Borough plans Nikiski environmental investigation

  • By KAYLEE OSOWSKI
  • Thursday, February 6, 2014 9:10pm
  • News

After receiving $150,000 last session for an environmental investigation in Nikiski, the Kenai Peninsula Borough is working to make sure its plan for the project falls under what the grant allows.

“(We’re) figuring out where the gaps of information are, so the public has some reasonable assurance that their water is safe to drink,” Borough Mayor Mike Navarre said. “And that we’re doing what we can to provide them with information about that.”

The investigation stems from resident concerns about water contamination from Arness Septage, a site that saw at least 4,200 gallons of oil waste and other pollutants in the early 1980s.

Last summer the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation issued a permit to AIMM Technologies Inc. to build a drilling waste monofill storage site to the southwest and adjoining the Arness Septage property.

AIMM installed six monitoring wells to satisfy the permit applications, according to DEC.

Phase one of the plan includes gathering all available well logs as well as surveying static water levels in existing wells. That data will then be used to determine the water table, the level below ground saturated with water, as well as various aquifers, bodies of saturated rock that can transmit water. From there the phases calls for geologic maps to be drawn and the groundwater flow directions to be determined.

“Trying to determine which way groundwater is flowing, which aquifer goes where so that if you have wells that test clean, which way the water’s moving and if there are wells that are contaminated, where it’s going to, so that part is just figuring out what’s happening,” Navarre said.

Along with a report summarizing the study’s findings, the borough will also make recommendations for the second phase of the investigation. Navarre said phase one will help to determine what the next steps will be and what the cost will be.

Joe Arness worked with his brother Jim Arness and DEC to come up with a plan to assess the site. They drilled a well last summer to about 125 feet and tested it.

It showed, 0.012 parts per million of trichlorethane, a cleaning solvent, the same level as a previously tested well. He said that’s about 1/20th of what’s considered safe in drinking water. Joe Arness said they drilled through the “worst spot,” so if there was serious contamination, that’s where it would be.

He said they considered drilling a third well to help determine groundwater flow direction.

“But the information from the first two wells … it didn’t really say anything and so I’m very skeptical that a third well would have told us anything different or anything new,” Arness said.

He said he is waiting to see how the borough’s plans proceed and its results before doing any further work, especially with a “low-level contamination” result from testing from last summer.

“I talked with several people about it and virtually everyone of them said, ‘There’s not much you can do about cleaning it up anyway,’” Arness said. “One hundred twenty feet down over time it will deteriorate, but it takes a long time when it’s underground like that.”

 

Kaylee Osowski can be reached at kaylee.osowski@peninsulaclarion.com.

More in News

Alaska State Troopers logo.
State Trooper convicted of attempted sexual abuse of a minor

Vance Peronto, formerly an Alaska State Trooper based in Soldotna, was convicted… Continue reading

Soldotna City Hall is seen on Wednesday, June 23, 2021 in Soldotna, Alaska. (Ashlyn O’Hara/Peninsula Clarion)
Soldotna moves ahead with staff recruitment strategies

Soldotna City Council members last week gave city administration a thumbs up… Continue reading

State representatives Tom McKay, R-Anchorage, and Andi Story, D-Juneau, offering competing amendments to a bill increasing the per-student funding formula for public schools by $1,250 during a House Education Committee meeting Wednesday morning. McKay’s proposal to lower the increase to $150 was defeated. Story’s proposal to implement an increase during the next two years was approved, after her proposed amounts totalling about $1,500 were reduced to $800.
Borough, Soldotna call on Legislature to increase school funding

The City of Soldotna last week became the latest entity to call… Continue reading

Kenai River Brown Bears goalie Nils Wallstrom celebrates winning a shootout over the Fairbanks Ice Dogs on Saturday, March 25, 2023, at the Soldotna Regional Sports Complex in Soldotna, Alaska. (Photo by Jeff Helminiak/Peninsula Clarion)
Brown Bears sweep Ice Dogs, move into 3rd place

The Kenai River Brown Bears earned a two-game sweep over the Fairbanks… Continue reading

The waters of Cook Inlet lap against Nikishka Beach in Nikiski, Alaska, where several local fish sites are located, on Friday, March 24, 2023. (Jake Dye/Peninsula Clarion)
Unprecedented closures threaten setnet way of life

Setnetters have been vocal about their opposition to the way their fishery is managed

Legislative fiscal analysts Alexei Painter, right, and Conor Bell explain the state’s financial outlook during the next decade to the Senate Finance Committee on Friday. (Mark Sabbatini / Juneau Empire)
Legislators eye oil and sales taxes due to fiscal woes

Bills to collect more from North Slope producers, enact new sales taxes get hearings next week.

Expert skateboarder Di’Orr Greenwood, an artist born and raised in the Navajo Nation in Arizona and whose work is featured on the new U.S. stamps, rides her skateboard next to her artworks in the Venice Beach neighborhood in Los Angeles Monday, March 20, 2023. On Friday, March 24, the U.S. Postal Service is debuting the “Art of the Skateboard,” four stamps that will be the first to pay tribute to skateboarding. The stamps underscore how prevalent skateboarding has become, especially in Indian Country, where the demand for designated skate spots has only grown in recent years. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)
Indigenous artists help skateboarding earn stamp of approval

The postal agency ceremoniously unveiled the “Art of the Skateboard” stamps in a Phoenix skate park

Bruce Jaffa, of Jaffa Construction, speaks to a group of students at Seward High School’s Career Day on Thursday, March 23, 2023, at Seward High School in Seward, Alaska. (Jake Dye/Peninsula Clarion)
Seward students talk careers at fair

More than 50 businesses were represented

Alaska state Sen. Bert Stedman, center, a co-chair of the Senate Finance Committee, listens to a presentation on the major North Slope oil project known as the Willow project on Thursday, March 23, 2023, in Juneau, Alaska. The committee heard an update on the project from the state Department of Natural Resources and the state Department of Revenue. (AP Photo/Becky Bohrer)
Official: Willow oil project holds promise, faces obstacles

State tax officials on Thursday provided lawmakers an analysis of potential revenue impacts and benefits from the project

Most Read