Final fuel cleanup at Kirtland should be a top priority of state and Air Force

As members of the community and advocates for the Kirtland National Security Complex, the Kirtland Partnership Committee — KPC— has monitored the Bulk Fuels Facility Cleanup Project — BFF— since 2005.

The BFF project has made significant progress over the 24 years since the discovery of the release in November 1999. Most importantly, the BFF’s groundwater monitoring program continues to consistently demonstrate no impacts to the Albuquerque Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority’s Ridgecrest production wells from leaked fuel. In addition, there is in place a New Mexico Environment Department regulatory-approved BFF risk assessment that concludes there is no current or future risk to drinking water from contaminated groundwater given the continuous operation of the groundwater treatment system interim measure.

The KPC has worked closely with seven Kirtland Air Force Base commanders since 2005 on the BFF situation. We can assure the Albuquerque community that each commander has worked diligently to ensure every possible corrective action is taken.

The Air Force, through the Air Force Civil Engineering Center, has provided remediation funds. To date, the Air Force has spent over $130 million to ensure comprehensive remediation in a scientifically based professional manner.

Several key interim corrective measures have been performed at the BFF site. In protecting our community, the Air Force has completed 241 wells, 174 groundwater monitoring wells, and 67 nested soil monitoring wells. The combined wells have a total of 323 soil vapor sampling points.

Since 2015, four extraction wells have been drilled: One in 2015, two in 2016, and a fourth in 2018. Remediation actions include the removal of all surface soil — 3,000 cubic yards of impacted soil removed to 20 feet below ground surface, 13 years of soil vapor extraction activities — 750,000 equivalent gallons of fuel removed, and 8 years of groundwater extraction controlling the migration of contaminants — nearly 1.8 billion gallons of water treated, removing 155 grams of ethylene dibromide. To date, the BFF stands at a 96% reduction rate since 2015.

These interim corrective actions are geared specifically toward eliminating risk to human health and the environment. The regulatory-approved risk assessment demonstrates these corrective actions are successful. However, there is still impacted media at this site, which is required to be addressed in a final remedy. We encourage all parties associated with this cleanup effort to continue to support remediation efforts moving to the remedy stage.

However, Kirtland AFB is currently seeing reversals proposed by prior regulatory decisions. The Air Force must rely on required regulatory approvals that are consistent with federal authorization of New Mexico’s federal Resource Conservation and Recovery Act — RCRA. Unnecessary delays should be avoided to maintain the progress achieved through interim measures and site investigations performed to date. Consistency in state regulatory direction is required if the Air Force is to reduce delays in progressing to the required final remedy.

The KPC praises the Air Force and the NMED for the progress made by the use of interim corrective measures and monitoring activities. Based on the successes to date on this project, we encourage all parties to strive to support progress to the final remedy selection stage of the cleanup process. Final remedy selection should be the top priority of both NMED and the Air Force. This step is essential and critical to ensure the final remedy meets the needs of the public and addresses all remaining contamination above cleanup levels at this site.

This effort should be largely celebrated by all involved as we are entering the final remedy stage at a faster pace than expected.

Matt Rarden is chair of the Kirtland Partnership Committee. He authored this guest column on behalf of the KPC's board of directors.