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STAR-ADVERTISER / 2007
Navy officials Thursday said the leaks, which are not visible to the naked eye, were found Wednesday and Thursday during an inspection of the emptied fuel tank.
The U.S. Navy has committed to improving technology for preventing and detecting fuel leaks at its Red Hill Bulk Fuel Storage Facility near Pearl Harbor under an agreement reached with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the state Department of Health, it was announced Monday.
All upgrades by the Navy must be approved by the EPA and DOH and monetary penalties may be imposed if the work is not in accordance with the agreement, the agencies said in a news release.
“This agreement will ensure the safety of Oahu’s drinking water supply, while allowing the Red Hill tanks to remain in use as a resource for our national defense,” Jared Blumenfeld, the EPA’s Regional Administrator for the Pacific Southwest, said in the release. “EPA and the Department of Health will remain vigilant during this long-term effort to protect the public health and Hawaii’s precious aquifers.”
In January 2014, about 27,000 gallons of jet fuel leaked from one of the 20 World War II-era tanks under Red Hill. Water wells at the nearby Halawa shaft and Moanalua shaft provide about 25 percent of the drinking water for urban Honolulu, but the Board of Water Supply has found no signs of contamination in the water supply around Red Hill.
As part of the agreement, a feasibility study, to be submitted within two years, will look at a range of tank upgrade options that could be implemented, according to the monitoring agencies. Each of the underground storage tanks that are in-service are to be upgraded in phases over the next 20 years. The Navy agreed to double the frequency of its tank testing from biennial to annual, the release said.
