The Jamestowner has uncovered more local Deep River 1,4-Dioxane contamination sources that we’ll be adding to our master spreadsheet of polluters.
First up, the 25-acre unlined Jackson Lake Road Landfill which lies between Kersey Valley Landfill and Richland Creek. This segment of Richland Creek also receives groundwater and stormwater run-off from Kersey Valley Landfill and GFL C&D Landfill right before it merges into Deep River.
All of this landfill wastewater, along with wastewater from dozens of industrial dischargers in High Point, Jamestown and Greensboro, flows just 7 miles to the John Kime water plant at Randleman Lake where it is treated and pumped back to us as drinking water.
Jackson Lake Road Landfill is owned by the City of High Point and a private resident, according to the report below. It’s a pre-regulatory landfill which means it was a landfill before CERCLA regulations required landfills to be lined in order to prevent leaching into bedrock and underground aquifers. Local residents have been asking the City of High Point to do something about this Landfill since the 1990s:
Kersey Valley Landfill is also owned by the City of High Point. Kersey Valley Landfill sits closer to Jamestown than High Point, and also discharges into Jamestown’s drinking water supply (Richland Creek/Deep River).
A 2005 profile of MRR Southern (which built a reclamation service near the landfills) refers to these waterways as “the state’s waste stream.” What is not mentioned in that profile is the fact that in 2005, Randleman Lake was being filled by that “waste stream,” and that in 2010 Piedmont Triad Regional Water Authority (PTRWA) began pumping it to residents of Jamestown, Randolph and Guilford County as drinking water.
In 2020 and 2021, extensive sampling and excavation was done at Jackson Lake Road Landfill to determine the source of high levels of 1,4 Dioxane in “Monitoring Well 18/18d.” What follows is from a 2021 report to the City of High Point from Smith/Gardner and Babb & Associates following the excavation. A link to the full report follows the images and key findings, below:
+ The [Jackson Lake Road Landfill at Kersey Valley Landfill] covers approximately 25 acres across properties owned by the City of High Point, and [a resident].
+ Between 830,000 and 1.5 million cubic yards of waste are interred in the Jackson Lake Road Landfill depending on final acreage and cover thickness.
+ “This is not an insignificant waste disposal area and is a major source of contaminants to both groundwater and surface water. Given that this landfill is unlined, the constituents detected within the waste are free to migrate to groundwater and surface water without hindrance.”
+Maps from 1951 and 2015 indicate the surface topography has been raised up to 50 feet higher in some areas since 1951. This is consistent with the depths of waste encountered in test pits.
+A former quarry existed on this property that was reportedly filled in with waste.
+The location of waste disposal on the property has been verified by the excavation of test pits and collection of soil samples for laboratory analysis. Based on the information obtained from these activities, landfill disposal has occurred immediately upgradient of monitoring well pair MW-18/18d.
+One of the soil samples collected from the waste residue on the property identified 1,4 Dioxane at a concentration of 23 ug/kg.
+Given the lack of affinity for 1,4 Dioxane with soil, and the complete miscibility of 1,4 Dioxane in water, the concentrations of 1,4 Dioxane in groundwater beneath and surrounding the Jackson landfill is anticipated to be quite higher.
+The compound chlorobenzene has been reported in the soil samples at a concentration of 120 ug/l, upgradient of the MW-18/18d well pair.
+The Jackson Lake Road Pre-Regulatory Landfill is unlined and waste was interred directly in fractured bedrock. Based on hydrologic tests conducted at the Kersey Valley Landfill, the rate of groundwater flow in the fractured bedrock in this area ranges from 0.1 to 0.7 feet per day.
+Groundwater in the upper and bedrock aquifers, and an intermittent drainage feature, discharge to the South Tributary.
NOTE: The “South Tributary” flows directly into Richland Creek, which flows into Deep River less than a mile from there. This segment of Deep River (NC17-(4)b has been classified as WS-IV CA* drinking water supply since March 1999, yet Deep River isn’t mentioned in this report and is erroneously referred to as “Randleman Reservoir.” Deep River is an ancient triassic-era river with the same width and flow it’s had for centuries. Randleman Reservoir is at least 10 miles downstream in Randolph County.
Here’s how the report describes the surface water in that area – as if Deep River doesn’t even exist:
The Babb report concludes this section with the statement, “The Jackson Lake Road Pre-Regulatory Landfill is the source of impact to MW-18/18d which is immediately adjacent to it, and to the South Tributary. Future assessment and remediation of this pre-regulatory landfill is the responsibility of the NCDEQ Pre-Regulatory Landfill Unit.”
Here are more images from the report, dated October 2021 (note the image Description boxes, and swipe left or use the arrows to advance the slideshow):
And here’s the complete October 2021 report:
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