United States Environmental Protection Agency
Region V
POLLUTION REPORT

Subject: 

The United Wholesale Grocery PCB Site is located at 25700 West 8 Mile Road, Southfield, Michigan, 48033.  The facility is a 70,000-ft2 United Wholesale Grocery (UWG) warehouse, which distributes dry-packaged foods, candies, and tobacco products to eleven warehouses in Michigan and Ohio.

August 9, 2008, at approximately midnight, a transformer recently taken out-of-service and staged at the northeast corner of the warehouse was stolen.  During the theft, low-level polychlorinated biphenyl* (PCB) oil was dumped in the parking lot and shipping and receiving area. On August 10, 2008, a UWG employee discovered the spill; placed absorbent material on it; and then powerwashed the spill down the sewer.  

*According to the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, PCBs can cause damage to skin, liver, stomach, and thyroid glands.

August 12, 2008, a resident notified the Southfield Fire Department (SFD) of oil on the Rouge River. SFD deployed sorbent boom and traced the spill back to UWG, who hired Marine Pollution Control (MPC).  Between August 11 and 18, MPC vacuumed and quadruple washed the parking lot; jetted the conduits and sewer lines; took over boom and containment on the Rouge River; skimmed free product; and removed impacted river debris.  Response efforts were coordinated with Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ), Michigan Department of Agriculture (MDA), and City of Southfield Water and Sewer Department.

August 19, 2008, MPC stopped emergency response operations due to a contract dispute concerning payment of services. Waste collected during the response - a frac tank and three roll-off boxes of debris - remained on site along with response equipment that required decontamination.  

August 19, 2008, MDA inspected the facility and reported, "on the basis of the information obtained after interviewing the management and also conducting an onsite inspection it could be stated that food inside the warehouse might not have been affected.”

August 20, 2008, Michigan Department of Community Health requested U.S. EPA assistance in determining whether PCBs had been tracked into the warehouse.  U.S. EPA mobilized to the site; met with MDEQ, City of Southfield, and UWG.  The contract dispute was resolved and MPC restarted cleanup operations; U.S. EPA collected ten wipe samples at the back entrances; and response goals to assess the parking lot, drain effluent, and remaining river debris were developed.

August 21, 2008, U.S. EPA received analytical results of the ten wipe samples.  All results were non-detect for PCBs. Between August 21 and 22, MPC received analytical results from samples collected in the parking lot, drain, and river debris.  All results were non-detect for PCBs.

Laboratory reports can be found at    http://epaosc.net/doc_list.asp?site_id=4333

Beach Daly Road, closed during response operations, has been reopened.

MDEQ will oversee disposal and continued boom deployment, which is expected to last two weeks.

U.S. EPA has demobilized.