ENVIRONMENTAL CLEANUP
Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton is one of the Department of Defense's busiest installations and offers a broad spectrum of training facilities for many active and reserve Marine, Army and Navy units, as well as national, state and local agencies.
In response to environmental problems posed by past hazardous waste disposal practices, Congress directed the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to develop a program to manage and control past disposal sites. This program was outlined in the Comprehensive Environmental Response Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA) of 1980 and was amended by the Superfund Amendments and Reauthorization Act (SARA) of 1986. CERCLA and SARA established a series of programs for the clean-up of hazardous waste disposal and spill sites nationwide. CERCLA also established the National Priorities List (NPL), which guides the EPA in determining which sites require further investigation. MCB Camp Pendleton was placed on the NPL on November 15, 1989.
The DoD (Department of Defense) developed the Installation Restoration (IR) Program in 1986 to identify, assess, characterize, and clean up or control contamination from past hazardous waste disposal operations and hazardous materials spills at United States Navy and Marine Corps installations. Equivalent to the EPA Superfund program, IR Program cleanup actions reasonably interpret and apply EPA policy and guidance when making cleanup decisions in order to meet federal requirements regarding the clean-up of hazardous waste sites, outlined in CERCLA, as amended by SARA.
In 1990, the Department of the Navy (DON) and regulatory agencies entered into a Federal Facilities Agreement (FFA) for MCB Camp Pendleton. The FFA is a legally binding document that outlines the schedule for completing the investigation and clean-up of sites at the Base. Parties to the FFA included the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), California Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC), California Regional Water Quality Control Board (RWQCB), and the Department of the Navy (DON). The FFA specifies the working relationships among the Navy and each agency. FFA team meetings are held three times a year in order to provide transparency in site status to all team members.
To date, more than 65 IR Sites have been cleaned up and/or closed under the program. There are currently a little over a dozen active IR Sites in the MCB Camp Pendleton's IR Program, all in different phases of the cleanup process.
Information Repository
To provide the local community with opportunities to review project documents, an Information Repository has been established for Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton's IR Program. A copy of the complete Administrative Record index and pertinent program-related documents are available for public review at this established resource.
The community Information Repository for MCB Camp Pendleton is located at the Oceanside Public Library, Civic Center Branch. Please check the Oceanside Public Library website for up-to-date hours of operation.