Source: Albuquerque Journal (NM), April 8, 2012
Posted on: http://envfpn.advisen.com
Groundwater pollution got a lot of attention in recent years, as Santa Fe County found itself having to clean up petroleumcontaminated dirt and water in the construction of the new courthouse at Montezuma Avenue and Sandoval Street.
But that’s not the only pollution plume in the City Different. The county has a handful of “brownfields.”
One got a spate of publicity through the 1990s, when groundwater pollution led to occasional closures of the city’s Baca Street Well. A PNM service site and generating station — a substation and transmission line are still on that site, along with an easement for a walking trail — was blamed for that plume of gasoline-related contaminants covering around five acres in the area of Baca Street and Cerrillos Road.
And, although the company never accepted full blame, it continues to run monitoring wells and a pump to clean up the water in that area. “In the next five years, we expect to spend $350,000” to monitor and treat the water, said PNM spokeswoman Susan Sponar.
No one was able to predict how long that water treatment will have to continue. It can stop only “when the concentration in groundwater meets standards,” said Dale Doremus, program manager for remedial oversight with the New Mexico Environment Department.
The good news is that the plume isn’t getting any bigger, according to Bart Faris, environmental scientist with the department’s Groundwater Quality Bureau.
“It’s not getting smaller,” he added. “It’s about stable. It’s going to be awhile before containment will really get all of it.”
Under Railyard Park
Another brownfield has been listed by the state Environment Department roughly under the area of the Railyard Park. While the Santa Fe Railyard, a former Conoco Phillips gas station and La Unica dry cleaners have been mentioned as possible sources of those contaminants, not enough evidence has been found yet to finger the culprit, according to Faris.
“That area has shown levels of chlorinated solvents and a little bit of petroleum products,” he said. And while the affected area is listed at “less than 50 acres,” the actual size of the plume isn’t known, Faris said.
“Under current regulations, we identify who is the responsible person, and they determine the extent of the contamination and clean it up.”
Other brownfields listed in Santa Fe County include less than 10 acres with PCE (tetrachloroethylene, also known as perchloroethylene) contamination from One Hour Martinizing, 1091 Santa Francis Drive; about 20 acres with sulfates around La Bajada Mine, near the community of La Bajada; and the Ortiz Landfill, with an unknown area of nitrates and volatile organic compounds around Camino de las Crucitas and Buckman Road.
The Environment Department has also checked a state Department of Transportation site along Cordova Road and the railroad tracks, where the department once had a materials testing lab that used sulfates, according to Faris.
Soil vapor samples — testing of underground air pockets — in that area revealed low levels of chlorinated solvents, he said. “Air in the soils before it hits the water table may have volatile materials in it.”
So far, though, no pollutants from that site have been found in the groundwater, which is being sampled quarterly, he said. “At this point, no cleanup is necessary,” Faris added. Since no contaminants have hit groundwater, this area isn’t considered a brownfield.
Better than elsewhere
But don’t get the idea that Santa Fe is seething with underground pollution.
“It doesn’t have so many groundwater contamination problems as elsewhere in the state,” Faris said.
While some of the sites seem to range along the city’s railroad tracks, Doremus said she wouldn’t say “that’s the most contaminated side of town.”
“It probably was an industrial side of town,” she added, not unusual historically when industries had their materials shipped in and out by rail.
But, as the list of in-town sites suggests, many old pollution sources were dry cleaners or underground storage tanks for gasoline. Former gasoline stations in the area, for example, are considered possible sources of the pollution that forced the clean-up of the courthouse site.
Modern gasoline stations operate under pretty rigorous regulations to prevent leakage, Doremus said. “They used to be old ‘mom and pops’ — the trend is away from that.”
As for dry cleaners, there are some ongoing investigations, she said. “The city of Espanola has a Superfund site addressing some dry-cleaner waste,” Doremus said.
That site, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency website, is called the North Railroad Avenue Plume. It is about 58 acres in an elliptical shape less than a mile south of 113 North Railroad Ave. extending toward Santa Clara Pueblo; it originated at the Norge Town Laundromat and Dry Cleaning operation.
These days, many dry-cleaning businesses have changed to “closed-loop” systems, Faris said. “Most have gone to equipment where there is no waste.”
Water supply OK
Now that water reaching the Baca Street Well is being treated — as it has been since 1998 — none of the other known pollution sites appears to be an immediate threat to Santa Fe’s water supply, according to Alex Puglisi, environmental compliance officer with the city’s Public Utilities Department.
The plume under the new courthouse site has extended to shallow groundwater, but has not penetrated to the deeper groundwater accessed by wells, he said. “There’s no sign of it entering the water supply,” he said.
Over by the Ortiz Landfill site, the city has three wells, but not in the immediate area. “We don’t see any contamination showing up in the city wells,” Puglisi said.
He added that he’s not convinced the Ortiz Landfill is the source, or at least the sole source, of nitrates showing up in monitoring wells in that area. The Alta Vista Landfill is nearby, he said. “And there also was an old (Japanese) internment camp that had (sewage) lagoons.”
The city has 22 wells supplying drinking water — seven in the city limits, 12 (plus an inactive one) at the Buckman wells site, and a couple of others. Those wells are not being used much for drinking water any more, Puglisi said. The most recent use was last summer, when the Buckman wells were brought online after the Buckman Direct Diversion was closed down after the Las Conchas Fire and following rains that sent ash down into the Rio Grande, he said.
Most drinking water comes from reservoirs along the Santa Fe River and that Buckman diversion, he added.