Army outlines PFAS contamination at Tanani Point

Staff from Brice Construction sink monitoring wells into the beach at Tanani Point on July 14, 2024, in Haines. The site, which is owned by the U.S. Army used to be a tank farm which has been in various stages of testing and remediation for contamination for decades. (Rashah McChesney/Chilkat Valley News)

By Will Steinfeld

Chilkat Valley News

Clean-up of so-called forever chemicals at Tanani Point remains unfunded and unscheduled, said U.S. Army representatives during a meeting last Monday evening with Haines residents.

The Army-owned land at Tanani Point on Lutak Road today is almost completely empty, save for one nondescript building. That building is the last remaining trace of the old Haines Tank Farm; at least, the last trace obvious to the naked eye.

Soil and groundwater at the site, which served as the southern end of the Haines-to-Fairbanks fuel pipeline throughout the last century, holds the chemical footprint of the old facility: contamination from leaking tanks, spilled fuel, and burned chemicals.

Testing began in the mid-1990s, but it wasn’t until 2020 that measuring and mapping was completed. In the intervening period some small-scale spot removals of burn pits and contaminated soil were carried out, said the state’s project manager for the site Anne Marie Palmieri. Still, soil and water on the site remained contaminated.

With the completion of data gathering in 2020, the process looked to be moving past a significant checkpoint. But soon after, a whole new grade of contaminant that had not been previously measured began to be investigated at the site: a group of chemicals known as PFAS. Initial measurements then confirmed PFAS levels at the site exceeding safe standards.

PFAS, an abbreviation of perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, have long been used in consumer manufacturing, including to lend water-resistant and non-stick properties to products like teflon and raincoats. They were also for decades used in firefighting chemicals, which state and federal officials think may be the main source of PFAS contamination at Tanani Point.

But after the decades of regular use, recent studies have shown the chemicals to pose a health threat, including increased risk of cancer. And more recently, PFAS, have become known as “forever chemicals” due to the length of time it takes for the chemicals to break down and dissipate naturally. The findings are new enough that the Environmental Protection Agency only released an initial action plan to start regulating PFAS in 2019.

The introduction of PFAS considerations into the Tanani Point site have forced remediation work to circle back to a new starting line. Since 2023, the Army has begun PFAS-specific measuring, retracing many of the steps it has taken in the past two decades to deal with the traditional contaminants found on the site.

Greg Rutkowski, of Brice Engineering, the Army’s contractor on the remediation project, said Monday that the remedial investigation on PFAS contamination is expected to be completed next spring. That investigation is currently measuring and mapping PFAS levels around the site, but does not include any cleanup.

For cleanup to happen, yet another study, a feasibility study determining the most viable remediation methods, would have to be completed. That step, not to mention cleanup itself, is still unfunded with no timeline for completion.

“There’s a little bit more uncertainty with the availability of funding with recent changes to administrations, and the Army is still working on the details for the schedule for some of those follow-up activities,” Rutkowski said.

Rutkowski’s reference to a change in administration coincides with the Trump administration’s deprioritization of PFAS regulation. In recent months, the federal government has delayed implementation of regulatory standards on one type of PFAS chemical, and knocked down proposed limits on four more.

On top of PFAS cleanup being deprioritized across the board, Tanani Point is relatively low on the list of the countless cleanup sites across the country. It has not been designated as a high-risk superfund site by the Environmental Protection Agency. That’s based on lack of threat to humans, including proximity to drinking water, as determined by the EPA, said Palmieri. Other sites with contamination in dense residential neighborhoods or flowing toward wells are more likely to receive that designation.

Despite being a lesser priority for the EPA, frustration has been building for years in the Chilkat Valley.

That includes the Chilkoot Indian Association, which is waiting on remediation to be completed to potentially receive title to the land. In 2010, the Department of Defense budget for that year stated “the Secretary of the Army may convey to the Chilkoot Indian Association all right, title and interest of the United States… at the former Haines Fuel Terminal.”

The legislation also wrote that “to the extent practicable, the Secretary is encouraged to complete the conveyance by September 30, 2013, but not prior to the date of (remediation).”

Chilkoot Indian Association council president James Hart said this week he was disappointed to still be looking at a remediation process without an end date.

“I’m the third generation of people sitting in cleanup meetings,” Hart said. “It would have been nice to hear, hey, this is our goal – even if it was 20 years – instead of ‘maybe one day.’”

Palmieri said she was optimistic about the feasibility study determining remediation steps going forward following the end of data collection next spring.

“The feasibility study is a desktop exercise,” Palmieri said. “(The Army) has all the data they need, so I’m optimistic about it getting funded at some point.”

But until that goes forward, and subsequent remediation is complete, the site will remain contaminated. And those contaminants are seeping in groundwater down to the Tanani Beach, which is open to the public. Rutkowski said Monday that testing showed PFAS concentrations at the beach low enough “to indicate a lack of human or ecological risk.” Still, the levels were measured to be above safe levels for drinking water.

That puts risk in somewhat of a grey area – safe to contact, but unsafe to drink, according to state and national standards. Palmieri said she personally still gathers seaweed at the beach to put in her garden. But it was up to individuals to determine their own risk tolerance.

“At a very low tide there is PFAS contamination in the fresh water running across the beach rocks. People should use their own judgement as to whether or not they want to come into contact with that,” she said.

• This article originally appeared in the Chilkat Valley News.