The specific CSM (Conceptual Site Model) handed out by consulting/engineering company Onterris to TRAC (Technical Remediation Advisory Committee) had a 2024 date on it. Assuming (as dangerous as that is) that TRAC had previously received this CSM I am reasonably confident that their failure to loudly and clearly proclaim the major differences to the east was not solely due to corruption or ill intent. Far more likely they simply have no one on that committee with the clearly not requisite combination of hydrogeological knowledge AND unbiased honesty. Certainly Eric Hodgins and Tiffany Svensson have the hydroG knowledge but just as certainly they are committed or bound to the Woolwich Township narrative which is in full alignment with that of Lanxess and the MECP. Susan Bryant, in my opinion, has neither of the requisite combinations.
I have long been aware of the errors and weaknesses in these pictorial CSMs. While generally helpful they are also riddled with errors. This is especially concerning when we look at the 2017 CSM that is part of Dr. Neil Thompson's primarily written CSM. For clarification he had included on page 17 of his written CSM a copy of the June 19, 2017 pictorial CSM which Dr. Dick Jackson had referred to as a "cartoon". Personally while I like them visually I was disapponited that they were not as accurate as they both could have and should have been. One of the obvious problems dealt with the known "window" at OW-58 on Uniroyal's west side property boundary which made a direct hydraulic path between the Municipal Upper and Municipal Lower Aquifers. Nevertheless it has never made it onto the pictorial CSMs over the decades.
Other issues might include the very belated groundwater flow direction arrows showing Bedrock groundwater being pumped by both W5A and E7/E9. Other problems include the failure to include the eastward groundwater flow component from the Surficial Aquifer (SA) at the north end of the east side of the site until the most recent 2024 CSM. The lack of any Municipal Lower Aquifer (ML) being shown either on or eastwards off the Uniroyal site is a particularly garish failure. The use and abuse of serrated lines allegedly representing unknown areas in the sub-surface is far too self-serving. Drilled wells are the major source of data for where various sub-surface stratigraphic units start and finish yet their use is inconsistent. Another example of inconsistency is the completely horizontal surface of the Bedrock from the south end of Elmira (E7/E9) all the way north to the Uniroyal/Lanxess site where the Bedrock elevation allegedly rises dramatically based upon nothing. Similarly we are to believe that the serrated lines for the Municipal Upper Aquifer (MU) on the extreme east (right) side of all the CSMs indicate that there are no data and hence no observation wells on the east side of the Uniroyal site. That is not true and if it was all the more shame to the company(s) over the decades for intentionally hiding the extremely relevant stratigraphy from the public. The aborted Upper Aquifer (UA) on the east side of the Creek on all the pictorial CSMs is also misleading considering that there have been shallow wells along Uniroyal's east side property line since at least the 1980s.
The final (2024) pictorial CSM presented by Onterris has three additional problems. Firstly his Insert listing the mass contaminant removal rate (mg./day & g/yr) for pumping well PW5 (now PW6) is actually covering the location of the Municipal Upper Aquifer (MU) on the east side of the site. Secondly this Figure/map doesn't tell us for which of the two "chosen" contaminant representatives (NDMA or chlorobenzene) the mass contaminant removal rates apply. I would suggest that it is for NDMA based upon the masses involved. Thirdly and perhaps of supreme importance is the possibility (probability?) that the three lowest aquifers on the Stroh property are hydraulically connected namely the MU, the ML and the Bedrock (BR). That Uniroyal/Lanxess have allegedly not got data to clarify this is an abomination and absolutely self-serving keep the public and citizens in the dark and covered in @#%* (i.e. the mushroom treatment).
No comments:
Post a Comment