Bannock County To Take Action On Solvent Pollution

Bannock County officials have agreed to move beyond more studies toward action to clean up a cancer-causing solvent that is polluting the underground water supply for Pocatello and Chubbuck.

“We’re past the point of studying this thing to death,” Mark Lowe of the state Division of Environmental Quality told county commissioners. “We need to do something about it.”

The commissioners have directed County Engineer Terry Bailey to bring in scientists and other technical experts to assess all the information gathered so far on the trichloroethylene pollution in the aquifer and help come up with the best, cheapest cleanup option.

“We’ll act on it,” Commission Chairman Tom Katsilometes promised.

The solvent is seeping in the groundwater out of Fort Hall Mine Canyon landfill two miles above Pocatello’s well field, forcing the city to shut down some of the wells. The chemical was dumped there before congressional imposition of stricter disposal laws over 15 years ago.

Cleanup could be complicated if there is also seepage from potential dumping in another area as experts suspect.

The city and county have already spent several hundred thousand dollars in hydrogeological studies and temporary remedies. There has also been a $1 million water line installed to serve Pocatello’s expanding south side and people in or near the path of the solvent pollution to eliminate any imminent health risk.