Soil, sediment and groundwater samples will be collected by
Port of Bellingham contractors from a shipyard in Fairhaven later this month to
better locate and define the extent of contamination on the property.
The Harris Ave. Shipyard site, located at 201 Harris Ave., has
been used as a shipyard since the early 1900s, and past shipbuilding and ship
maintenance operations contaminated portions of the site.
Contractor crews collected samples from in and around the
property from Jan. 28 through Feb. 2, 2013, and collection is scheduled again for
Feb. 14. The work is expected to cost about $130,000, according to the port,
and is part of an extensive environmental study being performed, which would be
used to develop future cleanup plans.
Previous sampling and investigations have found gasoline,
diesel, oil, arsenic, metals, polychlorinated biphenols, polycyclic aromatic
hydrocarbons, semi-volatile organic compounds and more in the soils, sediment
and groundwater. Their concentrations, which exceed standards set by the state’s
cleanup law, have been typical of historic shipyard operations throughout the
Puget Sound.
Two tenants currently lease the property from the Port of
Bellingham, All American Marine and Puglia Engineering, but neither is believed
by the port to have caused the contamination.
The property, which is owned partly by the state and port,
has been designated as a cleanup site by the Washington Department of Ecology, the
agency overseeing the sampling and future cleanup.
A 2010 legal agreement between the port and Ecology Dept. requires
the port to assess contamination and cleanup options. The department is
scheduled to reimburse half the port’s costs through the state’s Remedial
Action Grant program, which helps pay to clean up publicly owned sites and is
funded with revenue from a voter-approved tax on hazardous substances.
The Harris Avenue cleanup site is one of 12 sites around
Bellingham Bay that are part of a coordinated, bay-wide effort by federal,
tribal, state and local governments to clean up contamination, control
pollution sources and restore habitat. The pilot program, known as the Bellingham Bay Demonstration Pilot, is a major step toward
restoring Puget Sound.
