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Outboard Marine Corporation

Recovery.gov
Superfund Program Implements the Recovery Act
Outboard Marine Corporation/Plant 2, Waukegan, Illinois
Site Information
Contact Information

Community Involvement Coordinator
Mike Joyce (joyce.mike@epa.gov)
312-353-5546 or 800-621-8431, ext. 35546

Remedial Project Manager
Kevin Adler (adler.kevin@epa.gov)
EPA Region 5
312-886-7078 or 800-621-8431, ext. 67078

Repositories

(where to view written records)

Waukegan Public Library
128 N. County St.
Waukegan, IL

EPA Superfund Home Page
Region 5 Superfund
Superfund glossary
Agency for Toxic Substances & Disease Registry

Background

The Outboard Marine Corporation, Inc. (OMC) site is located in the northern Waukegan Harbor area in Waukegan, Illinois. The site containsfour cleanup parcels, called "operable units" (OUs). The Waukegan Harbor (WH) site is OU #1. The Waukegan Manufactured Gas and Coke Plant (WCP) site is OU #2. The PCB containment cells created when the harbor was cleaned up in 1992 is OU #3, and the OMC Plant 2 site is OU #4.

Land use in the immediate area of the OMC site is marine recreational and industrial andthere is a public beach on Lake Michigan on the east side of the WCP site. OMC declaredbankruptcy in December 2000 andbegan liquidation proceedings in August 2001. The city of Waukegan purchased the WCP site andthen theOMC Plant 2 property from the bankruptcy estateas part of its plan to revitalizeitslakefront. It hopes to build townhomes and condominiums where the coke plant and OMC Plant 2 once stood.

Site Updates | News Releases || Public Meetings

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Site Updates

Latest Update:

OU 1- Waukegan Harbor:
The start of EPA's planned harbor cleanup work has been delayed due to the difficulty in completing the soil cleanup on the OMC Plant 2 property. It is still hoped that work on the harbor may begin within the next year if the necessary work at the Plant 2 site can be completed and if sufficient funding for the harbor cleanup is available.

OU 2- site of the former Waukegan Manufactured Gas and Coke Plant:
Soil cleanup on this operable unit began in November 2004 and was completed it in November 2005. Thousands of tons of contaminated soil were trucked off site for disposal in area landfills. Some of the more tarry material was trucked to Utah and Pennsylvania for disposal in facilities that used the material to generate electricity. After all excavations were completed and testing was done to show that cleanup levels had been reached, backfill material was placed into the excavations and a 6- to 10-inch clean top soil layer was placed over the site. A groundwater cleanup plant was completed in fall 2008 to pump and treat contaminated groundwater under this operable unit. The plant has worked well and EPA estimates that active groundwater cleanup will be complete by June or July 2011.

OU 3- PCB Containment cells:
The City of Waukegan, under EPA oversight, remains in charge of conducting operation and maintenance work on the three PCB containment cells on the OMC Superfund site.

OU 4- site of OMC Plant 2:
EPA received funding under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) in June 2009 to begin the cleanup work on Plant 2. Demolition work on the building began in January 2010 and was completed in July 2010. About 5000 tons of steel were recovered, most of which was recycled locally. EPA began cleaning up the soil on the former Plant 2 site in 2010 and hopes to complete this work by Summer of 2011. EPA also plans to begin cleaning up the groundwater under the site in 2011. However, because some contaminated groundwater flows off site toward Waukegan Harbor, EPA has also installed an underground air-sparge curtain to remove dissolved solvents from the water as it flows off site. The air-sparge curtain will be operated for at least 15 years. 

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