SANFORD — The clean up of about 4,000 tons of old copper circuit boards at the former CGA recycling site on New Dam Road is underway.

It’s been a long time coming.

The former CGA circuit board recycling facility was abandoned by its owners in the 1990s. The city took possession of the site in 2010.

Mounds of circuit boards cover the site around the derelict building that had housed the recycling process.

Then, out of nowhere in April, the Department of Environmental Protection informed the city of its intention to go out to bid for the project that includes the removal of the the boards, termed special waste by environmental officials. The removal will be completed by early November. Then, in the spring of 2018, the agency plans to test the remaining soil. 

Hauling material from the site began on Monday, City Manager Steve Buck said. The old circuit boards are being taken to Juniper Ridge Landfill, a state-owned facility operated by New England Waste Services of Maine, LLC, a subsidiary of Casella Waste Systems, near Old Town.

The Maine DEP selected the site for clean-up under their Uncontrolled Hazardous Waste Sites and is funding 100 percent of the clean-up actions, Buck said in his report Tuesday.

The news came as a complete surprise to city leaders, who have been looking to get the property cleaned up for more than 25 years and have pursued a number of avenues, to no avail. In fact, the city had to turn back a decade or more ago a $200,000 federal grant that would have paid for soil remediation because the money could not be used to remove the circuit boards, and the city couldn’t find a way to get rid of them that it could afford. At that time, removal of the circuit 4,000 tons of circuit boards was estimated to cost $300,000.

News of the clean up is very popular with folks in the neioghborhood, who have been looking for action on the site for years.

“It’s been a long road, and we were disappoitned a few years ago when the grant was turned back,  but we’re now excited the project is on track,” said David Bernier. “We’re very appreciative.”

The city in 2012 had lined up a company that proposed to clean up the site in exchange for the salvage rights to the circuit boards and the 17 acres that is part of the property. But the company dropped out in the fall of that year, when, it said, the market for copper declined.

The project had been on the DEP’s books since 1991.

The copper processing facility had been operated by Billy and Glennis Lloyd from the mid-1970s through 1987, and until 1991 by Stephen Thibeault, the Lloyd’s son-in-law. In 1991, the site was abandoned and the DEP spent $130,000 removing vats of chemicals and other wastes, but the circuit boards remained. The property was purchased for $1 by Freeport resident Lawrence DiPietro in 1992. DiPietro agreed to  clean the site, but that never happened, despite a 1999 court order.

Buck in April said once the work is completed the city may advertise a request for proposals for the demolition of the existing concrete and steel building to completely clear the site.

— Senior Staff Writer Tammy Wells can be contacted at 324-4444 (local call in Sanford) or 282-1535, ext. 327 or twells@journaltribune.com.