Salem Acres is a 235-acre site in Salem, Massachusetts, where sludge, grit, and grease from a sewerage district were dumped into eight unlined pits from 1946 through 1969. That waste included tannery byproducts and left behind a contaminated area of about 13 acres once a fly ash pile and an old landfill were factored in. EPA placed the site on the Superfund National Priorities List (NPL) in June 1986 after testing found polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), volatile organic compounds (VOCs), semi-volatile organic compounds (SVOCs), arsenic, and chromium in the pits.
More than 130 chemicals were identified as contaminants of concern across the site. These include metals such as arsenic, lead, chromium, cadmium, and mercury in soil, groundwater, sludge, and surface water. Organic contaminants include benzene, toluene, trichloroethene, tetrachloroethene, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), PCBs, DDT compounds, dioxins, and dibenzofurans, among many others.
EPA and the responsible parties conducted two removal actions between 1987 and 1990. A full remedial investigation ran from June 1987 to March 1993, and a Record of Decision selecting the final cleanup method was issued in March 1993. Cleanup construction ran from July 1995 through September 1999. Workers excavated and hauled away the landfill, debris piles, fly ash pile, sludge lagoons, and contaminated soils, removing about 120,659 cubic yards of hazardous waste in total. A wetland next to the fly ash pile was restored in summer 1999. Post-cleanup testing confirmed no contamination remained above EPA's cleanup standards.
EPA deleted Salem Acres from the NPL on July 23, 2001. The site is approved for unrestricted land use, including residential use, and has since been developed into single-family homes. No institutional controls such as zoning restrictions or excavation limits are required because no contamination remains that could cause unsafe exposure. Human exposure is considered under control across the entire site, and physical construction of the cleanup is complete.
Community members with questions can contact Olivia Lopez, the Community Involvement Coordinator, by phone or email. Site records are available at the Salem Public Library at 370 Essex Street in Salem and at the EPA Region 1 records center in Boston at 5 Post Office Square, Suite 100.
