Nevada getting $600 million to clean up industrial sites

By Cy Ryan

Friday, Jan. 23, 2015 | 4:19 p.m.

CARSON CITY — The state Environmental Protection Division said today it will receive more than $600 million as part of a court settlement to prevent pollution of the Colorado River and Lake Mead.

A $5 billion nationwide settlement was announced in April 2014 with the Anadarko Petroleum Corp., parent of Kerr-McGee Corp., which operated industrial plants in Henderson and near Pioche.

Perchlorate, a chemical used in rocket fuel, contaminated the soil at the sites.

The division has been working since 1997 to contain polluted groundwater from reaching the source of drinking water for Southern Nevada. The division will now start removing contaminated soil at a rate of 300 pound pounds a day, officials said.

The levels of perchlorate contamination in Lake Mead are well below the drinking water advisory level, the agency said.

Colleen Cripps, administrator of the division, said the cleanup will “eliminate the remaining underground sources of contamination feeding the plume, as well as complete treatment of the plume areas with groundwater cleanup systems.”