A monitoring well on the southern border of the old sludge dump at 1855 House Street NE detected perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS) at 44,000 parts-per-trillion (ppt), according to a Nov. 27 report by Wolverine’s contractor Rose & Westra GZA.
Test results show PFOS at 44k-ppt @WolverineWW’s House Street dump in Belmont: https://t.co/g8EZ3jMYga #PFAS pic.twitter.com/wIyHRSmA5Q — Garret M. Ellison (@garretellison) December 21, 2017 Notably, the PFOS level under the House Street landfill, where sludge from Wolverine’s tannery was dumped on a daily basis throughout the 1960s, is 7.5 times lower than the PFOS concentration underneath the former tannery site itself in downtown Rockford.
Discovery of PFAS in wells near House Street in April sparked a multi-township search for old Wolverine tannery waste dump sites, sampling of more than 1,000 residential wells so far, numerous meetings and anxiety among residents of northern Kent County.
The landfill sits on a ridge of high ground near the divide between the Rogue River and Grand River watersheds.
According to the report, "most of the groundwater at the site area is expected to flow southwest for a relatively short distance, approximately 1,000 to 2,000 feet, then flow southeast toward the Rogue River."
Monitoring wells are also being drilled near the river.
Most of those are planned in the House Street plume area, although some are planned in Algoma Township, where sludge believed to have been dumped in an old gravel pit that’s now a pond near Royal Hannah Drive NE has contaminated homes in the Wellington Ridge subdivision with PFAS levels as high as 10,000-ppt.
The contamination is "likely to reach" the Rogue River — where Wolverine began canvassing and supplying bottled water to homes on the east bank near Woodwater Drive NE this week.
"It sits on a mound on a divide where the chemicals can make their way a long distance.
You have river systems involved — it’s a complicated area to study."