technical practicability, and the potential for recontamination of remediated areas by surrounding areas with elevated background concentrations.” It said they “do not have records indicating the Lauritzen Channel was dredged for decades and the material disposed of in other areas of the San Francisco Bay.”
