Price's Pit History

The Superfund process appears in many ways to be long, complicated, and thorough process; a polluted site is not simply brought into the Superfund program once hazardous materials are discovered on site. Price’s Pit is an excellent example of the lengthy process involved when a site enters the Superfund program. The Price’s Pit site is located on 26 acres of Egg Harbor Township and Pleasantville along Mill Road, in Atlantic County, NJ. The site was originally used for a sand and gravel excavation business owned by Charles Price. Price’s excavation operations ceased in 1968, as the excavation had come to within two feet of the groundwater table (EPA, 1986). After the termination of excavation operations, in 1969 Price opened the site up as a solid waste landfill for municipalities in the area, Absecon, Atlantic City, Brigantine, Ventnor, Pleasantville, and Egg Harbor Township. At the time effects on the environment of landfilling household garbage (MSW) as well as other chemicals was largely unknown to both the regulatory community and the public at large (R. Dovey, personal communication, April 12, 2011). Therefore unlike other Superfund sites where the disposal of hazardous waste was largely unknown while it was occurring, and may not have been discovered until environmental impacts were observed, this site was always known to contain waste substances.

In addition to the MSW received at Price’s Pit, the site also began to receive liquid wastes, including oil, sludge, greases, septic wastes, and industrial chemicals in 1971. These chemicals were disposed of via both drummed (though often leaking) containers and directly poured into the landfill. Over 9.1 million gallons of chemical waste are estimated to have been disposed of at the site (EPA, 1986). The site ceased operations in 1976 under direction of the State and Price ultimately sold the site in 1979 to A.G.A Partnership. Both of these parties, including Price’s wife and brother who also held a stake in the site, were brought up on charges in 1980 holding them responsible for the cleanup costs of the site (Diamond, 1980). Since the site was always publicly known to be taking solid waste, and discovered to be taking liquid and chemical waste in the early 1970s, it wasn’t until well samples taken at the site in 1973, 1974, and 1976 indentified several state water quality violations that the site began to gain significant attention (Donohue, 1979) (Janson, 1981) (Grady, 1982). In 1980, tests of surrounding residential wells found significant contamination from Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) and the Atlantic County Health Department recommended that the residents no longer use these wells for potable water (EPA, 1986). In addition to the impacts on the local residential wells from the contamination, the Atlantic City Municipal Utilities Authority (ACMUA) had a large well field in the vicinity; the closest of the ACMUA’s 13 wells was only 4,000 feet from the contaminated site. The well field provided Atlantic City with its needed potable water supply, over 11 million gallons daily. At the time the site began to receive significant in national attention the well field had not yet been contaminated (Donohue, 1980), however studies indicated the toxic plume from Price’s Pit would reach the well field by 1983 (Janson, 1981).