GILROY
– The South Valley received some national attention – and better
yet, some federal funding – for its effort to clean perchlorate
from tainted wells and underground aquifers.
GILROY – The South Valley received some national attention – and better yet, some federal funding – for its effort to clean perchlorate from tainted wells and underground aquifers.
U.S. Congress approved Thursday $1.75 million to help restore clean water to homes affected by the nearly 10-mile plume of perchlorate that originated from the Olin Corp. site in Morgan Hill.
“We saw this opportunity for federal money a few months ago,” said Mike DiMarco, spokesman for the Santa Clara County Water District. “Any way to get money into the South Valley is going to help.”
The district was represented in Congress by Santa Clara County representatives Zoe Lofgren, Anna Eshoo, Richard Pombo and Mike Honda with support from Senators Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer.
The grant was offered to the water district from the Environmental Protection Agency and only can be used to further the effort of restoring clean water to families affected by the contamination – not to reimburse the district for money already spent. The water district has spent an estimated $2 million on perchlorate in the last year.
DiMarco said the Perchlorate Working Group, which is represented by Gilroy, Morgan Hill and county interests, will discuss uses for the grant money in its next meeting Feb. 5 in San Martin.
“Right now we’re waiting on clarification from the EPA on what we can use this for,” DiMarco said.
One idea for the grant money is to take part in testing home water filtration devices. So far, several companies have come forward with devices they say filter perchlorate out of water, but more testing needs to be done to obtain state certification.
“That was one proposal, internally at least,” DiMarco said. “Helping them get state certification so they can get them on the market.”
The filters, which would be attached underneath a sink and use so-called “reverse osmosis” technology, have yet to be tested for their effectiveness against the controversial chemical.
“It would need a special filtration system to catch perchlorate ions,” he said. “It takes a lot of technical expertise, and that’s what we have at the water district. We’re willing to share that expertise with the industry if the grant allows us to do that.”
DiMarco said he also hoped the money could be used to help families with the cost of purchasing and installing the units – possibly through a rebate system – with the remaining money.
Just over a year ago, the Santa Clara Valley Water District and the Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board announced that perchlorate from an abandoned safety flare plant on Tennant Avenue in Morgan Hill had leached into the underground water table. Today, the toxic plume of rocket fuel ingredient stretches roughly 10 miles south all the way to north end of Gilroy.
The contamination has triggered class action lawsuits, calls for scientific testing and treatment plans costing millions. It has also united – and in some cases divided – those with health, real estate and agricultural interests.
Over the course of the Tennant Avenue plant’s 40-year life, the chemical had spread in a southeasterly “plume” through southern Morgan Hill and into San Martin polluting as many as 450 wells.
By spring 2003, perchlorate was detected by a City of Gilroy monitoring well and showed up in a private well off Holsclaw Road, south of Gilman Road. The plume did not trickle much further over the next several months, contaminating just a handful of private wells in the northeast section of town.
Nonetheless, it brought immediate action by Gilroy officials concerned that the city’s drinking water supply – eight wells all within a mile of the contaminated sites – would soon be next. As of December 2003, perchlorate has not been found in any of the city’s drinking water wells.
Already the city has authorized spending $200,000 to buy land around some of its wells where ion exchange treatment systems will eventually be installed. It is unclear if the recent federal grant can cover any of the cost.
Gilroy estimates it will cost roughly $1.5 million to purchase an ion exchange system and $90,000 a month ($1.08 million a year) to maintain and operate. In addition, the city will have to spend $600,000 prepping sites – pouring the concrete and laying the pipes – for the filtration system.
Staff Writer Eric Leins contributed to this story.
