Integrated Assessment Halaco Engineering Company ... - Archives

Halaco Engineering Co. IA Section 2
CAD009688052
On March 17, 1986, the DHS issued a NOV to Halaco for disposal of hazardous waste without a
permit. Copper and zinc were found to be above California Title 22 threshold values, and
ammonia and cyanide were found to be above background (14).
On April 29, 1994, the DTSC and Halaco entered into a settlement agreement. The DTSC
agreed to relax Total Threshold Limit Concentration (TTLC) criteria for copper from 2,500 to
25,000 milligrams per kilogram (mg/kg) and zinc from 5,000 to 50,000 mg/kg for the Halaco
Site due to the high alkalinity of the soils, insoluble nature and chemical stability of the solid
phase of the waste material. In this settlement, the DTSC agreed that the waste on site was not
hazardous with respect to copper and zinc (15).
In 1980, EPA determined Halaco was also subject to a National Pollutant Discharge Elimination
System (NPDES) permit (10). At some time after 1980, the City of Oxnard issued an Industrial
Waste Discharge Permit, which was terminated in 2003 (16).
In June 2000, the LARWQCB estimated that 430,000 cubic yards of waste material were present
in the WMU covering approximately 14 acres at thicknesses varying between 20 and 40 feet.
Pursuant to a November 2000 federal wetlands delineation prepared for the City of Oxnard, it
was determined that a substantial area of wetlands existed immediately east of Halaco's surface
impoundment (17).
A nonprofit public interest organization, the Environmental Defense Center, on behalf of the
Santa Barbara Channel Keeper, sued Halaco in state and federal court in January 2001. These
lawsuits resulted in a settlement agreement with Halaco in 2003 under which Halaco was
required, among other things, to cease discharging contaminated wastewater to its ponds, stop
adding solid waste to the WMU, and remove a portion of the waste pile over a 3-year period, or
pay up to $500,000 into a local environmental enhancement fund. Additionally, the agreement
required Halaco to submit to random air sampling (18).
In March 2002, the LARWQCB issued Halaco a Cease and Desist Order (CDO), ordering it to
cease discharging into the WMU and to characterize site wastes to determine whether the solid
waste was inert. Based on Halaco’s report, the LARWQCB determined that the solid waste was
not inert due to elevated levels of ammonia that could be released to ground and surface waters.
In September 2002, Halaco ceased discharging into the WMU in response to the March 2002
CDO and began operating a filter press to process waste material. In July 2003, the LARWQCB
issued Halaco a NOV for failure to properly store and contain piles of filter cake at the Smelter
side of the Site. In October 2003, the LARWQCB issued Halaco a Cleanup and Abatement
Order (CAO) to remove the filter cake (process waste solids). In the 2003 CAO, the LARWQCB
concluded that Halaco’s past waste disposal practices and the existing state of the WMU created
conditions of pollution that violated an earlier LARWQCB Order and continued to threaten
pollution to Ormond Beach, the Ormond Beach Wetlands, the OID, the Oxnard Plain
Groundwater, and the waters of the State of California (19).
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