DEC deems completion of brownfield cleanup at former Bernzomatic

Image from URS: This shows the site of the former Bernzomatic manufacturing plant at 1 Bernzomatic Drive on the east side of the Village of Medina near Route 31 and Bates Road.

Press Release, NYS Department of Environmental Conservation

MEDINA – The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation has determined that the cleanup requirements to address contamination related to the former Bernzomatic Facility site at 1 Bernzomatic Drive, under New York State’s Brownfield Cleanup Program have been met.

The site is in the Village of Medina in the towns of Ridgeway and Shelby. The site is about 15 acres and is bound by New York Central Railroad and a vacant commercial property to the north, vacant wooded land to the south, Bernzomatic Drive to the east, and wooded land and commercial property to the west.

From 1969 through 2014 site operations involved the machining, assembly, packing, and shipping of hand-held torches by the Bernzomatic Corporation.

Current site activities include dry goods storage and material assembly, packaging, and shipping of air duct components.

The cleanup activities were performed by the Newell Operating Company and B360 Holdings LLC with oversight provided by the DEC. The DEC has approved a Final Engineering Report and issued a Certificate of Completion for the site.

The following activities have been completed to achieve the remedial action objectives:

• Demolition – The eastern machine building was demolished, and the concrete slab was removed. Following removal, the building footprint was backfilled with clean fill.
• Excavation – Excavation and off-site disposal of about 23 tons of contaminated soil exceeding the Restricted Commercial Use soil cleanup objectives was performed. The excavations were backfilled with clean fill.
• In-Situ (in-place) Reductive Chlorination – Groundwater at the site is impacted with Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs). To prevent groundwater contamination from migrating off-site, Liquid Activated Carbon and Biological amendments were injected into the ground to breakdown the VOCs.
• Site Cover System – The site cover system includes hard cover (building foundations, asphalt pavement, and concrete sidewalks), and 1-foot of clean soil cover in landscaped areas.
• Site Management Plan (SMP) – Development of a SMP for long-term management of residual contamination.
• Easement – An Environmental Easement was recorded to prevent future exposure to any contamination remaining at the site and to ensure implementation of the SMP.

Photos from LaBella: These images show some of the cleanup work at the former Bernzomatic site in Medina.

NYSDEC has approved the Final Engineering Report Approved, which:

1) Describes the cleanup activities completed.

2) Certifies that cleanup requirements have been achieved for the site.

3) Describes any institutional/engineering controls to be used. An institutional control is a non-physical restriction on use of the site, such as an environmental easement, when contamination left over after the cleanup action makes the site suitable for some, but not all uses. An engineering control is a physical barrier or method to manage contamination such as a cap or vapor barrier.

4) Certifies that a site management plan for any engineering controls used at the site has been approved by NYSDEC.

The following institutional controls have been put in place on the site:

• Site Management Plan.
• Groundwater and Land Use Restrictions.
• Environmental Easement.
• Vapor intrusion must be evaluated for any buildings developed on-site.

The following engineering controls have been put in place on the site:

• Cover System.

Next Steps: With its receipt of a Certificate of Completion, the applicants are eligible to redevelop the site. In addition, the applicants are eligible for tax credits to offset the costs of performing cleanup activities and for redevelopment of the site.