Leaders from Lauderdale County, the city of Meridian and a few members of the public learned about recent environmental investigations conducted on the property of the former Kerr-McGee wood treating facility in Meridian on Wednesday. 

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Multistate Trust representatives held an information session at city hall.

An additional public information meeting was shortened due to low turnout. Instead, officials answered questions one-on-one. 

Don Rogers, who said he had an interest in a company that owns property nearby, came to the meeting to learn about the results of the environmental tests and any potential impacts. 

“If they have a problem on this property…I don’t want that problem moving over on us,” he said. 

The 93-acre facility is located south of I-20 between Highway 11 South and Tommy Webb Drive.

Wood treating operations began at the site in 1924, according to a fact sheet. In 1964, Kerr-McGee Chemical Corporation bought the facility, operated it until 1986, and then dismantled it. In 2005, Kerr-McGee transferred the Meridian facility into a new company, Tronox, which filed for bankruptcy in 2009, the fact sheet said. 

A court appointed the Multistate Trust to assume responsibility and cleanup for the facility, as part of the Tronox federal bankruptcy settlement, according to Lauri Gorton, the environmental programs director for the Multistate Trust.

The results of environmental investigations show contamination from chemicals used to preserve wood in the soil and groundwater, including creosote and pentachlorophenol, Gorton said.

“Most of that contamination is in the old process areas, towards the middle of the site. We are going to be moving now into the next phase of doing risk assessments and determining what cleanup activities are necessary,” she said. 

Field teams collected 677 samples from the soil, sediment, surface water, groundwater and pore water, according to the presentation.  

The site is fenced off and while a small area of contamination has spread to an adjacent vacant property, the general public is not exposed to the contamination, Gorton said.

Human health and ecological risk assessments are expected to be completed in 2020, according to the fact sheet. The assessments will evaluate the potential for risks to the public or environment under future site uses, according to Gorton.

Following those assessments, the Trust will determine how to clean up the site.

 “We are comfortable that we know the bounds and now we just need to do the risk assessments and decide how we’re going to make sure that it stays protected,” Gorton said.

Bill Hannah, the president and CEO of the East Mississippi Business Development Corporation, attended the presentation.  

“I think it’s a great site for something,” he said. “We’re trying to determine what that is and the schedule for that, the timeframe for that, and the cost of that. What I’ve learned today is it may be premature to suggest anything that it could be.”

The Trust is also responsible for the cleanup of the former Kerr-McGee site in Columbus, which is part of the EPA’s Superfund program, according to Gorton.

The Superfund program allows the EPA to clean up contaminated sites and forces responsible parties to either perform cleanups or reimburse the government for EPA-led cleanup work, according to the EPA website.

Gorton said the Meridian facility did not meet the requirements for the Superfund program, but is managed by the EPA under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act.

Mayor Percy Bland said last week that he has had several meetings about the site’s potential use and would like to see more progress on the project.

“We’re just glad that they came in and talked to the community today and we look forward to a shared partnership with the Trust,” he said Wednesday night.