Lab’s Sewage Plant cleanup completed

Contaminated soils at the Sewage Treatment Plant have been cleaned up.  Over the fall and summer of 2002, workers removed the soils.  After completion, samples were taken to ensure that the work met cleanup goals.  The cleanup plan and sampling plans were approved by the U.S. Department of Energy, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation. 

After the contaminated soils were removed from all Sewage Treatment Plant cleanup areas, a team of independent surveyors from the Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education (affiliated with Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, Tennessee) collected samples from the work site to confirm that cleanup goals were met.  The team from Oak Ridge inspects all U.S. Department of Energy Superfund cleanup projects. 

Once the survey team verifies that the site is clean, the Laboratory will use clean fill to restore the excavated areas, and the excavated  sediment will be sent to a licensed, off-site disposal facility.

From the 1940s through the 1980s, Laboratory disposal procedures resulted in some chemicals being processed by the sewage treatment plant. Some of these chemicals became trapped in the plant's sand filter beds and berms.