Hazardous Dump Could Foul Water Supply for 40,000

Contaminated water from the Stringfellow hazardous waste dump could reach domestic wells within 2 1/2 years and threaten the water supply of 40,000 Southern California residents unless preventive measures are undertaken soon, according to an environmental review of a cleanup plan for the site.

The report, prepared by the state Department of Health Services and released Wednesday, said state and federal officials have concluded that “a significant threat to public health exists due to groundwater contamination of the site,” and that quick action is needed to halt the flow of toxic wastes toward critical groundwater supplies.

The review was prepared in response to Orange County officials’ demands for an environmental impact report on an interim cleanup plan designed to pump contaminated groundwater from beneath the Stringfellow site, pre-treat it and pump it through a regional sewer line for eventual disposal into the ocean off Huntington Beach.

The review concludes that there is essentially no hazard to Orange County from the cleanup plan. In fact, it emphasizes the potential dangers of delaying the cleanup for further studies.

Bill Dendy, a consultant hired for the cleanup project, said Wednesday that contaminated water has already been found in two wells near Glen Avon, a Riverside County community located across the Pomona Freeway from the Stringfellow site. Officials are concerned that the contamination will spread from Pyrite Canyon, where the dump is located, into the vast natural underground reservoir that lies beneath the Santa Ana River and eventually flows into Orange County.

Dendy said the contamination is moving underground at a rate of 1,500 to 2,000 feet per year.

“Once it clears the canyon and starts to fan out, it’s almost impossible to recover again,” he said. “Once it gets out of control, there’s no way to stop it. It . . . goes all the way out to the Santa Ana River.”

Neil Cline, manager of the Orange County Water District, added: “Once it gets to the river, it’s our community drinking water supply. That’s why we’re urgently supporting this.”

Still, the Orange County Board of Supervisors, particularly Supervisors Roger Stanton and Bruce Nestande, have accused state officials of bypassing regular environmental review procedures and leaving Orange County--the eventual recipient of the wastes--out of the decision-making process.

Stanton said Thursday that he had not yet seen the environmental review, but he said it falls far short of the official environmental impact report requested by the county, which would have been subject to public hearings and which would have required thorough study of possible alternatives to the cleanup plan.

“You’ve got a rather obscure public agency, which has minimal review and control by the public,” Stanton said of the Santa Ana Watershed Project Authority, the association of water districts that is on contract with the state to undertake the cleanup plan.

“They’ve essentially made their decision in the absence of public input in the first place, and now they’re reviewing it in the absence of public input, and I think it’s absolutely ludicrous to say that’s going to satisfy anyone,” Stanton said, adding that he expected the review to be “nothing but a self-justification.”

Nestande could not be reached for comment Wednesday, but an aide said: “He’s not happy.” The environmental documentation presented so far “doesn’t go as far as he would like,” the aide added.

Officials from the watershed-project authority held the first of two public meetings on the issue in Huntington Beach Wednesday night. The second is scheduled for Jan. 30 in Fountain Valley.

The environmental review concluded that most of the fears Orange County officials have expressed over the plan to pipe the wastes into the ocean off Huntington Beach are groundless.

A series of charts in the review demonstrates that before the water is pumped from the Stringfellow site into the regional sewer line, it will be treated to make it of better quality than is required of industrial waste routinely dumped into the system. It will then be subjected to additional treatment at the county’s Fountain Valley sewage treatment plant and pumped out to sea.

The review acknowledges that some of the treated waste could be injected into Orange County’s groundwater supply “to an insignificant degree,” but only after it has been treated a third time so that it meets common drinking water standards.

Though radioactivity has been detected in some of the Stringfellow waste, it will be below safe levels for discharge into sanitary sewers before it reaches Orange County, the review said. All waste will be monitored daily to make sure it meets discharge standards before it is released into the sewer pipe, the review added.