Springs compound landfill concerns

Water has surfaced east of the closed Sunrise Mountain landfill, and scientists are testing it to see whether the seepage contains wastes once buried in the old municipal dump.

The location of the springs and the landfill presents a problem as a potential drain into the Las Vegas Wash, six miles upstream from where Southern Nevada collects its drinking water.

"We didn't expect to find this seep," said Glen Wilson of the Desert Research Institute, the research arm of the University of Nevada system. The DRI is sampling and analyzing the water.

The DRI was asked by the Bureau of Land Management to study flows of ground water after earlier studies found environmental problems with methane gas escaping from the landfill, which stopped accepting waste in 1993 and closed in 1995.

The DRI discovered a series of pools flowing across the top of bedrock downhill from the landfill. It is about four miles downhill from the landfill's 720-acre site to the Las Vegas Wash.

"It appears the water is coming from a fracture," Wilson said.

Such a fracture is not surprising. The Frenchman Mountain fault and other fractures run right through the landfill site. However, faults sometimes stop ground water or springs from running through rocks. In other cases, faults can allow water to flow faster.

The Sunrise landfill acts as a retention basin, but it also could channel the water through the dumpsite.

Wilson said there is significant water contained in springs above the landfill site and there's evidence of seeps in the area.

Samples taken on two different days of water from the area below the landfill are under study for volatile organic compounds (VOCs), heavy metals, chemicals and fecal coliforms, Wilson said. Study results are not available yet but are expected within a week.

The water samples were collected after a severe thunderstorm Sept. 11 tore a 30-foot by 75-foot hole in the cap placed on the Sunrise landfill. The BLM has disputed assurances by Clark County and Silver State Disposal Services Inc. officials that the initial cap protects the closed dump.

BLM consultants discovered cracks in the landfill, one 100 feet long, about two two years ago. The cap was supposed to be impermeable and keep rain out of the landfill. EPA rules spell out the thickness and the materials used in such caps, but they do not vary to allow for differences between dry and wet climates.

"We are most concerned with pubic health and safety," BLM spokesman Phil Guerrero said.

After the Sept. 11 thunderstorm, garbage flowed from the landfill into the wash.

The Sierra Club called for the county Health District to quarantine the four-mile area that was strewn with debris including household garbage, intravenous tubing, pill bottles and construction wastes. Silver State changed the locks to the landfill on Friday. The site was not quarantined.

Although the land is owned by the BLM, the site was leased to Clark County in 1962 for a municipal landfill. Silver State, now owned by Republic Industries, manages the site and has responsibility for keeping it intact for the next 18 months.

Silver State attorney Robert Groesbeck characterized the attention on the landfill as "a media circus." The disposal company is concerned about unauthorized entries raising a "serious safety risk" to people working on the landfill cover.

Groesbeck notified county Public Works Director Marty Manning last week that the site would be closed to anyone not involved in repairing the cover. But BLM officials said they still have access to the site if the need arises.

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