Costs soar for removal of PCB-tainted Hill AFB housing area soil

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SALT LAKE CITY -- With a small amount of dirt left to be lifted from a residential housing area, the price tag for the cleanup of contaminated soil at Hill Air Force Base has exceeded $2 million. Hill environmental-issues spokeswoman Barbara Fisher said this week that $1.7 million was spent to lift, move and replace thousands of tons of soil in which inspectors found potentially dangerous levels of polychlorinated biphenyls in a housing area in the southwest corner of the base. The chemicals, known as PCBs, were discovered in December 2006 near homes and at levels dozens of times higher than what environmental experts consider safe. Additionally, Fisher said, the military spent about $400,000 investigating and sampling the soil. "We've finished up for the year," Fisher said. "But we will have to go back in the spring." She said an additional inspection revealed one small area of soil -- perhaps 50 square feet -- that would need to be replaced. However, that contaminated soil is about two feet below the surface, so Fisher said Hill no longer considers any area to be "off limits," although she was uncertain whether one home where inspectors found a particularly high level of PCBs had yet to be reoccupied. Health effects associated with PCB exposure include acne-like skin conditions in adults and neuro-behavioral and immunological changes in children, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Hill has been conducting testing for PCBs since the early 1980s and had tested 10 of 12 base housing areas without finding any signs of the chemical until the recent tests revealed unusually high concentrations. In the first round of tests, three of eight samples taken in preparation for a renovation of about 50 duplex-style housing units showed indications of the chemicals, which once were used as coolants and lubricants. The chemicals have been banned since 1977. Hundreds of other tests found concentrations of the chemicals throughout an area of the base that investigators believe was once used for storage and dumping. Contact Matthew D. Laplante at mlaplante(at)sltrib.com(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)