EPA Plans to Add Newark Site to 'Superfund' List

U.S. Senator Robert Menendez Wednesday praised the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) plan to clean up two toxic industrial sites in Essex County, including  the Troy Chemical Corporation site in Newark.

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“The Superfund program is critical for the Garden State,” said Menendez.  “The designation will ensure that these contaminated sites in Essex County are properly cleaned up and that the health and well-being of New Jersey residents are protected.”

For more than a decade beginning in 1956, Troy Chemical,  a maker of antimicrobial and antifungal paint additives,  pumped 7,000 gallons of wastewater containing mercury every week into Pierson’s Creek, which feeds into Newark Bay.  According to the EPA, exposure to even small amounts of mercury can damage the nervous system, brain, heart, kidneys, lungs and immune system, with children and pregnant women  especially vulnerable.  State Department of Environmental Protection tests of Pierson’s Creek found that the sediment contained as much as 60 percent mercury by weight.

The EPA will publish notices in the Federal Register and invite public comment before the Essex sites are formally added to the Superfund list.  If approved, New Jersey would have 116 Superfund sites, tops in the nation.