The Site is located in the Omaha metropolitan area and encompasses Council Bluffs, Iowa, Carter Lake, Iowa, and east Omaha. It is centered around downtown Omaha, Nebraska. ASARCO Incorporated (ASARCO) operated a lead refinery at 500 Douglas Street in Omaha, Nebraska, for over 100 years beginning in the 1870s. The operation of the refinery ceased in 1997. As a routine part of the refinery operation, lead particles were emitted into the atmosphere at the refinery. In addition, the Gould Incorporated Lead Battery Recycling Plant was located at 555 Farnam Street in Omaha and was a secondary smelter of lead from discarded lead batteries. The blast furnace used to smelt the lead at the Gould plant emitted lead particles into the air from that refinery. The Gould plant closed in 1982. Several other facilities in the Omaha area used lead in their manufacturing processes. A few of these included Carter White Lead at 21st and Locust Streets which produced white lead paint bases and red lead and litharge protective coatings until 1936, Omaha Shot and Lead which later became Lawrence Shot and Lead, and then became National Lead Company which manufactured lead shot by melting pig lead, Grant Storage Battery Company, Storage Battery Factory, and Exide Corporation which manufactured lead storage batteries. Numerous other locations in the Omaha area such as foundries, iron works, metal salvaging companies and other manufacturers used or processed lead at their facilities.
The plan is to continue the implementation of this removal action that includes excavating lead contaminated soil from residential properties with one or more non-foundation soil concentrations greater than 2,500 mg/kg.
Continued activities are being centralized from the Missouri River Treatment Plant located at 5600 S 10th Street, Omaha, Nebraska 68107-3501. The city of Omaha has partnered with EPA to allow the use of a portion of the facility.
There were 3 homes that were excavated and 4 homes were backfilled this week operating with two crews under this removal action. A total of 7 homes were excavated and 6 homes backfilled under both actions.
Attached is a table that lists the work progress for this reporting period and project totals.
A new piece of equipment is being mobilized to the site next week. It is a very small excavator that will be utilized in advance of the larger excavators on scheduled properties. It can excavate a drip zone quickly and will also be used in very tight areas of properties to accelerate the work crews. It will used on a trial basis while the efficiencies are being measured.
EPA is in the process of ammending the action memorandum to include properties with non-foundations concentrations greater than 1,200 ppm to be eligible for removals.
Due to a new grouping of properties that are expected and will require lead contaminated soil to be excavated (over 330 properties), a third excavation crew is scheduled to be mobilized and commence work on November 3, 2003. All of these properties fall under the amendment to this Action Memorandum changing non-foundations concentrations greater than 1,200 ppm to be eligible for removals instead of 2,500 ppm of lead.
Overall, involving the entire Omaha Lead Site, there has been over 10,000 properties that have been sampled by Black and Veatch at this time. Over 5,200 samples have been processed and over 11,000 property accesses have been received
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