Progress on San Jacinto Superfund, But EPA Says Cleanup Takes Time
At the start of 2024, the EPA told the companies responsible for the San Jacinto River Waste Pits Superfund Site that their plans for remediating the site were “seriously deficient” and, if the companies didn’t address those deficiencies, the EPA would take over the cleanup. By doing that the agency sent a strong message to International Paper and Waste Management, the parent company of McGinnes Industrial Maintenance Corporation. An EPA takeover would mean the companies would have no say in the cleanup but have to pay all the cleanup costs.
One year later, on January 7th, EPA program managers met with the local community to say the approach has achieved some goals, but the cleanup of the Northern Pit is still years away.
On the positive front, in the past the companies had delayed the process by arguing that the cleanup approach that everyone agreed to in 2017 should be scrapped. Now they have accepted the community’s demands (and orders by the federal government) that the dioxin-laden material be removed from the site, rather than just covered over and buried. That’s good news.
Also, with the EPA breathing down their necks, the companies revised their plans three times last year to incorporate EPA and community concerns. The revisions added plans to address storms, overtopping, barge strikes, scour and heave (primarily protecting the area from the impact of the river). They also conceded to the EPA’s request that construction take place year round on the project, shortening the time to complete the work.
The EPA is currently reviewing the latest revisions to see if they meet the agency’s concerns.
On the negative side, the project is still a long way from starting the cleanup. Before a shovel full of material is removed, the EPA needs to:
Finish its review of the companies’ proposed plans,
Share the plans with the public,
Potentially push the companies for more revisions, followed by another review, and
Finalize what is called the 100% Remedial Design (RD) plan.
This is where it gets interesting. The EPA emphasized at the public meeting that it may still need to force the companies to actually comply with the cleanup requirements. The presentation from the meeting said:
The EPA has three options to implement a Remedial Action under the Superfund statute:
1) A judicial consent decree negotiated with potentially responsible parties;
2) Issue a Superfund unilateral administrative order; or
3) Implement as a federal Superfund project using Fund money.
In 2025, we anticipate the plan to be finalized and the agency to assess whether the companies are complying before it determines which of the three options it will choose. That’s important because the EPA also said, “Once there is an enforcement instrument in place, it may take up to 1-2 years of additional planning, contracting, and approvals before on-site construction begins.”
And there is another important wrinkle to the project. The Texas Department of Transportation wants to replace the I-10 bridge, perhaps starting construction in 2027. That means that the cleanup would take place while construction is going on. It could mean highway construction crews would be sinking pilings into the Southern Pit that was just remediated last year, likely disturbing material that was left buried in place.
What it all means: The cleanup of the Northern Pit is making progress on paper, but the site will continue to be a threat for several years and the potential for additional delays is very much a part of the equation.
Watch the full public meeting here.