(The following article by Mike Dennison was posted on the Billings Gazette website on January 27.)
HELENA, Mont. — BNSF Railway wants to move on cleaning up pollution traced to its Livingston rail yard, but often has been stymied by regulatory foot-dragging, a consultant to the company told a legislative panel Thursday.
“We are bogged down in red tape,” said John Norris of Kennedy/Jenks Consultants. “We’re not able to get things approved and get to (work in) the field.”
Norris said state Department of Environmental Quality personnel keep insisting on more investigation of the site, when “at some point, we have to draw the line and make a decision.”
But a state environmental official said the state wants to make sure it doesn’t sign off on an incomplete cleanup that might still leave the public at risk.
“We can’t ignore new technologies, new information that indicate there are risks,” said Denise Martin, a supervisor of the state Superfund program.
Norris and Martin took part in a panel before the Environmental Quality Council’s Agency Oversight Subcommittee, a legislative group that examines environmental regulation by the state.
The panel talked about progress or lack thereof of cleanup at BNSF’s Livingston Superfund site. Pollutants were first discovered at the site in the late 1970s, including diesel fuel and toxic solvents used to clean and service locomotive engine parts.
The pollutants seeped into the soil and have contaminated portions of Livingston’s aquifer, which is where the city gets its public water supply.
The state entered a “record of decision” on potential cleanup plans more than four years ago, but investigation of the full extent of the pollution is still taking place.
Thursday’s panel also comes in the wake of a letter written to BNSF last month by state Environmental Quality Director Richard Opper, who told the railroad that the state wants to pick up the pace of cleanup at BNSF’s 18 state Superfund sites.
Most of the sites are rail yards polluted by diesel fuel or other materials.
Opper said the state no longer will have open-ended negotiations on how to proceed with the cleanups, instead setting target dates for completing steps in the process.
The Livingston site is one of two “maximum priority” sites where BNSF is responsible.
At Thursday’s meeting, Norris and a BNSF official said they’re frustrated by state inaction on proposed plans at Livingston or an unwillingness to wrap up investigation of the problem and approve cleanup plans.
Dave Smith, manager of environmental remediation for the railroad, said the state needs to set deadlines for itself in responding to BNSF proposals and adhere to those deadlines.
Norris said the state should “promote an attitude to get cleanup under way even if it’s not perfect.”
Under questioning from Sen. Jim Shockley, R-Victor, Norris acknowledged that the state had OK’d several interim cleanup jobs at Livingston. Norris named only one project that he wanted to move forward with and that hadn’t been approved: Attempting to contain and control groundwater contamination by PCE, a major pollutant.
Jarrett Keck, the state’s project manager for the Livingston site, said after the meeting it could take many months to complete further investigations and agree on final cleanup plans.
“It’s predicated on what we find, so we can’t really put a number on it,” he said.
Martin also said turnover of project managers has been high. Keck is the fifth project manager for the Livingston site in the past two decades, she said.
She said when managers are inexperienced, she often has to double-check some of their work to make sure it’s following the law and regulations.