Posted on: Thursday, March 31, 2005

EPA orders check of toxic site

By Jan TenBruggencate
Advertiser Science Writer

A former O'ahu Sugar Co. pesticide mixing plant on Navy land at Pearl Harbor contains high levels of dioxin, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said there is evidence that people — perhaps children — have been getting into the contaminated area.

Despite two locked fences and the fact that it is a secure Navy reserve, investigators in September 2003 said they found bicycle tracks inside the old chemical mixing site.

The EPA yesterday announced it has ordered O'ahu Sugar Co. LLC to investigate dioxin contamination at the site on the Waipi'o Peninsula. The sugar company leased 3.5 acres from the Navy during the 1940s until it was closed during the 1990s. O'ahu Sugar went out of the sugar business in 1995.

The site is part of the Pearl Harbor Naval Complex Superfund Site. EPA Hawai'i spokesman Dean Higuchi said it is not near residential areas. "We toured the area, and it's not being used now. It's just overgrown with weeds and kiawe trees," Higuchi said.

Herbicides and fertilizers were mixed on about an acre of the leased area, which is at the head of Walker Bay, about halfway between the Ted Makalena Golf Course and the end of Waipi'o Peninsula. An aircraft runway was nearby, and mixed chemicals would be loaded onto planes for aerial application or onto backpack sprayers or trucks.

"O'ahu Sugar needs to determine how much contamination exists at the site and then control any releases to the environment," said Keith Takata, the EPA's Superfund division director for the Pacific Southwest Region.

The EPA said that dioxins, contaminants in the manufacture of some chemicals, are associated with a range of health issues, including skin rashes, liver damage, weight loss and reduced immune response.

The state Department of Health found high dioxin levels at the site during a 2002 investigation. In September 2003, investigators found there had been holes in the 7-foot-high fence around the site, and that although the holes had been repaired, there were bicycle tracks inside the fence.

They also concluded that during rainy periods, dioxin-contaminated sediment could flow off the site and through a drainage ditch into Walker Bay. The company was ordered to determine the full extent of the contamination and to prevent people from being exposed to the contamination until a cleanup plan is put into effect.

Reach Jan TenBruggencate at jant@honoluluadvertiser.com or (808) 245-3074.