Refining, storage and pipeline transportation of petroleum products have dominated industrial activity in northern Hartford for many decades. The three adjacent refinery properties of the area have gone through several successive owners and name changes over these decades. The current owners of these refineries are Premcor Refining Group (formerly Clark Oil and Refining; Apex Oil Company was another former owner), BP Products of North America (formerly Amoco) and ConocoPhillips (former owner Shell). The long history of refinery operations in the area is accompanied by a long history of petroleum releases from pipelines and on-site facility units. The larger image referenced in the fact sheet will be included as a separate pdf attachment.
Las instalaciones de la Antigua Refinera de Premcor ocupan casi 156 acres en el lado norte del Canal Calumet-Sag, entre las ciudades de Blue Island y Alsip. Las parcelas, de las que Premcor es el dueo, estn localizadas dentro de una rea delimitada al norte y el este por la calle 127th, unas vas de ferrocarril de la compaa CSX Railroad que corren hacia el noroeste y sureste y propiedades industriales y comerciales; al sur por el Canal Calumet-Sag; y al oeste por ms propiedades industriales y comerciales (vea el mapa en la pgina anterior). Anteriormente conocida como la Refinera Clark-Blue Island, las operaciones de la refinera comenzaron en este sitio junto con la Refinera de Great Lakes a mediados de los 1920 y continuaron hasta que Premcor decidi cerrar las operaciones de la refinera en el 2001. The printable map (mapa imprimible) referenced in the fact sheet will be included in a separate pdf attachment.
After a history of environmental violations at the Western Lion and Service Disposal #1 Landfill sites, a temporary order from the Illinois Attorney Generals Office required all of the waste disposal operations to stop in January 1996. During an inspection by Illinois EPA in June 1997, field personnel discovered that an open trench had filled with 35-40 feet of leachate (rainwater that has traveled through the landfill and contacted waste). The leachate overflowed at times into nearby Riley Creek, a Class A Stream considered a "unique aquatic resource" in the state.
Located less than 1/4 mile south of the Sangamon River and north of Rock Spring Road, the landfill has significant erosion, with wide erosion gullies. Visible leachate is observed on three sides of the landfill and drains into a stream that flows into the Sangamon River. No groundwater monitoring has been performed at the site, where depth to groundwater is less than twenty feet. Financial assurance for the site, in the form of a letter of credit, has expired and has not been renewed. The case is currently under enforcement action by Illinois EPA and the Illinois Attorney General's Office.
Environmental problems at the landfill include steep slopes with erosion problems and inadequate cover. Leachate seeps have been observed on the south and west slopes of the property. (Leachate is a liquid that results from water traveling through decomposing waste in a landfill and usually contains a variety of contaminants.) Some portions of the riverbank at the southern slope of the landfill are undergoing erosion. Recent sampling found low concentrations of polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in one of three sediment sample taken from the east side of Lake Tokorozawa. PAHs occur naturally in coal, crude oil and gasoline and products made from these. They are released during the burning of fossil fuels, garbage or other organic substances. An ecological risk assessment indicates that the landfill might pose a threat to local ecological resourses.
Illinois EPA has scheduled the first controlled prairie burn at the former Waste Hauling Landfill site for late February to mid-March 2008. The specific date of the event will depend on weather conditions. The site is located west of Decatur, approximately 1/4 mile south of the Sangamon River on the north side of West Rock Springs Road. The controlled burn is necessary to eliminate accumulated dead vegetation and to stimulate new growth and diversity in the plant life. It will also eliminate invasive plant species, which have more shallow root systems than the mix of prairie plants on the landfill cap.
The Illinois EPA performed off-site environmental investigations in the fall of 2001 and did not find ongoing or residual health impacts to nearby residential communities from past refinery catalyst releases to the air. Refinery operations may have impacted neighboring surface water bodies, however, additional investigation is needed to determine the source of those contaminants identified above background levels. The printable map referenced in the fact sheet will be included as a separate pdf attachment.
The former New Jersey Zinc/Mobil Chemical Superfund site is located in the Village of DePue in Bureau County and consists of approximately 950 acres. The former zinc smelter plant began in the early 1900s with operations including zinc smelting, and included sulfuric acid production, lithopone paint pigment production and zinc dust production. A diammonium phosphate fertilizer plant began operations in the 1960s. The printable map referenced in the fact sheet will be included in a separate pdf attachment.
This fact sheet describes the interim water treatment system that the DePue Group ( Horsehead Resources Development Co., Inc., Mobil Oil Corporation, and Viacom International Inc.,) is constructing to reduce the levels of metals in groundwater (water beneath ground surface) and surface water discharging into DePue Lake. These metals have accumulated in the soil of the former New Jersey Zinc/Mobil Chemical site from years of zinc smelting and other industrial processes. The metals are either leached (dissolved) or washed into the water on particles of metal-bearing soil. Occasionally, some of this water has flowed over the Marquette Street sidewalk. The larger diagram referenced in this fact sheet will be included as a separate pdf attachment.
The Illinois Environmental Protection Agency (Illinois EPA) and the United States Environmental Protection Agency (U.S.EPA) are proposing a remedy for the unnatural sediments in the South Ditch at the DePue-New Jersey Zinc/Mobil Chemical Site in DePue, Illinois. This proposed remedy would remove the unnatural sediment by a combination of hydraulic and mechanical dredging, stabilizing the removed sediments and containing them in an on-site unit until a final remedy is selected for the much larger quantities of similar material on and around the plant site.