PCBs found in soil under Hill housing

Add another probable carcinogen to the list of contaminants you can find at Hill Air Force Base.

The 75th Air Base Wing said Friday that soil samples in a section of military family housing near the base's southwest gate yielded polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs. About 100 homes are affected.

Hill Air Force Base was declared a Superfund site in 1987 and added to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's National Priorities List, because of trichloroethylene, or TCE, found in various groundwater plumes flowing off the base.

From the 1940s to the 1970s, base employees discarded waste solvents in chemical pits and ponds around the base, before environmental laws curtailed the practice.

TCE, a popular degreaser for about three decades, may cause cancer, and the U.S. Air Force has already spent $210 million on cleanup efforts at the Superfund site.

PCBs also are believed to cause cancer, suppressed immune systems, low birth weight and learning deficits. The contaminant is governed under the Superfund law.

The PCBs were found while construction crews worked on a project to renovate military family housing. No PCBs have been found in other sections of base housing, according to a news release from the 75th Air Base Wing.

Col. Linda Medler, 75th Air Base Wing vice commander, said the base is starting an investigation to determine the extent of contamination.

Bob Elliott, the base's environmental-restorations chief, said about 16 samples have been taken so far, and his team expects to take at least 200 over the next few weeks. That will give them an idea of how far contamination ranges and what remediation may be necessary.

If levels are high enough, it may be necessary to excavate contaminated soil and replace it with clean soil.

"We do not believe there is an immediate health risk to residents," Medler said.

One reason, Elliott said, is the PCBs are being found in low concentrations. Also, the only way people would be exposed to PCBs is by ingesting the chemical by not washing hands after playing or digging in soil.

Elliott said he reviewed photographs of the current housing area from the late 1960s and early 1970s that showed the area appeared to be a storage yard with sheds, which were removed to build the duplexes.

The photographs don't show what was stored there, but Elliott guessed there could have been old or leaking transformers, which used PCBs as a cooling liquid.