Page Content
Pennzoil Quaker State Co., (dba Shell Oil Products) is working with the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection to remediate property along State Route 36, near Wallback in Clay County.
Pennzoil has entered the Stockley (Valley Fork) Station into the DEP’s Voluntary Remediation Program (VRP). The 0.75-acre facility is believed to have been constructed by Eureka Pipeline Co. and contains three buildings (a pump building, a driver building, and an office building) and two above-ground storage tanks (ASTs). The site is an active oil gathering facility, where crude oil from nearby production wells is transferred to the ASTs, with the stored oil periodically transferred to a pipeline which runs through the area.
Pennzoil is working with the DEP’s Office of Environmental Remediation (OER) to address environmental conditions at the site which may have resulted from historic operations at the facility. The OER’s voluntary remediation agreement with Pennzoil includes provisions for identifying human health and ecological risks associated with potential future uses of the site in order to establish appropriate cleanup standards. A final report will be submitted to the OER for review to confirm that work meets all applicable remediation standards.
The OER encourages voluntary clean-ups of contaminated sites, as well as redevelopment of abandoned and under-utilized properties, in the hope of counteracting the lack of growth on sites with contamination or perceived contamination. The OER sets applicable remediation standards and confirms that the site maintains these standards.
Typical DEP enforcement actions, as well as liability under environmental laws, are limited while sites are being remediated. The Voluntary Remediation Program gives developers the ability to redevelop sites with existing industrial infrastructure at a lower price, and provides financial incentives to invest in Brownfields.
Questions should be directed to either Pasupathy Ramanan, WV DEP-OER, 2031 Pleasant Valley Road, Fairmont, WV 26554 (304) 368-2000 ext. 3730 or to Steven Stinger, Project Manager, URS Corporation, 12420 Milestone Drive, Suite 150, Germantown, MD 20876 (301) 820-3149.