Courtesy Photo | Lt. Col. Robert Burnham, commander for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Pittsburgh...... read more read more
Nearly 80 residents filed into the Parks Township Fire Department Hall in Vandergrift, Pennsylvania, on Nov. 5 to get the latest updates about the Shallow Land Disposal Area, only a few miles away from the fire hall.
The doors were supposed to open at 5:30 p.m., but the first resident arrived 30 minutes early, signed in, and went straight to the poster boards to ask questions. This early arrival wasn't unusual. At other SLDA meetings, residents have arrived as much as an hour early.
Doreen Smeal, the mayor of Leechburg, explains how vital transparency and information are to the surrounding communities, which is why residents are often early to the public meetings.
“The meetings held by the Corps of Engineers keep our residents informed about ongoing operations,” said Mayor Smeal. “We encourage everyone to attend. Representatives from the Corps are available to answer all questions. I hope all the residents take advantage of the opportunity to stay informed and engaged.”
Since the site stopped the first remediation in 2011 due to a contractor safety violation, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Pittsburgh and Buffalo districts have held approximately two public information sessions annually for the residents of Parks, Vandergrift, Leechburg, Apollo, and Kiskimere townships and other areas.
“These public meetings are well attended and so important for the residents,” said Dawn Orlic, the outreach program specialist for the Pittsburgh District. “Residents really get to express their concerns, voice their opinions about our processes – good or bad – and ask a lot of questions. We listen, answer, and consider their comments.”
Communicating to the public is as important as ensuring the site is ready for the physical remediation.
“In a complex remediation project like this, public communication is not a supplementary activity,” said Lt. Col. Robert Burnham, the commander of the Buffalo District, overseeing the technical remediation of the project. “It is a core component of the remedy itself.”
After years of planning, coordinating with the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) partners, and holding public meetings, the Corps of Engineers is finally poised to enter the physical remediation phase. But it’s the transformation over the last 18 months or so that the residents surrounding the 44-acre site have witnessed.
“A little less than two years ago, one of the residents at a public meeting dubbed the waste material building the ‘white elephant,’ and that was the only building on the hill,” said Steve Vriesen, the project manager for SLDA with Buffalo District. “Now, some residents are calling the site a city.”
Unlike a traditional city that houses people, the SLDA city houses everything needed to safely remediate the low-level radioactive waste deposited in 10 trenches by the Apollo Nuclear Fabrication Facility between 1961 and 1970. The Nuclear Materials and Equipment Corporation (NUMEC) generated the waste under Atomic Energy Commission contracts to produce nuclear fuels for power plants and Navy submarines in the 1950s and 60s.
Then, decades later, Congress charged USACE with cleaning up the area.
The authority to remove the discarded contaminated waste is under the Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program, more commonly known as FUSRAP. A 2002 law, Public Law 107-117, directed the Army Corps of Engineers to clean up the radioactive waste at the Parks Township site. The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act outlines the cleanup and the pre-remediation processes.
Contractors have constructed six large buildings, including the ‘white elephant.’ These buildings include decontamination, packaging, material testing, and transportation and staging areas. The highly functioning operation has one goal: to safely remove the radioactive material from the trenches.
“The engineering and construction of buildings, roads and facilities were designed and executed to ensure the safe, efficient operation and remediation of the waste at the SLDA site,” said Joe Matis, the project engineer for SLDA with the Buffalo District.
“The size of the structures alone is impressive,” said Col. Nicholas Melin, the commander of the Pittsburgh District. “When you add the specialized equipment required to characterize and safely package waste materials and safeguard the workforce and surrounding communities, it becomes clear that this is one of the most complex and specialized construction projects in the entire Corps of Engineers portfolio.”
The Corps of Engineers and its contractor, Amentum, expect to begin physical remediation of the waste material in early to late winter 2025 – 2026.
During remediation, specialized crews will carefully dig up small amounts of soil at a time. Workers will bag the material, move it to the processing building for testing, identify it, and then send it to the waste management building. There, the material will be placed into sealed shipping containers designed for radioactive waste. The containers are then scanned to ensure they are free of contaminants, loaded onto trucks, and transported off-site.
“Even though a serious on-site accident is unlikely, the type of waste we’re dealing with makes it essential to work closely with local first responders,” Vriesen said.
The Corps of Engineers conducted several tabletop exercises and a joint emergency drill to ensure the MOU partners, first responders, and contractors can respond swiftly, safely, and collaboratively to protect workers, the surrounding community, and the environment.
“The joint exercise, drills, and tabletops ensure everyone understands safety procedures, radiological controls, and emergency response protocols,” said Vriesen. “Practicing response scenarios in tabletop and live allows us to codify our procedures, see what works, and doesn’t, as well as reduces confusion and saves critical minutes if a real event should occur.”
The Shallow Land Disposal Area remediation is one of the largest environmental projects in the northwest Pennsylvania region. USACE expects the remediation to take approximately six years and cost roughly $500 million.
Pittsburgh and Buffalo districts, our federal partners, and the contractors remain committed to protecting the community, the workers, and the environment. Through continued careful planning, the project will continue to move forward at the ‘speed of safety.’
“Our project team has worked tirelessly, and we are now finalizing the pre-remediation stage,” said Lt. Col. Burnham. “This means rigorously setting and verifying every condition to ensure a safe [remediation] start this winter.”
| Date Taken: | 11.25.2025 |
| Date Posted: | 11.25.2025 17:59 |
| Story ID: | 552411 |
| Location: | PARKS TOWNSHIPS, PENNSYLVANIA, US |
| Web Views: | 14 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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