Environmental chief says dredging from Philadelphia to Delaware Bay could send millions of tons of contaminated sediment to creeks, wetlands
A Waste Management trash bin lies in the Delaware River in this 2005 file photo.TRENTON — The Christie administration this week extended its legal battle to prevent the deepening of the Delaware River by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
A filing with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit seeks to overturn two federal District Court rulings that denied a call for fresh studies examining how the dredging will affect the waterway.
"It is irresponsible for the Army Corps to move ahead with this project without addressing New Jersey’s concerns and without completely updating testing for contaminants," state Department of Environmental Protection Commissioner Bob Martin said today in a news release.
The Army Corps says its $379 million project to deepen the river’s 103-mile channel between Philadelphia and the mouth of the Delaware Bay will create jobs and improve cargo shipping.
But the state and environmental groups fear that if the project moves ahead, millions of tons of sediments will be dumped in confined disposal areas along ecologically sensitive creeks and wetlands in Gloucester and Salem counties.
The state argues the Army Corps violated conditions of several environmental laws by failing to complete testing of contaminants in river sediments and failing to update studies to determine how the project might hurt the river.
The majority of the studies were done in 1997, with limited updates, DEP said.
The state’s testing shows river sediments contain elevated levels of PCBs, metals, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and other contaminants.
Also, DEP reviewed Army Corps testing of discharges from sediments the Corps placed last year at the Killcohook Confined Disposal Facility in Salem County as part of the first phase of the deepening project.
It found elevated levels of selenium, copper, mercury, aluminum and cyanide that could affect surface water quality in the area, located near a federal wildlife refuge, the news release states.
"Simply put, the Army Corps needs to start using sound science and being forthright with the state and the public about its findings," Martin said.
The Army Corps contends the clay, silt and dirt at the bottom of the river contain no more toxins than the material that has been dumped on the same federally owned sites by ongoing maintenance dredging in the river. The channel, built in 1885 at 18 feet deep, was dug to 40 feet deep in the 1940s and would be 45-feet-deep after the current project.