Triana/Tennessee River

• Site Profile
• Administrative Record Index: OU1 (PDF, 19 pp., 775K)
• Additional Site Documents including Five Year Reviews, Records of Decisions (ROD) and Explanation of Significant Differences (ESD).
• Region 4 Fact Sheets and Other Site Information
• Review Panel Activities, 1983-1986 (PDF, 178 pp., 8M)
• Triana Chemical Weapons Movement History (PDF, 139 pp., 9.7M)
• 404/26a Permit Application for the Huntsville Remedial Action Plan (PDF, 29 pp., 216 pp., 3.0M)
• Second Report on the Remedial Action to Isolate DDT from People and the
  Environment, November 1990 (PDF, 83 pp., 29.1M)
• Third Report on the Remedial Action to Isolate DDT from People and the
  Environment, September 2000 (PDF, 83 pp., 205K)

Site Background:
The Triana/Tennessee River site is located approximately five miles southwest of Huntsville, Alabama. This Site consists of an 11-mile stretch of two tributaries, the Huntsville Spring Branch and Indian Creek which both lie almost entirely within the confines of the Wheeler Wildlife Refuge and the Redstone Arsenal. The flow of both streams empties into the Tennessee River near the town of Triana, Alabama. From 1947 to 1970, the Olin Corporation operated a dichlorodiphenyl-trichloroethane (DDT) manufacturing plant within Redstone Arsenal and discharged wastewater into Huntsville Spring Branch. Fish in the vicinity became heavily contaminated with DDT from the estimated 408.8 tons of contaminated stream sediments.

Cleanup Progress: Construction Completed:
To resolve the contamination problem, the State of Alabama, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and Olin entered into a Consent Decree (CD) on May 31, 1983. The CD requires Olin to implement a remedial plan to meet a performance standard of 5 parts per million of DDT in fillets of channel catfish, largemouth bass, and smallmouth buffalo fish. The CD also provided for a Review Panel responsible for technical overview of Olin's proposals to meet the performance standard. The Review Panel consists of EPA, Tennessee Valley Authority, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, Department of the Army, the State of Alabama, and nonvoting participants from the town of Triana, Alabama and from Olin.

Remedial actions consisted of diverting stream flow around the contaminated portions of the tributaries, excavating new channels, excavating portions of the contaminated sediments, and burying portions of the contaminated sediments in place. These remedial actions began on April 1, 1986 and were completed on October 14, 1987. The CD specified that within 10 years from the date of construction completion, Olin shall attain the performance standard of 5 parts per million of DDT in fish fillets; pursuant to the terms of the CD, an extension of the fish monitoring has been granted.  Continued attainment of the performance standard has been achieved in both largemouth bass and channel catfish, which will no longer be monitored, while progress continues towards meeting the performance standard in smallmouth buffalo.