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Dry cleaning chemicals, grain fumigants and World War II-era munition plants are just a few contaminators of Nebraska’s water, soil and air from Omaha to Ogallala.
All three and more contaminate the Hastings Ground Water Contamination Superfund site. One of the Environmental Protection Agency’s largest and most complex sites, Hastings was the first Nebraska site added to the National Priorities List. The EPA uses the list to guide the investigation and cleanup of contaminated sites.
Superfund was created in 1980 when Congress passed the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act in response to toxic waste dumps that gained national attention. The program allows the EPA to clean up contaminated sites.
Hastings is home to three of Nebraska’s 18 sites: the Ground Water Contamination site, Garvey Elevator and the West Highway 6 and Highway 281 site.
The city’s Superfund saga began in 1983 when it reactivated an old municipal well.
“When they pumped it (the well) in the 1940s, they said it had a phenol taste,” said Marty Stange, Hastings’ Utilities environmental director who’s worked for the city since 1989. “The Board of Public Works at the time decided not to put the well into the water system because it had a bad taste.”
The city figured the problem would have passed since the ‘40s. So, they tested the water’s nitrate and Ph levels and, upon finding nothing wrong, reactivated the well. Within a few hours, a woman who lived near the well called and complained that her water tasted and smelled strange.
The city deactivated the well and sent it to Kansas City for special testing.
“We’re the ones who probably rang the bell on it. Because of us doing our due diligence,” Stange said. “So, I’ve had some people that (said), ‘Well, if you hadn’t done that, we wouldn’t have had a problem.’ Well, we had a problem. I’m just glad we figured it out as soon as we did.”
Cleanup begins
There, volatile organic compounds, or VOCs, were found in their water. VOCs are a common groundwater contaminant because of their widespread use in manufacturing. Shortly after the EPA got involved – or, as Stange puts it, “People in moon suits showed up” – setting off the long, complex process of Superfund cleanup.
In 1986, Hastings was officially added to the National Priorities List. As investigations into the contamination continued, new sites were discovered.
Today, the Hastings Ground Water Contamination site has 7 subsites, not including the two other Superfund sites nearby.
Under current conditions, no one is being exposed to unacceptable levels of contamination. And Hastings never experienced widespread, adverse health effects as a result of anything in the water.
But cleanup is far from over. Contaminants are still regularly monitored, and new remediation is still happening. One subsite, the former Naval Ammunition Depot, has a 90-year plan.
“We’re into it, maybe 10-15 years now,” Stange said. “These efforts will go on for a long, long time.”
Enforcement
Another goal of Superfund is to make responsible parties pay for cleanup work. When funding from responsible parties falls short, the government is meant to foot the bill. But the program has struggled with a lack of funding for years. The Bipartisan Infrastructure bill passed in 2021 designated a much-needed $3.5 billion toward environmental remediation at the more than 1,300 Superfund sites nationwide.
The Hastings site received $15 million for soil treatment at one subsite contaminated by a coal gas plant that hasn’t operated since 1931. But most sites in Hastings haven’t been cleaned up using federal funds.
“When this all started, I’m sure ‘bout everybody here thought EPA would just clean it all up,” said Mike Sullivan, Hastings’ city attorney from 1980-2000 who still does environmental work for the city today.
He said potentially responsible parties or PRPs can be hard to identify and define, a challenge he calls the “web of liability.”
“Liability is imposed on those who generate the contamination, those who transported it somewhere, those who owned the property at the time the contamination was disposed there and those who own the property today – the day the EPA comes and knocks on your door,” Sullivan said.
The EPA did come knocking. Several different manufacturing and agricultural businesses were named PRPs – and so was the city of Hastings itself.
“I think EPA was coming down hard on us at first,” Sullivan said. “And I don’t know if they were trying to intimidate a small community, but I was told that by other communities. We networked with some other places where EPA was active around the country. And they said, ‘They’re just going to bully ya.’”
Hastings used to be home to a major clay manufacturer. Clay was mined at two different sites, and once it had all been dug up, two large holes remained. Stange said at the time, the solution was clear.
“They looked at it and said, ‘Oh, there’s a hole here. What’re we going to do with it? Fill it with garbage,’” he said.
The city operated the two landfills. So, when it was discovered that contamination had leaked into the groundwater from waste dumped there, the city was a PRP under Superfund rules.
The city was also considered a PRP for the Second Street subsite, the one contaminated by a coal gas plant because at the time the contamination was discovered, the Hastings Police Station was on that land.
Sullivan spent years on lawsuits and negotiations with the EPA. An agreement was made on the Second Street subsite, but the city was still named a PRP for all three sites, meaning they had to pay for the cleanup.
“We’ve spent millions,” he said. “And I don’t know if it’s five or six or seven. And I’ve been asked that before, and it’s probably somewhere in all these boxes. But the city has expended a lot of money on environmental issues. Paying lawyers and paying consultants – and paying EPA.”
But some community members and city government felt that the law was unfair. Hastings may have owned the land, but they weren’t the ones contaminating it.
Hastings and the EPA’s relationship was hostile at first, but after 40 years, they’ve learned to work together. A big part of it was just time for relationship building and understanding.
“That’s how things get done, I think, best is if both sides are willing to listen to each other,” Sullivan said. “And I think we have that. We’ve had it for some years now.”
The EPA started to trust the city more and grew open to new ideas. They accepted a proposal by the city to create a new well to collect contaminated groundwater from multiple sites that had mixed together. Then, Hastings used that water to cool its power plant, stripping the water of the contamination in the process. The project was cost-effective and helped quicken cleanup.
“EPA came back and said, ‘You don't have to do any more active remediation,’” Stange said. “And we said, ‘Well, that's fine, but we're still going to use the well because we're using it for the power plant.”
Redevelopment
Another major goal of the program is to return sites to productive use. According to the EPA, businesses on the Hastings site generate over $200 million in annual sales revenue.
Part of the former Naval Ammunition Depot is home to Central Community College. Both of the landfills have been capped. Hastings hopes to eventually put solar panels on one of them, and the other is now the city’s dog park.
An amendment to the law in the early 2000s helped ensure that Superfund liability wouldn’t harm the economic viability of towns with contamination. Prior to the amendment, Sullivan said at least a few real estate transactions he handled in his private practice fell through because of environmental issues.
“Now, you can buy land, even if it’s contaminated, and not have liability under Superfund, if you follow certain steps,” Sullivan said.
Looking ahead
Human health and the environment are protected, and Hastings and the EPA’s relationship has greatly improved in the last few decades. But new challenges could still come up.
Stange worries about PFAS contamination, a type of chemical that’s in everything from shampoo to pizza boxes. The serious health concerns of PFAS – reproductive issues, developmental delays in children and increased cancer risk – have only really been seen in people near very contaminated sites.
But PFAS are also called forever chemicals because it will take thousands of years for them to break down.
“Think about what we’re going to deal with in this country,” Stange said. “Because we’re not measuring those forever chemicals in parts per million or parts per billion. We’re measuring them in parts per trillion down to parts per quadrillion.”
Most VOCs are measured in parts per billion or one drop of water in a small backyard swimming pool. One part per trillion is like one drop in 20 Olympic-size pools. And the EPA’s latest advisory implies that any level of exposure, even one part per trillion, is going to cause some health impacts.
“That next generation of those chemicals are going to be a challenge for all the water industry that’s out there,” Stange said. “And sewer industry, too, 'cause it’s in there. Landfills, they’ve got it.”
New chemicals could mean new contamination, new treatment systems and a new source of funding. But 40 years into their Superfund experience, Hastings may be better prepared than most.
“We're still here, maybe that's the legacy,” Stange said. “I mean, it changed the way we probably do things today. We've improved it. And there’s things we needed to do, but it didn't destroy the community. If anything, we became a little more resilient and felt maybe a little bit more emboldened that, maybe some of the ideas that we've got are worth trying.”