Around the Sound: Work in full swing at Anacortes cleanup site

By Seth Preston, Communications Manager, Toxics Cleanup Program

Check out these photos of work being done to clean up part of the old Custom Plywood mill site in Anacortes.

Ecology is overseeing the cleanup of part of the site off 35th Street and V Avenue. A sawmill, a wood box factory and a plywood mill previously operated on the site. Fire destroyed the closed plywood mill in 1992.

Cleaning up this site will help to reduce pollution and restore Puget Sound habitat and shorelines. It also will clear away for economic development at a major piece of industrial land on the Anacortes waterfront.

Current site owner GBH Investments LLC plans to use the property for building and repairing boats.

Work will focus on cleaning up about 6 upland acres this year. It will include removing pilings and other structures to allow excavation of about 33,600 tons of contaminated soil; off-site disposal of the soil, structures and pilings; and backfilling the site with about 39,000 tons of clean soil. In-water work will start in the summer of 2012.

Here’s a news release with details on the project and the site.

And here’s more background about the Custom Plywood site.

---