Countywide : Contaminated Water Sites to Be Cleaned

Crews will soon begin cleaning three Orange County business sites where contaminated ground water has been found, a process which might take more than three years, officials say.

The Santa Ana Regional Water Quality Control Board will monitor the cleanup at the sites, where the contamination was discovered by county officials in routine checks two months ago.

According to Steven Overman, chief of pollutant investigations, each of the cases stemmed from leaks in unchecked waste-storage areas. The three businesses are BMF Energy Products on Dyer Road and Emerson Computer Power Plant on Standard Avenue, both in Santa Ana, and Unisys Inc. on Reynolds Avenue in Irvine.

Preliminary costs per site to neutralize the chemicals is estimated at between $100,000 and $1 million, Overman said.

The site of Unisys Inc., previously owned by Memorex Precision Plastics Facility, is the only one found to be threatening a county agricultural well. Early investigations revealed elevated levels of chlorinated solvents in the ground water. The investigation found concentrations of 2,000 parts per billion of trichloroethylene (TCE), a known carcinogen. The state maximum contaminant level in drinking water for TCE is 5 parts per billion.

Further investigations are needed to determine if deeper ground water has been affected, Overman said.

“At this point, the well is too deep and it might be too soon for it to be contaminated,” he said. “While the ground water needs to be cleaned up, we want to prevent the contamination from affecting existing or future sources of drinking or agricultural water.”

Tests taken in 1988 proved that the wells in the immediate area of the site were free of toxins--a signal to water officials that the spill occurred recently.

“We are still concerned that the further migration of the contaminants still poses a future threat to drinking and agricultural wells. This is why we are working fast on the cleanup project,” Overman said.