Major New Update On The Raritan Bay Slag Superfund Site

OLD BRIDGE, NJ — On Sept. 5, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced a proposal where Old Bridge Township, NL Industries, Inc. and the state of New Jersey will pay the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency $151.1 million to resolve the past and future clean-up costs at the Raritan Bay Slag superfund site.

This is the Superfund site on the Raritan Bay waterfront in Old Bridge and Sayreville.

NL Industries, Inc. has long been identified by the EPA as potentially responsible for pollution at the site. Old Bridge Township is one of NL Industries' former customers.

Old Bridge Township agreed to the proposed consent decree, which is publicly available here: https://www.justice.gov/enrd/m...

Old Bridge Twp. agreed to pay $21.1 million, plus interest.

The EPA says this agreement will allow clean-up to finally be completed there, and the area re-opened back to the public.

“This settlement would allow EPA to finish this clean-up and return the waterfront back to the community so that residents and visitors can use the beach without being concerned about their health,” said EPA Regional Administrator Lisa Garcia. “EPA looks forward to cleaning up the seawall and jetty and making good on our commitment to protect people from exposure to toxic lead.”

If accepted by a federal judge, this agreement will resolve all the allegations related to the Superfund site, and resolve all claims in the lawsuit NL Industries, Inc. v. Old Bridge Township, et. al.

The EPA submitted the consent decree to U.S. federal court in the district of New Jersey and it will be subject to 60-day public comment period.

The Raritan Bay Superfund site is located on the southern shore of Raritan Bay. The federal government declared it a Superfund site in 2013.

The site consists of the Seawall Sector, which contains a seawall about 2,300 feet long in Old Bridge Township; the Margaret’s Creek Sector, which consists of a 47-acre wetland located immediately east of the Seawall Sector, and the Jetty Sector, which consists of the approximately 750-foot-long western jetty, located nearly a mile west of the seawall in adjacent Sayreville.

The primary sources of contamination at the site are slag and battery casings.

The seawall and the western jetty were constructed using slag from blast furnace bottoms from smelting operations in the late 1960s to early 1970s. Battery casings were also deposited at the site, particularly in the Margaret’s Creek sector. The slag and battery casings resulted in high levels of lead contamination, including along the seawall and in the sand of a recreational beach immediately west of the seawall which resulted in the closure of a significant portion of a recreational beach area.

Since 2013, the EPA has been dredging and removing sediment contaminated with lead at the site. The EPA completed the Margaret’s Creek Sector clean-up in September 2018. That clean-up included removing about 15,775 tons of soil and 1,802 tons of slag from that portion of the site — and cost about $7 million. After becoming concerned about the quality of the engineering work being conducted by NL Industries for the Seawall Sector, EPA took over that work, which was completed last fall.

If the settlement is finalized and when the EPA receives payment, EPA can begin the cleanup work on the Seawall Sector followed by the Jetty Sector.