Monday, July 19
July 19, 2010LDWF plans meeting to discuss plans for waterfowl season
July 21, 2010
As cleanup workers both offshore and on the beach work tirelessly to collect and contain oil ravaging the coast of Louisiana, one must stop and wonder: Where does the oil go?
At last week’s BP and U.S. Coast Guard Open House Expo in Thibodaux, officials with the various response efforts were on hand to answer questions.
BP has contracted Swift Worldwide Resources to oversee waste management. The company’s waste team leader, C.C. Rice, said liquid oily waste is picked up by skimming operations offshore and taken to a disposal facility in Fourchon, Morgan City or Venice.
After attempting to separate water from oil as much as possible on the barge ride to the facility, the remaining oily water is loaded onto a larger barge destined for a disposal facility in Fannett, Texas, while any recovered oil is sent to facilities for recycling or re-processing.
Rice said there should be no environmental risk to the transportation of oil on barges.
“When the barge comes in, it is decontaminated so that it doesn’t have the oil on it from the skimming operations before it gets to the [disposal facility],” said Rice.
More than 120,000 barrels of oily liquids have been contained since the spill.
But when oil and tar balls reach the beach, solid contaminated materials become a reality.
Solid materials aren’t transported to Texas. Instead, they are trucked in plastic bags to landfills in Geismar and Avondale, causing concern for residents like Darlene Eschette of Bourg.
“They’re bringing it to two landfills which are above us, so I’m wondering how are they containing that oily mess so it doesn’t get into our water table years from now,” said Eschette. “I don’t want something to happen where it decomposes 100 years from now, if not sooner, and it gets into our water supply and contaminates it. I’m concerned about my grandchildren and their children.”
Rice assured Eschette and other residents with concerns of this nature that BP is working with the EPA to run tests on the solid waste once a week.
“Every week, we run analyses on the waste to make sure it doesn’t have any hazardous characteristics at the staging sites,” said Rice. “They’ll take a sample and send it to an independent lab for analysis.”
She said all the data they have received says the waste is not hazardous.
Moreover, she added, landfills are permitted to accept hazardous material.
“There are controls around each landfill that allow it to take that waste strain, so we’re going beyond what we need to do,” said Rice. “The landfill has a permit requiring the landfill has certain controls.”
Although Rice said the waste management department has received no complaints or suggestions on how to better their approach to date, she said BP has recently implemented an Environmental/Community Hotline at (866) 448-5816 where residents ask questions and voice their concerns.
Bourg resident Darlene Eschete questions Swift Worldwide Resources Waste Team Leader C.C. Rice and Conestoga-Rovers and Associates Waste Coordinator Ted Greed about the toxicity of skimmed oil and oily waste. RICHARD FISCHER
