MAJOR DNAPL TECHNICAL KNOWLEDGE HAS BEEN AVAILABLE SINCE 1990 & RESEARCH STILL CONTINUES TODAY

 

I am amazed with recent reading I've been doing as to all the factors pertaining to DNAPL migration in the sub-surface. 95% of those factors have never been discussed at public UPAC or CPAC, TAG or TRAC meetings. This is not by accident. Most of these factors including density, viscosity, wettability, stratigraphic slopes, pore sizes, solubility, volatility, groundwater velocity etc. have been known for decades . More recently I have seen technical reports advising that potential and probable lateral (horizontal) migration of free phase DNAPL has been seriously underestimated for decades. Again the factors affecting horizontal migration are many and include of course the volume of DNAPL released at the surface or from shallow lagoons (such as Uniroyal Chemical).  Another obvious factor is how much of this DNAPL is able to penetrate through aquifers and or aquitards vertically. Clearly if the aquitards (clay/silt) are discontinuous or have cracks and "windows" in them then the vertical penetration increases.

A couple of recent reports state that horizontal migration of DNAPL has been found at both 650 metres in one site from the source area and 750 metres at another site. Now two things seem obvious to me and that is the overall ongoing slope of the stratigraphic unit that the DNAPL is moving on as well as the large amount of free phase DNAPL released to the subsurface in order to "push" the DNAPL that far from its' source. I certainly can understand the unlikelihood of these distances from source being anywhere near the norm.

The other interesting tidbit I've begun to understand is how often for example chlorinated solvent sites with groundwater concentrations exceeding 1% still remain without the subsurface DNAPL  being clearly delineated. Here in Elmira subsurface free phase DNAPL has been found both on the Uniroyal site (OW88 near PW4) as well as off-site by the Howard St. Water Tower (OW57-32 (R). This data should have more than rung the alarm bells thirty-six years ago and precipitated appropriate DNAPL action. Instead it was all Uniroyal hands, friends and fellow travellors (including the M.O.E.) on deck to deny, deflect, delay and manage the situation and crisis. By manage I don't mean investigate proper cleanup as much as investigate improper coverup.

INCOMPETENCE & NEGLIGENCE TO THE POINT OF CORRUPTION AND BEYOND - IGNORING & AVOIDING DNAPL PRESENCE & SIGNIFICANCE

 

WORLD CLASS EXPERTS AVAILABLE AT U. OF WATERLOO - JUST DOWN THE ROAD

By 1991 and earlier the Waterloo Centre for Groundwater Research was world renowned.  Despite that none of the so called "experts", consultants or other "suits" ever mentioned that incredible source of knowledge to Woolwich/Elmira citizens attending public UPAC meetings. Our esteemed and long compromised Ontario Ministry of Environment never mentioned or suggested the tremendous value in asking neutral and unbiased in house groundwater experts for information or advice. Instead all our authorities pretended that bought and paid for client driven consultants (Dames & Moore, CRA) were somehow obligated by engineering or public interest principles to speak truth to those paying their invoices. As Steve Quigley of CRA once stated " We are obligated only to the best interests of our clients.".  

I have been reviewing technical DNAPL reports likely for the fiftieth time over the last 36 years. I was introduced to Drs. J. Cherry and B. Parker at the University of Waterloo in January 2007 as CPAC's "DNAPL expert", probably by Susan Bryant. I quickly clarified to the two real experts (Cherry & Parker)  that I was CPAC's amateur DNAPL expert only. Various further DNAPL literature written by these two doctors was distributed to the four of us attending (McLean, Bryant, Ruland & myself) and it was all barely glanced at and handed to me. I offered to read it quickly over the next few days and pass it along to the other three. That offer was never requested or acted upon by any of them to my surprise. 

This meeting and the strong and very clear advice from Doctors Cherry and Parker was never taken to CPAC or discussed at any public meeting. If it was done privately I was not so advised. This was the beginning of the end for me as far as Bryant, McLean and Ruland were concerned. Nevertheless I was still trusting enough to go to Susan and Wilf with my findings later in 2007 on the inappropriate off-site well that Conestoga Rovers (CRA) wanted to use as one half of a monitoring pair of wells (1 on-site and 1 off-site) in order to ensure that shutting down pumping wells on-site for the later ATS (Ammonia Treatment System) would not cause a loss of hydraulic containment (It did.).

Do current Woolwich councillors truly believe that  the methods and procedures to clean up the Elmira Aquifers will not be exposed particularly after 2028 as second rate if not downright incompetent? Do you believe that the knowingly "cheapest and least effective method" of hydraulic containment, despite constant endorsement by almost all past councils, will not be publicly and savagely excoriated? If indeed, as has been arbitrarily removed from public discussion, it turns out that DDT and Dioxins  have migrated off the Uniroyal site westwards as well as downstream (eastwards) via the Canagagigue Creek that there won't be a scandal resulting in a public inquiry of some sort?  The westward migration may very well have been via the DNAPL mobilizing DDT and Dioxins and carrying them along to the Nutrite property as well as by the Howard St. Water Tower (OW57-32 (R). 

DNAPL DENIERS may have saved the responsible polluting companies and the Ontario M.O.E. hundreds of millions of dollars in cleanup costs but what about the health costs past, present and future? Do you want to drink Elmira water again not knowing the truth about what is still in it?