St. Julien’s Creek Annex board considers new purpose for sites contaminated by ‘forever chemicals’

A field of vegetation about 5 feet high occupies the foreground of an administrative building at St. Juliens Creek Annex in Chesapeake. A sign warning visitors about hazardous chemicals peeks out from the overgrowth.

“Are we still planting milkweed and wildflowers here?” Denny Long asked, motioning to the field.

Long, self-proclaimed “the butterfly man,” said he remembers when the site looked more like the landfill it once was. Now, the Navy’s Environmental Restoration Program is working to give the lot a new purpose while mitigating the impact of long-lasting chemicals that contaminated its soil.

“It is essentially just a field now — nothing can ever be built here — but the site is being rehabilitated to help wildlife,” said Brett Cianek, restoration project manager for St. Juliens Creek Annex.

The St. Juliens Creek Annex Naval Facilities Engineering Systems Command hosted its annual restoration advisory board meeting Wednesday, taking community members, Navy officials and environmental restoration representatives on a tour of active sites where PFAS and other toxic, forever chemicals have been detected.

Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances — or PFAS — are a class of compounds used to make products resistant to water, stains and grease. The military contributed to PFAS pollution with its use of firefighting foam laced with the chemicals. The foam was used during military training exercises in the 1950s, but has since been limited to emergency situations, the Navy has said. The substances have been dubbed “forever chemicals” because most do not degrade in the environment.

St. Juliens Creek Annex, a 490-acre naval facility at the confluence of St. Julien’s Creek and the southern branch of the Elizabeth River, was named to the national Superfund priority list in July 2000. The federal program requires the cleanup of uncontrolled or abandoned hazardous waste sites and emergency releases of pollutants into the environment. The Navy invested about $40 million in getting long-term environmental threats under control after a century of storing ammunition and ordnance there. The facility also was involved in firefighting training operations.

As of May, the annex had seven sites undergoing environmental monitoring. Of those, four were identified in December as part of a site inspection that looked for PFAS.

Public concern for PFAS trickling into neighborhoods by way of groundwater grew last year when the Environmental Protection Agency recommended a national standard for the contaminants in drinking water. Its restrictions, finalized on April 10, outline that PFAS should have a concentration level much further below the agency’s previous guidance of 70 parts per trillion to be considered safe.

After the EPA proposed the regulation, the Department of Defense last year launched investigations into more than 700 facilities suspected of potential PFAS posing a pollution threat to drinking water for nearby communities. The department’s September briefing detailed that about one-third of the facilities had been investigated and that “forever chemicals” are trickling out of at least 245 U.S. military bases.

At St. Juliens Creek Annex, 21 on-base groundwater samples were found to have PFAS properties above 70 parts per trillion, officials with Naval Facilities Engineering Systems Command said in February. Those samples were from a warehouse, a fire training area, an industrial site and the Regional Fire Training Academy. All those locations were suspected of having firefighting foam either used or stored there, based on records, Cianek said.

The four new sites — along with two sites previously identified near the fire training area — are undergoing remedial investigations. The purpose of a remedial investigation, Cianek said, is to better define the contaminant — what chemicals are present and what are the risks to people and animals and how might they be mitigated.

“What we have done at this point is essentially identifying the highest risk,” Cianek said.

A timeline for when a solution would be identified and implemented, Cianek said, is impossible to provide at this stage.

While there is more work to be done to restore the environment at St. Juliens Creek Annex, the restoration program has made significant strides over the past 20 years. A total of 56 sites have been cleaned up and require no further action.

“We cannot risk human health by using these sites, but as we move forward, we do a feasibility study and proposed plan to figure out the best remedy for the site and what it can be used for,” Cianek said.

A gravel road that runs parallel to the Elizabeth River leads to one of the completed, yet still active, sites. What once was a landfill is now a wetland. Having been transformed roughly 20 years ago, Site 4 is lush with vegetation and wildlife. The area no longer has to be monitored on a bi-annual or annual basis, and is instead reviewed every five years.

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“Like with Site 4, the solution is sometimes as simple as putting in a land-use control for humans, and essentially giving the land back to the wildlife. It all depends on the severity of the damage,” Cianek said.

Long’s fluorescent pink shirt reflected on his face as he took in the wetland Wednesday during the tour.

“I remember when all this used to just be dirt,” Long said. “This whole base has changed in the last 10 years.”

Long, 61, has been a contractor at the base for 22 years. Before that, he was a Navy sailor serving aboard destroyers as an electronics technician.

Long said he walks St. Juliens Creek Annex each workday. He began attending restoration advisory meetings around 2015. Long recommended the program plant milkweed for the butterflies.

“And now I will be walking and see a kingfisher bird, or the coyotes and foxes will run around. All these things are coming back because of the mitigation and the work they are doing,” Long said. “We can’t stop what we did, but we can fix it.”

Cianek’s head bobbed in agreement as he said, “And we are going to continue working toward that.”

Caitlyn Burchett, caitlyn.burchett@virginiamedia.com

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Want to know more?

The Navy offers free sampling of drinking wells for residents living within one mile to the west of the annex. The sample area was identified based on the direction that groundwater flows. Residents interested in having their drinking wells tested should visit go.usa.gov/xSvtw. To learn more about the Department of Defense’s effort to address chemical releases on military installations, visit acq.osd.mil/eie/eer/ecc/pfas/.