Landfill
Two former municipal landfills
operated during the 1960s. The adjacent, unlined landfills
occupy 160 acres of geologically diverse land in southeastern
Michigan: one landfill sits in a former sand pit and the other is
essentially in a clay "bath tub." Three aquifers underlie the
landfills and are connected in a complex manner. Landfill leachate
had affected parts of all three.
The landfill operator faced several hurdles including: State
regulators entrenched in their interpretation of the hydrogeology
and thinking contamination was widespread away from the landfill;
ineffective, Court-ordered, interim remedial measures that changed,
rather than stopped offsite transport; and legal proceedings that
spanned two decades with
insurers for coverage and the State and surrounding property owners
for damages.
The Dragun Corporation characterized the site and delineated the
extent of leachate impact in each of the three interconnected
aquifers. The Dragun Corporation used state of the science
hydrogeologic site characterization, groundwater modeling, and
environmental isotopes to develop a site conceptual model capable of
withstanding technical, regulator, and legal scrutiny. In addition,
The Dragun Corporation saved our client remedial costs for part of
the groundwater impact in the deepest aquifer that we identified as
brine impact from abandoned oil exploration wells, not a leachate
effect.
At one point, a national firm convinced our client that they had a
"magic bullet" remediation and that our conceptual model needed
refinement. About $700,000 later, the magic bullet had missed the
target, the national firm had confirmed our conceptual model, and
the national firm was out.
The Result: The Dragun Corporation provided expert
witness testimony in the insurance and damages cases that extended
over a period of years. Our client was eventually awarded more than
$100 million from the insurers and damage awards were limited to
those properties actually affected by leachate. Our client used our
conceptual model to implement a cost-effective remediation for the
site.
