On behalf of concerned residents, U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin has requested and recently received an update on the Army’s pending cleanup of mercury-contaminated sediments at Gruber’s Grove Bay on Lake Wisconsin. The contamination was caused by the direct discharge of industrial wastewater from the Badger Army Ammunition Plant during active production years.
The primary public health concern associated with mercury in the bay is contamination of fish tissue. Mercury is a highly toxic element and there is no known safe level of exposure. Ideally, neither children nor adults should have any mercury in their bodies.
As a first step, the Army plans to conduct additional sampling of sediment in the 25-acre bay to better delineate remaining mercury concentrations, according to the February 2018 memo from the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Installations, Energy and Environment to Senator Baldwin. The decision of who and how planned dredging will be performed has not been made, the Army said.
The good news is that the military said that it does not intend to challenge the final level of cleanup at Gruber’s Grove Bay. The cleanup will be in accordance with the July 2000 WDNR approval which calls for a cleanup goal of 0.36 mg/kg (the background level) or less of mercury in remaining sediment, the military wrote.
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