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U.S. EPA orders soil removal work from industrial site in Torrance

Release Date: 01/19/2006
Contact Information: Francisco Arcaute, (213) 244-1815

SAN FRANCISCO –This week the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is overseeing contaminated soil removal work being conducted by three entities under EPA order from an industrial parcel outside Torrance. The soil will be disposed at a regulated hazardous waste landfill in Nevada.

In November the EPA ordered Montrose Chemical Corporation, Ecology Control Industries and Ronald Flurry to remove up to 5,000 tons of excavated DDT-contaminated soil piles from the ECI property at 20846 Normandy Avenue in Torrance, Calif. The estimated cost of disposal is $1.6 million.

“The agency issued the order to prevent DDT contaminated soil from blowing into the air or washing into storm drains,” said Keith Takata, director of the EPA’s Superfund Division in the Pacific Southwest region. “The EPA is pleased that the responsible companies have stepped up to the plate and that work is underway.”

The soil piles, located at an industrial property several blocks from the Montrose Plant Property, were created when the landowner was conducting environmental assessment activities in preparation for a potential property sale last year.

The DDT-contaminated soil is being transported in covered truck containers to the U.S. Ecology regulated hazardous waste landfill in Beatty Nev. The removal and hauling work is expected to take up to three weeks. The Nevada Department of Environmental Protection approved the transfer of the contaminated soil.

Montrose Chemical Corporation of California manufactured DDT from 1947 until 1982 at a plant located at 20201 Normandie Avenue, Los Angeles County, near the city of Torrance. The 13-acre former plant property located in the Harbor Gateway area of Los Angeles was named a federal Superfund site in 1989. The EPA believes that DDT was released into storm drains in the 1950's through the 1980's.

Copies of the EPA order, as well as other information on the Montrose Superfund Site, are available at the EPA information repositories located at the Torrance Civic Center and Carson Public Libraries.