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  • 1976 to 1985 - dioxane gathered on the surface of Gelman Sciences Inc.'s extensive lawns, pooled in its lagoons and began working its way into the ground.
  • The first well contamination was discovered in 1986, two years after a University of Michigan graduate student discovered dioxane in Third Sister Lake.
  • In mid-1986, Gelman Sciences began paying for bottled water for businesses and agreed to help pay for the extension of city water lines to affected subdivisions, including Westover and Evergreen. The state recommended dioxane be limited to 3 parts per billion as a safe standard for drinking water. At the same time, the Environmental Protection Agency permitted a deep-injection well on the Gelman property. A mile-deep well would be used to dispose of contaminated water being pumped from affected wells. Residents around the area were outraged, fearing the plan would further exacerbate the pollution problem
  • By early 1988, the site ranked second on a state list of pollution priorities. Gelman Sciences filed a lawsuit, demanding clear standards on environmental priorities, and then sued their dioxane supplier, Dow Chemical Co., accusing it of failing to test for dioxane's persistence in the environment.
  • The state Attorney General, on behalf of the Department of Natural Resources (then in charge of enforcing environmental law in Michigan) filed suit to force the company to begin cleaning groundwater and a couple of neighborhood groups also filed lawsuits.
  • In late 1992, the state and Gelman settled. The company would pay the state more than $1 million in damages and begin a cleanup estimated to cost $4 million. The treated wastewater would be dumped in a tributary of Honey Creek. The creek runs roughly parallel to Wagner Road until it empties into the Huron River, upstream of the city's water supply intake.
  • After another round of lawsuits, the company agreed in 1995 to dispose of wastewater on its own grounds. It would treat water to acceptable levels, and then pump it back into the ground.
  • At about this time, company owner Charles Gelman began a major public relations campaign. Gelman obtained hundreds of documents from the DNR through the state Freedom of Information Act and began mailing letters to Honey Creek residents, warning them of fecal contamination in the creek.
  • In February 1997, Pall Corp. bought Gelman Sciences Inc. and assumed liability for the cleanup.
  • Then problems developed with the cleanup in the Evergreen subdivision, off Dexter Road in Ann Arbor's northeast corner. City officials did not want wastewater dumped into its sewer system. Pall argued the city was using a double standard because it was dumping dioxane-laced leachate from the old city landfill into sewers.
  • A plan to transport wastewater back to Pall property through an underground pipeline sparked another round of lawsuits. The court ruled that city property did not extend deep into the ground. The city demanded an emergency hearing and threatened to issue a "stop work" order.
  • Washtenaw County Circuit Court Judge Donald Shelton denied it and chastised the city, saying it was impeding the cleanup.
  • Yet another battle ensued in early 1999, when Pall applied to more than double the amount and increase the concentration of wastewater it was discharging. Against the advice of an administrative law judge, DEQ director Russell Harding ruled Pall could discharge 800 gallons per minute and increase its concentration of dioxane to a daily maximum of 60 parts per billion, keeping the monthly average of 10 ppb.
  • In July 2000, Shelton ordered Pall to clean groundwater to within state acceptable levels in five years. And with that, the cleanup finally seemed to be progressing, if not in the way everyone would like.






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mnaud 		Latest page update: made by mnaud , Apr 4 2007, 11:29 AM EDT (about this update About This Update mnaud Edited by mnaud

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