Trucks will be rumbling across a small stretch of the Clara Barton Parkway in Mid-January when an effort to clean-up contaminated soil from the Carderock Naval Surface Warfare Center (David Taylor) begins.
The Center will open a temporary gate near the on-ramp of the Beltway, in order to minimize the distance the trucks will have to travel, said Bill Spicer, of the Center.
A public meeting is scheduled for Dec. 16 in order to explain how the truck traffic will be handled (see sidebar).
Trucks are not typically allowed on the Clara Barton, but the Center has been in discussion with the National Park Service, which owns the road, to use it.
“We want to help out as best we can without compromising our mission,” said Jeff Pinkard, park ranger. Pinkard expects the details of permits for hauling the materials to be decided this week.
Two sites on the base were found to be contaminated, primarily with arsenic, manganese and Aroclor-1260 — a type of PCB.
The contaminated soil will be removed, but its ultimate destination is not yet known. “We won’t know that until the stuff is sampled,” Spicer said.
After the soil is sampled, it may be used as cover at a regular landfill or taken to a hazardous waste landfill, Spicer said. He estimates that 500-600 truck trips will be necessary to remove all of the contaminated soil.
The disposal will cost the U.S. Department of Defense approximately $1.5 million. Spicer expects it to be complete by the summer, however, bad weather will force the project to take longer.