Old Blackwell landfill near Warrenville could be deleted from Superfund list

Thirty years after being designated a Superfund site, a former DuPage County landfill in Blackwell Forest Preserve near Warrenville could be removed from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's National Priorities List.

EPA officials say the cleanup of the old Mount Hoy landfill is complete and no further remediation is necessary to protect human health and the environment.

"This administration continues to make good on its commitment to pick up the pace of Superfund cleanups," EPA Regional Administrator Kurt Thiede said in a statement released Thursday. "Now that this cleanup is done, visitors can better enjoy nature and recreation at the Blackwell Forest Preserve."

The agency is taking public comment on the proposed deletion until Aug. 7.

The Mount Hoy landfill operated on roughly 40 acres at Blackwell and accepted waste from 1965 to 1973. It contains roughly 1.5 million cubic yards of refuse.

Even though the dump was closed in 1973, toxins were discovered leaking from it a decade later. The EPA placed the site on the National Priorities List in 1990.

Millions of dollars have been spent to clean up and monitor the site.

Federal officials said the EPA repaired the landfill cap, installed an extraction system, treated and disposed of the landfill leachate, and installed additional landfill gas vents. The agency continues to monitor the natural breakdown of groundwater contamination, officials said.

Close cooperation between the state and federal EPA allowed the Forest Preserve District of DuPage County "to address potential risks while maintaining public access to recreation and conservation activities," officials said.

The National Priorities List tracks the nation's most contaminated sites that threaten human health or the environment, officials said. Sites on the list are eligible for cleanup under the Superfund program.

The EPA removes sites or parts of sites from the list once all the remedies are successfully implemented and no further cleanup - other than operation and maintenance, monitoring and five-year reviews - is required.

Federal officials said the EPA deleted all or part of 27 sites from the National Priorities List in fiscal year 2019, the largest number of deletions in one year since 2001.

To submit a public comment about the proposed deletion of Mount Hoy from the list, visit https://bit.ly/blackwellfeedback.

Visit https://bit.ly/blackwellinfo for more information.