Back to Penobscot Bay Blog ***Back to Friends of Penobscot Bay

Kidder Point Legacy Shoreline Waste Remediation Project.

GAC Chemical finally to remediate its abandoned sulfuric acid plant!
Latest media stories: WCSH TV news Bangor coverage and WERU Community Radio news coverage

PLUME OF THE DAY

At Issue. Kidder Point's shore received thousands of tons of highly acidic waste slurries laid down behind wooden cribs between 1940 and 1970 on the sides of the 5 acre peninsula (Kidder Point) that the abandoned acid factory is perched on. These wastes are byproducts of fertilizer making for Maine's potato industry, alum production for Maine's paper industry, and sulfuric acid production to carry out both of the above.

The wooden cribs weren't maintained Very visible, very acidic long lasting multicolored plumes of eroding waste have been entering these waters at the southwest corner of Stockton Harbor and its tidal mud beneath the old factory,

Two acid sources for the plumes (1) leaked sulfuric acid from 30 years of sulfuric acid making, (2) more than sixty officially reported sulfuric acid spills at the site beween 1983 and 2004, alone.
GAC aerial photographs
Use Back Button to Return Here aerial photos from 1940 and 2011. See expansion of the point into the harbor.
See a large 1993 map of then-Delta Chemical's waste sites and landfills .
* News &reports from 1903 -1974 about this site & nearby Mack Point
* Google earth aerials of site 1997-2011
* 2011 GAC Chemical aerial w/company property lines.
* (5) Kidder Point waste fill areas
* 2004 Aerial with now-razed fertilizer-then-bauxite quonset hut. *** w/o quonset hut (2011).

FOPB GAC Shore visits
7/21/13 ** 3/10/13 ** 5/6/12 ** 4/22/12
Kidder Point Industrial Site History

Use back Button to return
* 1984 DEP consultant's 1984 sulfuric acid spill report.
* 1984 Surface sampling
* 1984 pH testing of acid spill. Drawn map
* 1990 Testing of 'Alum Reactor Waste' 9/14/90
* 1993 DEP consultant's 1993 site summary
* 1998 photo of tainted mud (acid tank in background)
* 1998 site assessment by Delta Chemical 3/17/98 pt1
* 1998 site assessment 3/17/98 pt2
* 1998 media coverage of spill detection & cleanup
* 2002 draft settlement agreement CLF & GAC

MDEP staff with oversight responsibilities

July 17, 2014 Lighthawk Flight
* GAC property, Sears Island & upper Penobscot Bay
* Abandoned Peninsula, old acid factory, plume
* Abandoned sulfuric acid plant, plume
* Abandoned acid plant from above, close-in plume
*

May 3, 2013 LighHawk Flight
* Tainted cove looking South. ** looking North.
* Kidder Point tainted cove & Sears Island.
* Old acid factory, eroding wastes & leacheates