2021 Milestones/Activities
As of December 31, 2021, more than 13.1 million gallons of petroleum product has been recovered, and over 6.4 billion gallons of groundwater has been recovered and treated from the three sites comprising the Greenpoint Petroleum Remediation Project. In 2021, the project recovered a total of approximately 42,988 gallons of product, while recovering and treating over 374 million gallons of groundwater to Clean Water Act standards.
ExxonMobil Greenpoint Petroleum Remediation Project (EMGPRP – S224150)
ExxonMobil continues to operate two product and groundwater treatment systems, the on-site recovery and containment system (RCS) located on Kingsland Yard (OU4) and the off-site free-product recovery system (ORS) located at the corner of Bridgewater and Monitor streets (OU7). Typical routine maintenance of both systems includes critical safety device (CSD) checks, acid cleaning of the air strippers, carbon change-outs, filter bag replacement, system inspections, soil vapor extraction (SVE) system sampling, bimonthly discharge monitoring report (DMR) sampling, and weekly operation and maintenance (O&M) task lists.
In November 2020, ExxonMobil began the installation of a 2,000-gallon cone bottom settling tank at the RCS to replace the existing settling tank equipment, as well as replace/upgrade other associated equipment, piping, valves, and controls. The settling tank installation was completed in January 2021 and the tank was successfully tested in February 2021 before in was incorporated into the RCS treatment system.
With the significant reduction in the off-site (OU7&8) free-product plume size and volume, ExxonMobil has begun the process of evaluating recovery well metrics of individual recovery wells to determine when they will request to NYSDEC to shut down a well because the well is no longer recovering a significant volume of free-product. Once ExxonMobil believes a well meets all criteria for shutdown, they will submit a formal shutdown request to NYSDEC detailing the evaluation of each criteria, as well as an evaluation of potential impacts of the shutdown on hydraulic control based on groundwater modeling. ExxonMobil also periodically evaluates recovery wells for redevelopment when the specific capacity around the well suggests there are performance issues causing the decreased free-product recovery at the well. A request to shutdown recovery well RW-E was submitted and approved by NYSDEC in December 2020. Recovery well RW-E was turned off on January 4, 2021, and the recovery well was decommissioned on June 24, 2021. Final RW-E decommissioning and removal activities (including UST removal, utility removal, and well house demolition) were completed in December 2021. Three of the 22 recovery wells did not recover any free-product in 2021 and it is anticipated ExxonMobil will submit a request to NYSDEC to shutdown recovery well RW-22 based on current recovery well metrics.
In August 2018, NYSDEC approved ExxonMobil to enhance free-product recovery on the Kingsland Yard property by installing a new pressure-pulse waterflooding injection well network to increase the hydraulic gradient and product movement toward recovery wells. Trenching and installation of pumping wells and vaults for the waterflooding program began in August 2018, with the majority of the construction work completed by the end of December 2018. The waterflooding program injection activities began in May 2019 and are currently active at the site.
In 2017, NYSDEC approved an Interim Remedial Measures Work Plan to delineate and excavate areas where Total Petroleum Hydrocarbon concentrations exceed site-specific cleanup criteria, delineation activities in the North Henry, Monitor, and Kingsland Yards. Excavation activities began in Monitor Yard in December 2017, and work shifted to Kingsland Yard in 2018 once the Monitor Yard work was complete. Petroleum-contaminated soil was temporarily stockpiled on-site before being transported off-site for proper disposal. Contaminated soil removal work was completed in April 2018 except for two excavation areas within Kingsland Yard (N and O) that were inaccessible as the result of stockpiled clean fill for use on other projects including the OU-3 PCB remediation. With the restoration of the OU-3 remediation work complete the clean fill stockpile has been used or relocated within the 400 Kingsland Avenue property, allowing access to the proposed excavation locations. Delineation work of these remaining hot spots was completed in May 2021 and a Second Addendum to the Interim Remedial Measure (IRM) Hot Spot Excavation Work Plan for OU-4 letter was submitted and approved by NYSDEC in August 2021. TPH Hot Spot Excavations for N and O began in the Third Quarter of 2021 and are expected to be completed in early 2022. A Final Engineering Report detailing the work will be submitted to the NYSDEC following the completion of the work.
ExxonMobil submitted a vapor enhanced recovery (VER) IRM Work Plan to the NYSDEC in November 2019 that was approved in December 2019. VER was then installed at two recovery wells (RW-24 and RW-C) in 2020 and currently being operated as part of normal system operations. In 2021 ExxonMobil installed VER system in recovery well RW-21 and VER operations began at RW-21 on December 3, 2021. The use of VER at select OU-8 recovery wells is currently being evaluated.
Former Paragon Oil Terminal (S224083) and Apollo Street Creek Parcels (S224122)
Through April 2018, Chevron-Texaco continued to operate a total fluids recovery (TFR) system where 17 recovery wells pumped both groundwater and product into an onsite treatment system that collected the product and treated groundwater before discharging into sanitary. Starting in April 2018, both TFR and the VPR systems were shut down to construct system upgrades that were outlined and approved by the NYSDEC. TFR system upgrades include demolition of the existing TFR system buildings and replacement with a new, expanded remediation system that can handle additional flow from new recovery wells with improved telemetry. The system upgrades were completed in February 2019 and the upgraded system operated on a limited basis until the treatment system began full runtime operation on August 19, 2019.
Typical routine maintenance of the TFR treatment system includes backwashing the clay and carbon units, changing out spent clay and carbon, and replacing filter bags. Recovery well pumps are pulled and cleaned as needed, typically every six weeks to two months, based on performance metrics. Non-routine maintenance/system upgrades performed in 2021 included: replacement of the regenerative vacuum blower on the VPR system at the start of 2021; treatment system discharge modifications were complete and the system began effluent discharge to the Newtown Creek under a new SPDES equivalency permit in April 2021; and procurement of a spare treatment system transfer pump to minimize downtime in the event of pump failure.
Chevron-Texaco also operated a vapor-phase recovery (VPR) system to remove vapor contamination from beneath the Empire Merchants’ buildings and aid in the reduction of product accumulations in and around the existing recovery well network. The VPR is a relatively low-vacuum system aimed at volatilizing PSH in extraction wells and reducing the PSH loading into the water treatment system. The catalytic oxidizer system had been off-line for approximately six months in 2020 due to blower and motor issues. The equipment was sent to the manufacturer for repair and the repaired equipment was installed and system running in late 2020.
As part of the treatment system operation and maintenance, Chevron-Texaco routinely performs bulkhead inspections and maintains the boom containment systems along both the former Paragon Oil Terminal and Apollo Street bulkheads. Chevron-Texaco continued to inspect and reseal bulkhead seams with a marine epoxy on a monthly basis from April until October, and containment booms were evaluated/adjusted on a quarterly basis during the other months of 2021. No sheens were observed within containment booms along the creek bulkhead during 2021 oversight events, but small amounts of sheen were observed in Newtown Creek outside the containment boom system during two of the oversight events in 2021 (October and December events).
Starting in April 2018, both TFR and the VPR systems were shut down to construct system upgrades that were outlined and approved by the NYSDEC. TFR system upgrades include demolition of the existing TFR system buildings and replacement with a new, expanded remediation system that can handle additional flow from new recovery wells with improved telemetry. As of December 31, 2018, work on the system upgrades was still ongoing, with work expected to be complete and both systems operational in early 2019.
As part of the treatment system operation and maintenance, Chevron-Texaco routinely performs bulkhead inspections and maintains the boom containment systems along both the former Paragon Oil Terminal and Apollo Street bulkheads. Chevron-Texaco continued to reseal bulkhead seams with a marine epoxy and adjusting containment boom on a quarterly basis in 2018. One sheen was observed within containment booms along the creek bulkhead during oversight events in 2018, but no sheens were observed outside the containment boom system.
Indoor monitoring wells in the Empire Merchants and the Apollo Street warehouses are inspected and slab maintenance activities (cracks, seams, and joints are repaired and resealed) are performed twice a year to prevent the possibility of vapor intrusion during the semiannual warehouse shutdowns (January and July). Ambient air quality in the warehouses is monitored on a semi-annual basis during the shutdowns, with a total of 18 air samples typically collected across the site to ensure air quality inside the building is safe. Product and groundwater sampling are also performed at select indoor monitoring wells during the warehouse shutdown events.
KM Terminal (formerly BP Terminal) (S224082)
In 2021, KM continued the operation of 13 product recovery wells and a groundwater treatment system that was installed in 2014. Typical routine recovery system maintenance activities include system alarm and integrity checks, bag filter changes, adjustments to the chemical feed for iron reduction, acid cleaning of the air stripper, and cleaning the product pump intake screens.
Due to persistent LNAPL thicknesses in monitoring well OW-11 the well was outfitted with a temporary product recovery system that operates independently of the full-scale recovery system in 2016. Monitoring well OW-11 continues to operate with temporary liquid petroleum hydrocarbon recovery equipment in the well, with 50 gallons of LNAPL recovered in 2021.
In 2021 KM performed five vacuum events to remove LNAPL product from recovery wells that were not currently running and monitoring wells with LNAPL product present. In total approximately 10.5 gallons of LNAPL product and over 1,500 gallons of liquid (water and LNAPL) were removed from the wells over the five events in 2021.
In October 2021 KM performed a LNAPL pump test with an alternative model (QED Genie) at RW-14 that was determined to be compatible with the rest of the system infrastructure and a possible upgrade in performance. KM plans to test this alternative pump in two additional recovery wells in 2022 for reliability and compatibility before a site wide replacement of LNAPL pumps is proposed.
KM performed methane screening at various locations on the Terminal Property as part of an annual site-wide vapor screening event in February December 2021 to monitor the levels of methane, oxygen, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, hydrogen sulfide, balance, lower explosive limit, barometric pressure, and relative pressure across the site. No vapor readings were identified by the screening events that required further action in 2021.
KM began the process of developing an Alternatives Analysis Report in 2018 that will evaluate remedial alternatives to address any potential significant threats to the public health from the remaining contamination at the site. This report will summarize previous and current site conditions, the current remediation activities, and remedial goals for the site while taking into taken into consideration the current and future use of the site. Following an examination of potential remedial technologies to for each media at the site (groundwater, soil, and air), the report will identify the recommended remedial action for the site going forward. KM submitted a draft report in June 2019 and is currently addressing NYSDEC comments to develop the final report.