ANN ARBOR – Some 40 years after it was first discovered, a plume of toxic pollution covering a large swath of the Ann Arbor area is officially on its way to joining a list of the nation’s most seriously contaminated sites.
On Tuesday, March 5, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency proposed the plume of 1,4-dioxane in Scio Township and parts of western Ann Arbor be added to the Superfund National Priorities List, federal officials announced.
Becoming a Superfund site would bring federal oversight to bear on the monitoring and cleanup of the pollution, a likely carcinogen which has spread in soil and groundwater from the operations of the former Gelman Sciences filter manufacturing plant on Wagner Road to cover a 4-mile wide area home to nearly 8,000 people.
Federal involvement has long been an ask of cleanup advocates, who argue federal oversight is the only way to force the polluter to fully contend with the contamination and halt its expansion.
“We’re proposing the Gelman site for the Superfund list to ensure that more federal resources are focused on tackling long-standing groundwater contamination in Washtenaw County,” said EPA Region 5 Administrator Debra Shore in a statement. “EPA’s robust community involvement program at Superfund sites would also enable us to directly address the concerns of residents and those impacted by the contamination from the facility over many decades.”
The EPA proposal triggers a 60-day public comment period, which begins Thursday, March 7. Between March 7 and May 6, anyone can submit comments via an EPA web page.
The federal agency may add the Gelman plume to the National Priorities List if it continues to meet listing requirements after the comment period closes, and the agency has responded to comments, officials said.
The announcement comes several months after the EPA said the dioxane plume was eligible to join the list, following a yearslong evaluation.
Michigan requested the EPA investigate the plume as a possible Superfund site in 2021, after the urging of residents and officials with Washtenaw County, Ann Arbor and Scio Township. The communities have also litigated against the polluter in Washtenaw County Circuit Court in attempts to accelerate cleanup efforts.
Superfund sites include locations across the country with the most serious uncontrolled or abandoned pollution, and the list serves as a way to prioritize EPA Superfund cleanup funding and enforcement, according to the agency.
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