News Releases from Region 04

EPA Adds Rockwell Grenada Site to the Superfund National Priorities List

Advances Agency’s Commitment to Expedite Cleanups Across the Country

ATLANTA (September 11, 2018) — Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced its commitment to clean up the Rockwell International Wheel & Trim (Rockwell Grenada) Site in Grenada, Mississippi, by adding it to the Superfund Program’s National Priorities List (NPL). Nationally, another four sites were added and six sites were proposed to the NPL. These additions represent commitments from the Agency to advance cleanup to protect communities across the country.

“In adding these sites to the NPL, EPA is carrying out one of our core responsibilities to the American people,” said EPA Acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler. “Cleaning up sites that pose risks to public health and the environment is a critical part of our mission and it provides significant health and economic benefits to communities across the country.”

“Adding the Rockwell Grenada Site to the NPL will advance a comprehensive cleanup to address all contamination—both at the facility and in the surrounding community—related to former operations,” said EPA Regional Administrator Trey Glenn. “EPA’s priority is to conduct the cleanup in a manner that allows the facility to continue to operate and protects the health of workers and nearby residents.”

The Rockwell Grenada Site includes the 40-acre facility at 635 Highway 332 (commonly called Grenada Stamping and currently operated by Ice Industries), and other areas where site-related contaminants have migrated or were disposed. Rockwell International, followed by Textron Automotive and later by Grenada Manufacturing, operated a wheel cover manufacturing and chrome plating facility on the property from 1966 to the early 2000s. In 2005, portions of the plant were leased to Ice Industries, which continues to operate a metal stamping plant there today.

Past operations, spills and waste handling practices resulted in air, groundwater, surface water and soil contamination. The solvent trichloroethene (TCE) has been found in the air inside the manufacturing building, groundwater beneath the site and in the adjacent Eastern Heights neighborhood, a former disposal area associated with the facility, wetlands and Riverdale Creek. Adding the Rockwell Grenada Site to the NPL will allow EPA to move forward with a comprehensive cleanup that addresses all contamination related to the former operations—both at the facility and in the surrounding community.

The following other four sites are being added to the NPL:

• Southside Chattanooga Lead in Chattanooga, Tennessee;
• Broadway Street Corridor Groundwater Contamination in Anderson, Indiana;
• Donnelsville Contaminated Aquifer in Donnelsville, Ohio; and
• Delfasco Forge in Grand Prairie, Texas.

The following sites are being proposed for addition to the NPL:

• Magna Metals in Cortlandt Manor, New York;
• Shaffer Equipment/Arbuckle Creek Area in Minden, West Virginia;
• Cliff Drive Groundwater Contamination in Logansport, Indiana;
• McLouth Steel Corp in Trenton, Michigan;
• Sporlan Valve Plant #1 in Washington, Missouri; and
• Copper Bluff Mine in Hoopa, California.

For the first time, EPA is listing sites on the NPL based on subsurface intrusion, or intrusion of contaminants into occupied spaces. With this recent addition to EPA's system for assessing sites, EPA examined the threat of subsurface intrusion to support listing the Rockwell Grenada Site and Delfasco Forge in Grand Prairie, Texas.

Under the Trump Administration, the Superfund program has reemerged as a priority to fulfill and strengthen EPA’s core mission of protecting human health and the environment. Since October 2017, EPA has deleted 10 full sites, and 2 partial sites from the NPL.

Background

The NPL includes the nation’s most serious uncontrolled or abandoned hazardous waste sites. The list serves as the basis for prioritizing EPA Superfund cleanup funding and enforcement actions. Only sites on the NPL are eligible to receive federal funding for long-term, permanent cleanup.

EPA initiates Superfund involvement at sites when states, tribes, or communities ask for the agency’s help, or when the agency finds contamination during its own investigations. Sites are deleted from the NPL once the agency completes all response actions and achieves all cleanup objectives. The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), which established the Superfund program, requires EPA to update the NPL annually.

The Superfund program has been providing important health benefits to communities across the country for more than 35 years. 

Superfund cleanups also strengthen local economies. Data collected through 2017 shows that at 487 Superfund sites in reuse, approximately 6,600 businesses are generating $43.6 billion in sales and employ 156,000 people who earned a combined income of $11.2 billion.

The NPL is one focus area of the 2017 Superfund Task Force Recommendations to improve and revitalize the Superfund program. On July 23, 2018, EPA released the Superfund Task Force 2018 Recommendations Update. 

The 2018 Recommendation Update can be found here: https://www.epa.gov/superfund/superfund-task-force-recommendations-2018-update 

The Superfund Task Force Recommendations can be viewed at: https://www.epa.gov/superfund/superfund-task-force-recommendations

For Federal Register notices and supporting documents for the final and proposed sites: http://www.epa.gov/superfund/current-npl-updates-new-proposed-npl-sites-and-new-npl-sites

For information about Superfund and the NPL: http://www.epa.gov/superfund

For information about the Rockwell Grenada Superfund Site: www.epa.gov/superfund/rockwell-intl-wheel  

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