Observations all along the line - Kimball & the Southern Panhandle First
Observations all along the line - Kimball & the Southern Panhandle First
Time Has Come To Test Petroleum Leaks From Kimball's Past
Crew members with state contractor Panhandle Geotechnical Inc. of Scottsbluff work near the junction of highways 30 and 71 in downtown Kimball during drilling to determine how petroleum leakage has spread from two nearby remediation sites. Possible leakage into groundwater is of particular concern.
In the period from the 1950s and 1990s when this little town was booming from the discovery of oil and the building of missile sites, Kimball had service stations located up and down Highway 30 – and all these service stations had underground tanks full of petroleum.
Over time those tanks, lines or pumps have leaked, and now the Nebraska Department of Environment and Energy is doing an investigation and testing for petroleum leakage. Those sites that have leaked are considered Petroleum Remediation Sites and the state is doing an investigation to determine where the petroleum has been released.
Geologist Phil Hargis from the NDEE is the project manager of the two Kimball sites, which were Kimball Texaco and George's Amoco. George's Amoco was identified in 1990 and Kimball Texaco was identified in 1996.
Both stations sat on the junction of Highway 30 and 71. They are both considered orphan sites because there is no responsible party. So, the state of Nebraska will shoulder the cost of cleaning up the spillage. More than 7,000 sites have had petroleum releases statewide, and the state has been working on these since the early 1990s.
The investigation into the two Kimball sites went through the Tier 1 stage, which was a 3-6 month time period, and has entered into Tier 2, which is a more detailed investigation. Tier 2 will continue for 3-6 months.
The subsurface investigation is now defining the area that the leakage has spread to and whether or not it has spread to the groundwater, according to Phil Hargis, geologist from the NDEE.
The company doing the drilling is a state contractor out of Scottsbluff, Panhandle Geotechnical Inc. Panhandle Geotechnical drills down to the groundwater and takes samples. Those samples are then sent to an analytical company that reports on what is in the sample. According to Hargis, if it has spread to the groundwater the petroleum then moves with the groundwater.
Brian Hilbert from Panhandle Geotechnical said that they have drilled in the stoplight area about six times, each incident requiring four or five individual samplings. He said it is a "very specialized drilling" and they must decontaminate their equipment after each sample.
Hilbert said all the information is public information, and he wanted people to know what was going on. The city of Kimball has all the information.
Hilbert continued by saying that the crews will be in Kimball to sample two additional sites, which are the former Ford-Mercury dealership (on the west edge of Kimball) where they had a 500-gallon fuel tank that leaked and the other site which is on city property at the power plant building area.
Hilbert said the state has a site fund with money been set aside to deal with these remediation sites.
