A temporary cleanup system is under construction at the Liberty Industrial hazardous waste site, and is expected to be completed within a few weeks, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) project manager for the site has reported.

The cleanup system is aimed at addressing a plume of pollution that EPA scientists believe has been spreading from the South Farmingdale site, through groundwater, into the neighborhoods of South Farmingdale and Massapequa. Excavation, piping and other signs of construction, which began five months ago, are currently visible at the site from Motor Avenue. Liberty is a federally designated Superfund site that was polluted by past manufacturing operations.

The federal agency wants to use the temporary groundwater cleanup system to stop the further spread of contaminants, such as cadmium, chromium and volatile organic chemicals, while it continues to study the site to come up with a long-term comprehensive cleanup plan.

"Right now, we are in the full-scale construction of that interim groundwater action," said Lorenzo Thantu, the EPA project manager. "And that would effectively contain the groundwater contaminant plume leaving the site, while EPA proceeds with the selection of the long-term remedy."

The interim groundwater cleanup action consists of below-ground wells that circulate the groundwater plume in place, and using vapor stripping, removes the contaminants from it. This is targeted at intercepting and treating the groundwater plume leaving the site, which has been found to be about 400 to 500 feet wide. Thantu noted that the interim cleanup action only addresses the groundwater contaminants that are directly beneath the site, not those that have already traveled off-site.

The comprehensive cleanup plan would include such aspects as soil pollution, in addition to both on-site and off-site groundwater, and will be chosen after the completion of the study, known as the Remedial Investigation and Feasibility Study (RI/FS). The RI/FS began a year-and-a-half ago for the purpose of coming up with a long term comprehensive cleanup remedy, and is ongoing. It is being funded by five companies which EPA believes are potentially responsible for the pollution, known as Potentially Responsible Parties (PRPs).

Once construction is complete, the interim groundwater cleanup plan is expected to continue operating solely until the implementation of the long-term remedy. That remedy will likely not be seen for at least two to three years, as the lengthy RI/FS process continues. After the long-term remedy is chosen, the current cleanup system will probably be incorporated into it, according to Thantu.

Commenting on the progress of the RI/FS, Thantu noted that the PRPs started with the study in the spring of 1997, and completed the field work just a few months ago. "The site is very, very complex in that the original scope that we had for the RI field work has probably expanded at least by about three or fourfold," he noted. "We ended up doing a lot more field work on the basis of the data that were coming back. The PRPs have spent well over a million dollars in implementing just the RI field work." He added that the PRPs have submitted draft RI and FS reports to the EPA, and that the agency is currently reviewing them. Once the EPA review is completed, and the agency has made revisions that officials feel are appropriate, they will be released to the public, according to Thantu. Among the findings of the studies is that the groundwater plume has reached the Massapequa Creek.

Thantu added, "Right now, we are hoping to make the RI and FS reports publicly available, hopefully, within the next two months, which will be followed by EPA's publication of the proposed plan, in which the agency will outline its preferred remedy, not only for the contaminated soils on the entire Liberty property, but also the groundwater, which primarily will be the off-site groundwater contamination, and lastly the Massapequa Creek and Preserve."