Most-thorough study yet of fly-ash course near completion

CHESAPEAKE

Dominion Virginia Power is nearing completion of the most intensive environmental study yet of Battlefield Golf Club at Centerville, which was contoured with more than a million tons of the company's fly ash.

The utility expects to spend about $200,000 on the study, which began about a month ago. It includes 16 permanent groundwater monitoring wells and an array of soil samplings.

The new tests began nearly five months after city officials announced that high levels of arsenic, lead and other contaminants had been found in groundwater under the golf course, sculpted by developers with 1.5 million tons of fly ash they were paid to take from Dominion's coal-fired power plant in Deep Creek.

In September, the utility formally committed to paying up to $6 million to extend city water lines to replace wells in nearby homes. About 200 potable wells lie within 2,000 feet of the outer boundaries of the course, city officials say.

Fly ash is a powdery residue left from the burning of coal to generate electricity. It contains arsenic, lead and other heavy metals that can pose environmental threats through water and air.

"We want to determine if there are any problems and, if there are any problems, how best to address them," said Dan Genest, a Dominion spokesman.

No matter what the findings, he said, Dominion will pay up to $6 million to extend city water to affected residents.

The results of the tests are expected to be released sometime in the spring, he said.

Dominion undertook the study to follow through on a commitment to conduct its own tests at the site, made earlier this year at a community meeting with affected residents, Genest said. The study is not challenging the results of earlier tests, he added.

"We want to have our own analysis of the situation," Genest said. "Rather than just having data, we want to know what that data means."

Many of the people who were at that community meeting are represented by attorneys who are investigating possible litigation involving Dominion.

While Dominion's tests have been conducted independently, "there has been very good communication" about the study between Dominion and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality and the city, Genest said.

Dominion's study of the golf-course site includes or addresses:

• Groundwater samplings from 16 permanent wells in eight locations around the perimeter of the course, with two wells at each location at different depths.
• At the city's request, an analysis of the aquifer, showing the direction and speed of water under the golf course.
• The quality and quantity of surface water in the course's roughly half-dozen unlined lakes. A series of "test pits" dug around the site, from which samples of soil and fly ash were taken to gauge whether a binding agent added to the fly ash worked the way it was supposed to, by preventing contaminants from leaching into the groundwater.
• Thirty core samples of soil to determine whether there is a minimum of 18 inches of earthen material on top of any fly ash, as required by the state.
• Tests at three sites to make sure that fly ash was properly compacted.

Based on results from three groundwater monitoring wells on the golf course installed by a consulting firm, the city announced in July that high levels of contaminants such as arsenic and lead had been found.

At the same time, the city petitioned the EPA for a preliminary site assessment.

In late August, the EPA took more samples from the same three city-installed wells and from 13 temporary "monitoring points" around the perimeter of the golf course.

The agency also conducted tests on more than 50 wells, mostly those of home-owners, on properties near the course. Early results did not show any immediate threat to human health or the environment, EPA officials said.

The original developer of the golf course was Combustion Products Management Inc., based in Ithaca, N.Y.

In June 2001, the City Council approved a conditional use permit for the project.

In March 2002, the state Department of Environmental Quality let the development move forward under state "coal-combustion byproducts" regulations that allow the "beneficial use" of fly ash, as long as certain conditions are met. Projects that meet the conditions - which include certifications that are not double-checked by the department - are then exempt from needing a state solid-waste permit.

The golf course opened in the fall of 2007.

Robert McCabe, (757) 222-5217, robert.mccabe@pilotonline.com