National Southwire Aluminum Company

• Site Profile
• Administrative Record Index: OU1 (PDF, 18 pp., 927K)
• Additional Site Documents including Five Year Reviews, Records of Decisions (ROD) and Explanation of Significant Differences (ESD).
• For documents not available on the website, please contact the Region 4 Freedom of Information Office (http://www.epa.gov/region4/foiapgs/submit.htm).

Site Background:
The National Southwire Aluminum Co. (NSA), a division of Southwire Co. of Carrollton, Georgia, is located on the south bank of the Ohio River near Hawesville in Hancock County, Kentucky, in Congressional District # 02. The 1,100 acre facility is an alumina ore refining operation which produces aluminum ingots for further processing by other Southwire facilities. The facility consists of the large main refining facility, four disposal ponds, and a refractory brick disposal area. A coal-fired electric power facility to the northwest of the Site supplies NSA with power for the refining process; the aluminum reduction process takes place in carbon-lined metal pots and, after numerous reductions, eventually produces unusable pot liners which are contaminated with cyanide (CN) resulting from the combination of the carbon in the pot liners and the nitrogen in air. Old pot liners had been disposed in one of several old disposal ponds several hundred yards from the main facility. Over time cyanide leached from the disposal pond into the shallow aquifer, which normally flows to the Ohio River. In 1979, a plume (the North Plume) of cyanide, fluoride, and heavy metals was detected moving from the closed North Disposal Pond towards the River, and a second, smaller plume was detected on the opposite side of the main facility (the South Plume) also migrating towards the River. In 1985, cyanide, was detected in one of the facility production wells which produced facility process water and drinking water for several hundred NSA workers. Wells within four miles of the facility draw water from the shallow aquifer and the River and serve over 16,000 people. During 1991, NSA, the State, and EPA detected polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) in subsurface soils near a cooling tower on the main facility, and also in soils at the refractory brick disposal area, and several other isolated areas. In February 1992, under State supervision, NSA hauled 850 cubic yards (130 truckloads) of PCB-contaminated soils to an EPA-approved hazardous waste facility.

Cleanup Progress: Actual Construction Partially Completed
Cleanup activities began at the site with the completion of a USEPA
Administrative Order by Consent for Remedial Investigation and Feasibility Studies (RI/FS) in 1992. The RI/FS which became final in 1999 formed the basis of the Final Record of Decision (ROD) which was issued in July 2000.

During the RI, it became clear that there was a need to begin protecting the drinking water aquifer beneath the site and the nearby river. Therefore, an Interim ROD was issued in February 1993, for groundwater cleanup. A USEPA/State Consent Decree for Remedial Design and Remedial Action (RD/RA) relative to the Interim ROD was completed in April 1994. Under this Decree, NSA designed and constructed a groundwater treatment system to remove cyanide, fluoride and heavy metals from the aquifer. The system began operations in June 1995, and treated water is discharged into
the Ohio River under Kentucky’s permit, Kentucky Pollution Discharge
Elimination System. The aquifer will continue to be pumped and treated
until contaminants are consistently below the standards set by USEPA and Kentucky.

Also, as indicated by the RI, it was necessary to address cyanide which was detected in the groundwater beneath an old disposal pond at the site. NSA conducted a removal action at the pond under a USEPA Administrative Order by Consent of October 1995. The work was initiated in the spring of 1996, and was completed in the summer of 1997. Shortly after the Final ROD was completed, negotiations for D/RA Consent Decree began. The Consent Decree was lodged in the U.S. District Court in Kentucky in November 2001 by the USDOJ. During the 30-day Public Comment Period, the Commonwealth of Kentucky submitted adverse comments on the Consent Decree. The USDOJ requested that EPA allow Kentucky to resolve its objections by negotiating a State Agreed Order with the potentially responsible party (PRP), Southwire Company. Negotiations for the Agreed Order continued under Court oversight from January 2002 through February 2004. In February 2004 Kentucky withdrew its objections to the Consent Decree. On March 8, 2004, the Consent Decree was entered by the U.S. District Court and RD began immediately. The RD for addressing all remaining affected areas of the site was completed in June 2006. Remedial Action construction activities began at the site in April 2007, and were completed by September 2008.  At this time, groundwater treatment and monitoring continue at the site as well as Operations and Maintenance of the remedial actions completed in 2008.