Steubenville, Weirton officials respond to pollution from train crash
State and local officials are outlining steps being taken to remove a pollutant found in the Ohio River following the East Palestine train derailment while stressing the process will ensure treated water from the river is safe to drink.
Weirton Utilities Director Butch Mastrantoni, speaking during Monday’s Weirton Council meeting, reiterated reports last week that the city’s monitoring system detected butyl acrylate in the river the afternoon of Feb. 7.
He said through the manipulation of the city’s water sources, which includes intake from the Ohio River and a well source, water employees have been able to keep any contaminant out of the city’s distribution system.
“We’re going to continue the treatment regime,” Mastrantoni said. “The water we set out into our system is totally safe.”
Officials with the Steubenville and Toronto water treatment plants said they were made aware of the chemical’s detection in Weirton on the same day.
Steubenville Water Superintendent James Jenkins and Toronto Water Superintendent Garry Daugherty said on Feb. 8, officials with the Ohio River Valley Sanitation Commission collected samples of untreated river water near intakes serving the two cities’ water treatment systems.
Jenkins reported an analysis of the Steubenville sample by a Cincinnati lab on Friday found butyl acrylate, with a concentration of1.23 parts per billion, present in that city’s sample, while Daugherty said the same lab found 1 part per billion of the chemical in the Toronto sample on the same day.
The two water superintendents said on Saturday, they were advised 175 pounds of powder activated carbon, a charcoal like substance normally used in the water treatment process, could be used to remove butyl acrylate with a concentration of 50 parts per billion.
Jenkins said the Steubenville water plant’s use of powder activated carbon was tripled from its normal level of 100 pounds per day.
“We are feeding three times the recommended dose to remove butyl acrylate from our raw river water,” he said.
Jenkins added officials in Cincinnati have shown, through testing, the chemical can be oxidized with one milligram per liter of chlorine.
“The Steubenville water department feeds a chlorine dose of 2 milligrams per liter of chlorine, so in the event of the powder activated carbon not removing all of the butyl acrylate chemical present, the chlorine dose would remove it,” he said.
Daugherty said he was advised 30 pounds of powder activated carbon is needed to remove the chemical and while the Toronto plant normally uses 60 pounds of carbon per day, it has been raised to 125 pounds per day as a safeguard.
He said in addition to its normal use of 1.4 milligrams per liter of chlorine, potassium permanganate at Toronto’s river intakes also serves to remove the chemical over a two-hour period prior to its exposure to the carbon.
Jenkins and Daugherty said information from ORSANCO, the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency and the assistance of Cincinnati city officials has helped to ensure the chemical pollutant isn’t reaching the cities’ water customers.
State officials have traced the path of the chemical and others spilled by the derailed train from Sulphur Run Stream and Leslie Run Stream to Little Beaver Creek, which empties into the Ohio River at Milepost 39.6, also known as Lock 57 Park.
They said samples of water at that point contained butyl acrylate at 12.5 parts per billion but added that concentration would become more diluted as it reached the Toronto intakes at Milepost 59.2 and Steubenville’s intakes 25.7 miles from Little River Beaver Creek.
Officials with the West Virginia Division of Emergency Management said low levels of butyl acrylate reached the river through Little Beaver Creek near the Ohio and Pennsylvania border.
Lora Lipscomb, public information officer for the agency, said, “Upon learning of the spill, the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources’ Bureau for Public Health immediately began contacting the five water systems along the Ohio River that could be impacted and recommended, out of an abundance of caution, to shut down all water intakes until additional information could be obtained.”
She said among those systems was Weirton, whose officials “detected chemicals at their intake and the water source was quickly switched to an alternate supply out of an abundance of caution.”
Lipscomb said, “Water sampling is ongoing and recent results have been non-detect for butyl acrylate in both the raw and finished water supplies.”
But she added water sampling will continue while the agency works with ORSANCO, the Ohio EPA and the federal EPA as they track the chemical as it moves down river.
On Monday afternoon, the WVDEM reported a chemical plume was observed in the river about 22 miles upstream from Ravenswood and said to be moving at 1 mile per hour.