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>>ANNOUNCER: Promoting a healthy environment It's the air we breathe
Clean, safe water Responsible management of our natural resources
We protect and restore For a sustainable future
Environment Matters >>GREG ROTE: "When you have places like this
that are remote and close enough where people who are can get in here and dump and nobody
can see them -- these are the kinds of places that we have problems."
>>NARRATION: Anatomy of an illegal dump: We'll check out one problem area and take a look
at what the DEP is doing to track down the people responsible. Plus: we'll have a first
look at West Virginia's newest, greenest school -- Huntington East Middle...
Hello everyone and welcome to Environment Matters. I'm Greg Adolfson with the West Virginia
Department of Environmental Protection. But first, on January 9th, an above ground storage
tank at Freedom Industries' Etowah River Terminal was discovered to have leaked roughly 75-hundred
gallons of a chemical blend used in the coal preparation process. A portion of that leak
escaped faulty secondary containment at the facility and spilled into the Elk River.
The leak was first reported after inspectors from the DEP's Division of Air Quality, investigating
complaints that morning of a chemical odor from area residents, traced the smell to the
Freedom Industries facility. That was shortly after 11 a.m. When they arrived on site, the
inspectors observed that no spill containment measures had taken place and that a pool of
the accumulated chemical was seeping through a containment ***. The facility is located
along the Elk River about a mile and a half upstream from West Virginia American Water's
Charleston treatment plant. The chemical traveled downstream and entered the plant's intakes
-- contaminating the water for roughly three hundred thousand residents for several days,
forcing schools and businesses to close and limiting water use in the affected areas to
sanitation and firefighting only while the chemical was flushed from the system.
The DEP issued notices of violation to Freedom Industries for its release of the chemical
and ordered the Etowah River facility to cease operations. After it was determined that 11
additional above ground tanks were within the same failed secondary containment area,
the DEP ordered Freedom Industries to remove all remaining materials from the site and
submit a plan for remediation of all contaminated soil and groundwater . Freedom Industries
filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on January 17th.
As of the January 22nd taping of this program, an investigation is underway into the cause
of the leak and the actions of those involved. Governor Earl Ray Tomblin has proposed legislation
to strengthen regulations on above ground storage facilities and the DEP is working
with the Governor to craft those rules. The DEP will continue to work with local media
to bring you accurate, up to date information on this ongoing situation. You can also check
out our website, dep.wv.gov, for the latest news releases concerning the spill.
Because of the State of Emergency and the Do Not Use water restrictions put in place
following the spill, hundreds of thousands of bottles of water were distributed to residents
in the impacted areas. State officials are encouraging residents to recycle those empty
plastic bottles, rather than add them to the waste stream.
There are places to drop off your empty bottles like this site in Cross Lanes. You can also
contact your local solid waste authority for more information on where you can take your
used plastic bottles for recycling. Statistically, only a tiny fraction of plastic water bottles
are ever recycled. The rest end up in landfills, or worse, end up as litter dumped in the landscape.
Cleaning up illegal dump sites and litter is the mission of the DEP's REAP Program.
REAP coordinates the efforts of several different state and volunteer programs, working as a
powerful force in the campaign against illegal dumping and littering. The DEP's Mike Huff
followed crews on a recent project.... >>NARRATION: It's hard, dirty and potentially
dangerous work... >>GREG ROTE: "We're finding all kinds of stuff
out here -- lots of tires, lots of gas tanks, we found a little bit of *** waste all ready,
we've got some prescription drugs that people have disposed of -- we find a little bit of
everything in open dumps like this. It seems like in West Virginia, it's always on a hillside,
most of the time. That's where they try to throw it where they can throw it over the
hill and makes it much more difficult for us to clean up then."
>>NARRATION: This site on Ventroux Road near St. Albans has been an ongoing problem -- one
that the DEP has had to clean up several times -- and that's not an uncommon situation...
>>GREG: "It's not really a widespread problem, it's kind of a localized problem. When you
have places like this that are remote and close enough where people who are can get
in here and dump and nobody can see them -- these are the kinds of places that we have problems."
>>NARRATION: Finding the evidence to prosecute people who illegally dump involves doing a
little detective work -- sifting through the mess -- looking for names and addresses and
finding ways of connecting people to a certain piece of trash. If it's a known dump site
like this one, the DEP will often set up hidden cameras to actually catch violators in the
act.../ >>GREG: "If we get them on camera they pretty
well plead guilty. It's tough, it's not like you can be everywhere at once so we do lots
of looking through the garbage, lots of looking for names -- lots of different ways to prove
who did it." >>NARRATION: Evidence is forwarded to Division
of Natural Resources law enforcement officials for further investigation and prosecution.
The DEP also has a place on its website where you can report illegal dumps. In St. Albans,
I'm Mike Huff for Environment Matters. >>GREG ADOLFSON: The DEP's REAP Program cleans
up roughly 11-hundred illegal open dumps every year. Last year, nearly 14-thousand West Virginians
took part in the DEP's annual spring cleanups. Volunteers with the Adopt A Highway and Make
It Shine programs took part in nearly 150 different cleanup projects statewide and helped
remove more than 450 tons for trash from West Virginia's landscape. If your group or organization
would like to help, you can find out more by checking out the REAP program on our website:
dep.wv.gov. Coming up:
>>DANNY HAUGHT: "it's a great partnership between all of the agencies which benefits
West Virginia as a whole..." >>NARRATION a different sort of recycling -- how these used
Christmas trees can provide real economic benefits, as well as improved aquatic habitat
in lakes all around the state. Those stories and more when Environment Matters continues..
We're back in a moment.