The Ringwood Mines Superfund Site was first placed on the EPA’s National Priorities List (NPL) in 1983. From 1987 through 2016, over 60,000 tons of paint sludge, associated soils, and 113 drums containing waste were removed from the Ringwood Mines Superfund Site and disposed of offsite. Considering that EPA estimated 70,000 tons of material in the Peters Mine Pit area, more than 100,000 tons in the O’Connor Disposal Area (OCDA), and 40,000 tons in the Cannon Mine Pit area, much remains in the ground (North Jersey District Water Supply Commission, 2017 p.18).
This graph shows when contaminated soil was removed from the Ringwood Mines/Landfill Superfund Site. The amounts and removal locations have been simplified for the purposes of this graph. Please see the Remediation Calendar on this page for more detailed information. The graph stops at 2016, but remediation at the site is ongoing as per the EPA's 2020 Record of Decision.
When the initial site investigation took place in 1984, the 500-acre Superfund site contained close to 50 private homes. The EPA identified two liable parties responsible for the contamination: Ford and the Borough of Ringwood. Ford then identified 3 areas where they had authorized dumping by waste haulers, as well as a potential fourth site. The search for sludge and other waste was limited to these 4 areas. 11,340 tons of sludge were removed by Ford during the initial investigation and EPA believed that the source of groundwater, surface water, and sediment contamination had been removed. The site was taken off the National Priorities List (NPL) in 1994, although a large amount of sludge remained.
A 2007 Evaluation Report admits to faulty oversight of the cleanup:
" Residents continued to discover paint sludge at the Site after EPA deleted it from the NPL in 1994. These discoveries were because EPA did not ensure that Ford’s initial Site investigation was comprehensive. During the initial investigation, EPA could have ensured that Ford conducted a more comprehensive survey of the 500-acre Site and made better use of aerial photographs. In addition, EPA itself could have conducted a more thorough search for records involving waste disposal activities at the Site by enforcing disclosure requirements on Ford." (NJDEP, 2007)
For instance, “the 1974 aerial photograph shows recently formed, large concentrations of debris piles scattered along Hope Mountain Road,” a dumping site that was not remediated in the initial phase. Because of this massive oversight at Ringwood, the EPA Office of the Inspector General (OIG) decided to use remote sensing technologies as an oversight strategy for other delisted Superfund sites (OIG, 2011). In addition, while the EPA conducted 5-year reviews as required by CERCLA, it failed to meet the requirement to notify the community of the reviews or their results. Between 1990 and 2004, Ford removed newly discovered areas of paint sludge.
Then, for the first time in the history of Superfund, the site was restored to the NPL in 2006.
The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (NJDEP) began testing residential properties at the site in 2005, and by 2011 this sampling identified elevated levels of lead in the soil on some of the residential properties. The EPA subsequently removed contaminated soil from 23 residences from 2011-2014. This timeline indicates that people lived for close to 40 years in homes built on toxic sludge - forty years of intimate contamination.
