Aquifer pollution feared State, county health officials find no environmental harm May 10, 01 Paula Lavigne Sullivan; The News Tribune Dean J. Koepfler/The News Tribune Rumbling compactors roll over piles of discarded boxes, bottles and mixed mangled garbage as they press another layer into the 60-foot-high pyramid of trash settling at the landfill south of Graham. Underneath some 520,000 tons of waste is part of an aquifer that provides drinking water to hundreds of thousands of Pierce County residents. In between the garbage and the aquifer are some 50 feet of rock, gravel, filters, protective liners - and layers of controversy. After about a year and a half of operations, the Land Recovery Inc. landfill has developed two of the planned eight sections, or "cells." It has taken in enough trash to fill 2.4 percent of the landfill's overall capacity. Both state and county health officials say everything is working well. There is no pollution, they say, and no sign the landfill is harming the environment. Despite those assurances, a group of Graham-area residents firmly believe the county someday will suffer as a result of the growing heap of rotting garbage. The group, Concerned Residents on Waste Disposal, failed to stop the landfill's construction. But it hasn't given up. The group's latest attack focuses on the landfill's effect on the region's water supply. The group believes landfill operators are taking too much water out of the aquifer. As the region heads for a probable drought this summer, area residents worry the landfill's consumption will dry up wells and further deplete water resources. The group also contends toxic water from the pile of garbage will seep down, squeeze through the protective layers, reach the aquifer and dump toxins into their drinking water. "My children - your children - are going to have to live with an enormous aquifer that's going to be polluted and no longer able to serve as a source of water," said Art Perkins, a group member who lives less than three miles from the landfill. Perkins and other group members do not trust the information LRI gives to local health officials, who rely on water quality data compiled by a private environmental consulting company that LRI pays to sample and test the groundwater. Officials from the state Department of Ecology, the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department, LRI and Kleinfelder, the consulting company, say the group's allegations are untrue. Landfill operators present the dump as a model of environmental efficiency where geology meets hydrology in an elaborate system of slopes, pipes, liners and ponds. Health officials say the company has gone above and beyond what is required for testing, monitoring and filtering the water in and around the landfill. Excess pumping Regulators do, however, acknowledge that the landfill is pumping more water out of the leak detection collection system than expected. The collection system is a gravel layer designed to hold groundwater coming up from the aquifer. Workers test the water in the system to determine if any polluted water has come down from the garbage above. A 1995 engineering report predicted that no more than 3,175 gallons would be pumped from all eight cells each day once the landfill is fully developed. That water eventually goes into an 80-acre wetlands area north of the landfill. The Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department became concerned when LRI started pumping more than 5,000 gallons from the first cell alone. Andy Comstock, an environmental health specialist with the Health Department, sent a letter to LRI last year questioning how the company would be able to detect pollutants if thousands of gallons of extra water had diluted the sample. Group president Viki Steiner shares that concern, and puts it this way: "If you put a cup of bleach in your washing machine, it's obvious that it's there. If you put a cup of bleach in a swimming pool, it's a lot more difficult to detect." Kevin G. Lakey, LRI's environmental consultant, said the excess water is not coming up from the aquifer. Rather, it's rainwater that has seeped into the ground from outside the landfill. The rainwater moved horizontally into the groundwater collection area, which is separated from the aquifer by at least 25 feet of hard-packed glacial till, Lakey said. Comstock said LRI responded to the Health Department's request by installing a clay plug in the section next to the first cell. But the water kept coming. In fact, the average daily volume of water pumped out of the first cell's collection area in April was 6,872 gallons, based on 28 days of recorded data. The high amount for that one cell was projected at 770 gallons per day. Comstock said he's talked to Lakey about finding a better way to cut down on the flow and still expects a solution. Lakey and LRI spokeswoman Jody Snyder said Monday they would keep working with the Health Department to address the issue. In the meantime, the group of opponents is pursuing the state Department of Ecology to require LRI to get a separate permit for pumping the excess water. Steiner said she hopes applying for that permit could stall, or possibly stop, the landfill's operation. Ecology officials say no new permit is needed. Cris Matthews, a state hydrogeologist, said that based on the design of the landfill and the type of aquifer below, the landfill's water use should not affect others' ability to draw water from the aquifer - even if there is a drought this summer. Watching for 'garbage juice' Company officials also are on the lookout for "garbage juice," the polluted rainwater - or leachate - that runs through the garbage and down into a 2-foot rock layer near the landfill's base. No pollutants from leachate reached the groundwater below, according to the annual report released in March, covering the facility's first full year of operation. Kleinfelder, the testing company, did find low levels of toxic compounds in groundwater samples from the first cell during readings in December, January and March. But the report says the compounds came from a methane-like gas created when garbage decomposes - not leachate. LRI has since installed a system to burn off the gas and stop the toxic compounds from reaching the groundwater in the leak detection collection system, which is below a protective liner designed to prevent leachate from seeping down. Because the water in the aquifer below is somewhat pressurized, it flows up into the gravel layer. That upward pressure is yet another safeguard, Snyder said, because it would prevent any leachate - if it did escape - from going down into the aquifer. The fight continues Matthews, the state hydrogeologist, said he understands group's concerns, but he still believes the landfill site is environmentally sound. "If I lived close to something like that, that I didn't know a lot about, I'd be concerned as well," Matthews said. Steiner argues that the group knows plenty. The organization has hired its own experts, and members like Steiner and Perkins have followed each step of the landfill's development. They also have the backing of a 1996 decision from the Army Corps of Engineers that denies the landfill a permit under the Clean Water Act. The decision states the landfill poses an "unacceptable risk to public health and safety due to the potential contamination of the" aquifer. LRI challenged the Corps' jurisdiction in federal court and won. Group members say the threat of such legal prowess has prevented both the Health Department and the state Department of Ecology from doing anything that would prevent LRI's operation of the landfill. It took LRI 13 years to get the 21 permits it needs to operate, responded Snyder, the LRI spokeswoman. That alone is evidence that public agencies are not just rolling over in LRI's path, she said. "There's nothing to hide at this facility," she said. "There's nothing to be ashamed of in having a good working relationship with the agencies that regulate us." Steve Merrick, public health manager with the Health Department's Source Protection Program, said his department is "doing more than is required" to monitor the landfill. Merrick also disputes opposing group's allegations that Kleinfelder, the company LRI pays to test for water quality, is altering the numbers so they're favorable to LRI. "That's (the group's) opinion, and they're a very small number of people in Pierce County," he said. "I put it in that perspective when we're dealing with these issues." Although the group's membership may be a few thousand, compared with the more than 700,000 people who live in Pierce County, Steiner said the issue is much larger than the organization. "If the general public was educated on the hazards of the landfill and irreplaceable nature of our sole source aquifer," she said, "I think they would all be interested." The group has separate actions in Pierce County Superior Court and before the state Pollution Control Hearings Board challenging LRI's permits. Both cases are scheduled to be heard this summer. Snyder said the company will continue to address local concerns but said she stands behind the landfill's reliability
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"We're very proud of the facility we have developed," she said. "I think it's doubtful that any of (the opposing group's) legal efforts will stop the landfill." - - - * Paula Lavigne Sullivan covers Pierce County. Reach her at 253-597-8542 or paula.sullivan@mail.tribnet.com. © The News Tribune