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EPA to Consider the CTS Site for Proposal to Superfund’s National Priorities List

Release Date: 09/01/2010
Contact Information: Dawn Harris-Young, (404) 562-8421, harris-young.dawn@epa.gov

(ATLANTA – Sept. 1, 2010) Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that it is moving forward with the process to propose the CTS of Asheville, Inc./Mills Gap Road Groundwater Contamination site to the National Priorities List (NPL) list of hazardous waste sites. This decision is based on a series of groundwater studies conducted over the past three years. A formal decision to propose the site may be made as early as March 2011, the date when a number of other sites across the nation are expected to be proposed to the NPL as part of the federal rulemaking process. Consideration to propose the site to the NPL does not guarantee that the site will be proposed, or, that the site will be listed on the final NPL. A community meeting will soon be announced to discuss the NPL listing process.

EPA continues to conduct private well monitoring within a 1-mile radius of the CTS site. The results for the June 2010 sampling event show that there were no new trichloroethene (TCE) detections in private wells. Results are being mailed out to local residents this week. The next sampling event is scheduled for the week of September 20, 2010. A website for the CTS site is expected to be launched by September 30, 2010. Site-related documents will be posted to the website.

The CTS site is interrelated with the Mills Gap Road Groundwater Contamination site (Mills Gap site). The sites are located in south Asheville, near the Skyland Community. Operations occurred at the CTS site from the early 1950’s until 1986. CTS Corporation manufactured electronic components at the facility from 1959 to 1985. The chemical compound TCE was used by CTS to clean and/or degrease metal objects prior to electroplating. In 1987, the original 57-acre property was sold to Mills Gap Road Associates (MGRA) who developed a residential neighborhood on approximately 48 acres, leaving a fenced 9-acre site where the manufacturing had occurred.