United States Environmental Protection Agency
Region V
POLLUTION REPORT

Subject: 

The Norwood Industries Site (Site), located at 1678 Norwood Avenue, Toledo, Lucas County, Ohio is in a mixed residential, commercial and industrial area. The Site consists of a two-story warehouse building located on approximately one acre on the west side of Toledo, Ohio. The Site consists of storage space on the first floor and office space on the second floor. The Site is bounded to the north by an open lot and Oakwood Avenue, to the east by Norfolk Southern railroad tracks and an open lot, to the south by Norwood Avenue and industrial properties, and to the west by Clinton Street and an unnamed tire and automotive service facility.

The Site consists of a warehouse facility that is currently used to store, mix, and repackage various materials, including Paracril (a synthetic nitrile rubber and plasticizer).  The property owner performs mixing and repackaging operations within the facility under the Norwood Industries company name.  According to the owner, Norwood Industries obtains empty drums and containers from a variety of sources and uses them to repackage materials for relocating businesses and other clients.  In addition, the owner stores miscellaneous materials for clients.  The Site has been in operation since 1977 and has accumulated various drums and small containers at the Site.

Currently there are over 2,000 drums (at least 800 containing material) and several thousand small containers containing various unknown wastes.  The building has been labeled as a "Code Red" by the Toledo Fire Department, which means no entries will be made in the case of a fire at the facility.  The Site Assessment revealed the presence of several flammable materials via laboratory analysis and there are dozens of containers labeled as flammable liquid.  In addition, at least 80% of the building was inaccessible during the Site Assessment due to extreme quantities of debris/solid waste, which would add to combustion in the event of a fire at the Site.

More information on the site is available in the Superfund Technical Assistance and Response Team (START) Site Assessment Report.

On October 16, 2008, U.S. EPA, START, and Emergency and Rapid Removal Service (ERRS) contractors mobilized to the Site and met with the property owner to performed a walk-through of the interior and exterior of the warehouse facility.

On Monday October 20, 2008, site security, site trailers, additional field personnel and equipment were mobilized to the Site.

From October 21-24, 2008, ERRS contractors began the process of clearing out the interior of the warehouse facility by disposing of miscellaneous non-hazardous bulk debris.  This is required to safely access portions of the building that contain massive amounts of general debris mixed with waste drums and containers.  It is anticipated that 80% of the building is inaccessible due to this debris.  To date, four (4) 20-cubic yard roll-off boxes of non-hazardous debris have been removed from the Site.

-  Continue non-hazardous general debris removal and disposal;
-  Begin segregation of materials;
-  Start sampling and field Hazard Categorization (HazCat);
-  Develop waste streams; and
-  Perform final disposal.

Continue Time-Critical Removal Action.

None.

To date initial removal of waste from interior of warehouse facility consists of non-hazardous misc. bulk debris classified as construction/demolition debris