The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has completed a required comprehensive site cleanup review, known as a “five-year review,” for the Saco Tannery Superfund site. The review concluded that the remedy at the Saco Tannery Waste Pits continues to effectively protect peoples’ health and the environment and made recommendations for follow up actions where needed, according to the EPA website.

As required by law, EPA conducts reviews at Superfund sites after cleanup remedies have been implemented every five years. This helps ensure that EPA continues to evaluate the performance of cleanup efforts and determines whether any further action to protect human health or the environment is required.

The Superfund program, a federal program established by Congress in 1980, investigates and cleans up the most complex, uncontrolled, or abandoned hazardous waste sites in the country and endeavors to facilitate activities to return them to productive use, according to the EPA.

Throughout the process of designing and constructing a cleanup at a hazardous waste site, EPA’s primary goal is to protect public health and the environment. At many sites, EPA continues to ensure it remains true to EPA’s mission, by requiring cleanup reviews every five years. It is also important for EPA to regularly check on these sites to ensure the cleanup remedy is working properly.

The 212-acre Saco Tannery Waste Pits, located on Flag Pond Road, was owned by the Saco Tannery Corporation and operated from 1959 until 1981, when the company filed for bankruptcy and stopped operations. The Waste Pits site, located about four miles north of the tannery, was used as a disposal area for process wastes such as chromium sludges, acid wastes, methylene chloride and caustic substances, according to the EPA. It is estimated that more than 23 million gallons of wastes were deposited in two lagoons and 53 disposal pits. After immediate actions to protect human health and the environment, the site’s long-term remedy was put in place. EPA took the site off the Superfund program’s National Priorities List in 1999.

In 1983, EPA performed a removal action on the property that included the removal of liquid wastes, neutralization of sludges, capping of three pits, and erected a fence along Flag Pond Road to prevent vehicular traffic into the site.

Long-term remedial action began in the fall of 1992 and was completed in October 1993. It included the construction of soil cover systems for the 53 waste pits, two lagoons, plus two areas outside the waste pits; re-vegetating the site; creating compensatory wetlands; and constructing permanent security fencing.

As part of the cleanup, the creation of compensatory wetlands was required for the wetlands permanently lost with the construction of the soil covers, according to the EPA. There was not enough suitable acreage on-site to offset the acreage lost through the cleanup. In 1993, the Maine Department of Environmental Protection purchased 247 acres of nearby unique and threatened habitat. The property was placed under the management of The Nature Conservancy and is protected from future development. The purchase preserves over 160 acres of highly valued peatland, a unique habitat where northern and southern range species overlap.

For more information about EPA’s Superfund program, visit epa.gov/superfund.