NOVEMBER 2014 CHEMTURA PROGRESS REPORT

This update is somewhat later than usual as I've been a tad busy dealing with the 2,4,5-T Fact-Finding Panel's Report. Off-site pumping at W4, near the Howard St. watertower in Elmira, sucks. The goal is 3.5 litres per second and up until recently it had been at 11.4 litres per second for many years. The average pumping rate for November 2014 was 2.5 l/sec. Spinning Chemtura's roulette wheel gives us the excuse of mechanical breakdown. Keep in mind that over two years ago we were promised a tripling of off-site pumping rates. In the interim while testing allegedly towards that goal has been going on, the actual off-site pumping has been reduced. Way to go Chemtura!

Table A.3 advises us of the still horrific on-site groundwater contaminant concentrations. These will continue forever due to the presence of both LNAPL and DNAPL (light/dense non aqueous phase liquids combined with a refusal to do appropriate on-site source removal. Toluene is at 71,000 parts per billion with chlorobenzene over 3,000 ppb.. MBT, aniline and carboxin are in the thousands of parts per billion as well.

Table C.1 (surface water) still does not have results for NDEA, NDBA and NMOR. This is due to a breakdown of equipment at Chemtura's Guelph lab. Sorry but that doesn't cut it for me. Pay some money and either get it fixed or send it out to another lab.

Table D.1 gives us NDMA results off-site, west of Chemtura. They are ridiculously high as in 30-65 ppb with a drinking water standard of .009 ppb. This is after 16 1/2 years of off-site pumping. Keep up the good work Chemtura!

Table E.1 gives us incredibly high NDMA SOIL readings 100 feet below ground surface of 19-43 ppb. This is on the west side of the former Nutrite (Yara) but rest assurred two hydrogeologists have rebutted their own findings of free phase DNAPL beneth the Yara site. Chlorobenzene is at an incredible 9.8 ppm (parts per million) in the soil here as well. Again it being a DNAPL chemical is just a wild coincidence I'm sure.

Thank you Chemtura for sharing your "progress" with us. My great, great grandchildren will understand why your site is still a toxic dump in their lifetimes.