DEQ Must Redraw Dioxane Zone Map

DEQ must redraw dioxane zone map

The city’s Northwest Supply Well at Montgomery Avenue will not be a part of a state-imposed prohibition zone that will stop people from using water or putting in wells on land that is or may be contaminated with 1,4 dioxane, a judge ruled on Wednesday.

Washtenaw County Circuit Court Judge Donald Shelton ruled that the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality must redraw a map of the prohibition zone in 10 days and resubmit it. The proposed zone would run from Wagner Road to the Huron River. It would allow the dioxane plume to migrate toward the river.

The dioxane was used by Pall Life Sciences’ predecessor, the former Gelman Sciences Inc., from 1966-1986 in the manufacture of medical filters at its Scio Township plant. It has spread through the soil to the aquifer and contaminated a nearly four-mile-long stretch of groundwater that widens out to as much as a mile.

Shelton said Pall Life Sciences’ liability in replacing the Northwest Supply Well will be determined in a separate lawsuit the city has filed against the company. No trial date has been set. The city shut down the well in 2001 after it was found to be contaminated.

City officials had hoped the judge would rule that Pall Life Sciences be held financially liable for the costs associated with the city finding an alternative to the Northwest Supply Well. That could cost millions of dollars.

Farsad Fotouhi, the environmental manager at Pall Life Sciences, said the levels of contamination in the well were not high enough to warrant shutting it down. He said further details would come out in the city’s lawsuit.