The chloroform detected at the site of a proposed youth sports complex in Institute is likely not from a nearby chemical plant but could have been from a chemical used on a golf course there, a Kanawha County official said Tuesday.
The latest round of chemical tests at Shawnee Park indicate that the chloroform concentrations decrease radially in all directions from the maximum detected location in the soil vapor, or the vapor in the air spaces between soil particles. The chemical was not detected in an ambient air sample at the park.
"The groundwater and soil gas results provide relatively strong evidence that the source of chloroform is near the location with maximum detected soil gas concentrations, rather than migrating onto the Shawnee Golf Course property," a report released Tuesday from CH2M Hill Engineers says.
Commissioner Ben Salango said the results indicate the chloroform came from the golf course or some other localized source and not the nearby chemical plant owned by Dow.
Additional samples, specifically of ambient air and soil vapor at six locations at the park were tested this month. The Kanawha County Commission requested the supplemental testing after initial tests indicated the presence of chloroform in one soil vapor sample but not in groundwater samples.
An initial report from CH2M Hill also said that 1,2-DCA, 1,4-dioxane and naphthalene were found in the shallow groundwater of the park and 1,4-dioxane was found in the deep groundwater at concentrations greater than screening criteria.
Dow Chemical agreed to fund the chemical tests at the park after nearby West Virginia State University sued the company and previous owners of the plant alleging that decades of chemical manufacturing at the Institute plant contaminated the groundwater beneath its campus. The lawsuit insists the contamination poses no health risks because the campus does not use groundwater for its drinking water. It says the pollution threatens campus development plans and the school's reputation.
Commission President Kent Carper said Tuesday the county has not asked that Dow clean up the chemicals found at Shawnee. He said removing them would require ripping up the golf course and halting all use on the property for years. Carper said cleaning up the chemicals would not be practical and is not necessary for the construction work that the commission wants to do at the park.
"I would do that if I thought it was unsafe," Carper said. Building the sports complex will not require digging deep into the ground, Carper said.
"Our issue is whether it's safe for surface recreational use," he said.
The commission had been waiting on the results and a peer review of the chemical tests from S&S Engineers before breaking ground on the sports complex. Officials have said they plan to have a representative from the engineering firm available to answer questions about the test results at a public meeting before they give the final approval to build the complex. Salango said the meeting could take place next week. The commission voted in May to build the estimated $15.2 million facility contingent on the results and analysis of the chemical tests. The county has also secured $10 million in funding and hired a facilities director for the complex.
Salango has said if all goes as planned, the county hopes to accept bids on the construction of the facility in September or October and break ground by November.
Reach Lori Kersey at lori.kersey@wvgazettemail.com, 304-348-1240 or follow @LoriKerseyWV on Twitter.