WM seeks permit modification at Louisiana hazardous waste facility

Chemical Waste Management, a hazardous waste facility owned and operated by Houston-based WM, is seeking a permit modification to revise its current groundwater sampling and analysis plan.

Located in Carlyss, Louisiana, the facility submitted the permit modification request Aug. 9 to the Louisiana Department of Environment Quality (DEQ).

As stated in the request, Chemical Waste Management’s new compliance monitoring program will be used to “monitor the groundwater to determine if the regulated units are in compliance with established groundwater protection standards.”

The plan is expected to include compliance monitoring constituents, concentration limits, point of compliance, compliance period, compliance monitoring well system, sampling procedures, sampling frequency, statistical methods and reporting.

With operations first starting in the early 1980s, Chemical Waste Management has had a long history of backlash from nearby residents who are “skeptical” of the facility.

As reported by KPLC, residents and environmentalists originally against the facility’s construction were worried it would one day leak and contaminate the environment and drinking water.

“There are several reasons this hazardous waste site should be of interest to everybody. For one, it’s a huge mountain of toxins. Ninety feet above sea level is the top of the mountain. Below there it goes deep down under the surface. And under the surface it’s connected to different layers of the water-bearing sands,” Mike Tritico, an environmentalist with Restore (Restore Explicit Symmetry To Our Ravaged Earth), told KPLC.

Chemical Waste Management plans to host a public meeting Sept. 27 to discuss more details about the request.