Developers in Australia’s Molonglo valley have come to a sudden halt in plans for a new suburban neighborhood. Excavating was stopped when an old landfill was found on the site. Possibly 100,000 tons of asbestos waste material have been dumped and covered under the ground.
Administrators in the development project are now considering options for proceeding. Safety for workers and potential residents is a priority. Asbestos dust and fibers cause severe respiratory illnesses including mesothelioma, a rare and aggressive cancer with no known curative treatment.
Budget and government funding plays a big part in the decision as well. David Dawes of Land and Property Service wants to find a solution that will not require relocating the entire project, or the waste, to a new location. He said, “There’s quite good ways of dealing with that without the expense of pulling it all away and burying it in another hole. So we can actually look at different solutions that we can overcome with that and minimise any cost blowouts of the project.”
Project administrators are facing a heavy burden and a delicate decision as work has already started and plans are underway. Chief Minister Jon Stanhope responded to the find. He said, “I would not have agreed to this project, the Cabinet would certainly not have approved the project if it had come to us as say a $37, $38, $40 million job. I can’t walk away from the fact that these sorts of issues shouldn’t happen, they have and I’ll seek to ensure it won’t happen again.”
This particular piece of land does not have a hidden past. It was once used as a sewage plant as well as a waste site. Neil Savery, CEO of ACTPLA (Australian Capital Territory Planning and Land Authority) said, “It’s on the contaminated site register and that’s lead to investigations for the better part of five years. On the contaminated site register it’s essentially identified as a site of interested it doesn’t tell you exactly what’s there.” He continues, “We’ve done over 10 investigations to establish what’s in the ground, how extensive it is. The contractor has gone in and has started excavating, it’s taken a while to get down to the bottom level, and it’s found that asbestos – it’s solid cement sheeting – it is spread over a large geographical area, it’s not deposited in one or two locations.”
The project has been stopped until at least middle of next year.
This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 8th, 2010 at 7:59 AM and is filed under General, News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.
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