THE BURNED OVER DISTRICT

The DuPont corporation, which profited mightily from the plant, closed its munitions plant in Pompton Lakes. For another 20 years it whines, complained, haggled and otherwise delayed any cleanup efforts. But now it has found a solution to its problem.

The manufacturing and waste management practices caused toxic seepage into the soil, air and groundwater of the nearly 600-acre site and its vicinity. More than two decades after the plant shut down, site cleanup efforts have started and stalled, and significant contamination remains in the town, home to about 11,000 people.

Marsh’s story is common among those who grew up in Pompton Lakes. Central nervous conditions and behavioral disorders affect her family members, from her parents to her great-nieces and -nephews. A New Jersey Department of Health study indicates abnormally high rates of numerous cancers in the borough, especially kidney cancer and non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. An ongoing state health department survey with public data from 1979 to 2008 indicates that women in Pompton Lakes are hospitalized for tumorous cancers nearly 40 percent more frequently than those in neighboring communities and the borough’s men are hospitalized 23 percent more often than elsewhere in the state.

She lives with chronic insomnia and a host of other medical issues that she said have kept her unemployed for years. She said her doctor attributes her fragile health to the contamination.

“Pompton Lakes was a wonderful place to grow up in. Everybody knew everybody. It was so safe,” Marsh said. “But as time went on, problems like miscarriages and cancer started cropping up. Now you never know what’s around the corner.”

And DuPont’s latest move has borough residents especially unnerved. The corporation announced earlier this month that a new spinoff company would assume DuPont’s environmental liabilities for 190 contaminated sites throughout the country, including Pompton Lakes.

The new company, Chemours, will take on nearly $300 million in environmental remediation obligations held by DuPont. In its December SEC filing, the company said that figure could rise several times higher, as “considerable uncertainty exists with respect to these costs.” The estimated cleanup cost in Pompton Lakes is about $87 million, according to that SEC report.

Chemours assured stockholders that the transfer of environmental risk would not negatively affect company finances. Along with the environmental baggage, Chemours will own DuPont’s multibillion-dollar titanium and fluoroproducts units. DuPont leads in global profits for both industries, but the ventures are subject to market volatility and significant competition.

Some Pompton Lakes residents worry the spinoff could be DuPont’s strategy to shirk full responsibility for the pollution in their community. These fears are grounded somewhat in historical precedent: In 2005 the energy company Kerr-McGee spun off the subsidiary Tronox, unloading its environmental issues without allocating sufficient assets to the new company. The case ended with Tronox’s bankruptcy and the largest environmental cash settlement ever, with plaintiffs receiving $5.15 billion.

However, Walter Mugdan, who directs the Environmental Protection Agency’s remediation response division in New Jersey and New York, said that DuPont’s intentions appear authentic.

“If two years from now Chemours goes bankrupt, we would look back to this transaction now and see if it was done on the up and up,” he said. “I have no reason to believe that there is any fraud going on.”

In a company statement, DuPont representative Robin Ollis Stemple wrote that “Chemours and DuPont remain committed to fulfilling all remedial and redevelopment activities.” Those activities have thus far included cleaning soil contaminated with lead and mercury along the Acid Brook, a stream that runs through more than 100 homes’ backyards, as well as a pond where the company detonated blasting caps. At least two-thirds of the identified contaminated zones still require remediation; in one spot the lead level is reportedly at least 236 times higher than New Jersey’s cleanup standard.

Gotta love the way the spokesman uses the two company names together. Having unloaded the liabilities and an uncertain profit stream to pay for it (hopefully), DuPont does not ever expect to see its name in court or any other official files about this. Good luck to those hoping for a solution.