
The Superfund Sites of Silicon Valley - iaw
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/26/lens/the-superfund-sites-of-silicon-valley.html
======
dekhn
Shocking how incomplete this article is. One of the prominent sites was caused
by Fairchild, and it's specifically described in Gordon Moore's autobiography.
he said they just dumped strong acids down the drain, unaware that it ate a
hole in the drainpipe, and so all the other solvents they dumped down the same
drain ended up hitting the water table and pluming
([https://www.amazon.com/Moores-Law-Silicon-Valleys-
Revolution...](https://www.amazon.com/Moores-Law-Silicon-Valleys-
Revolutionary/dp/0465055648)).

he claims he didn't know that would happen, but every trained chemist learns
to neutralize their acids before dumping them down the drain.

AFAICT, Moore and his buddies never had to pay anything for this- the
companies settled with the government.

~~~
HarryHirsch
The statement about the acids doesn't make any sense. Every building engineer
in charge of an industrial site knows that the pH of wastewater has to be
within range, or the city will come after you for messing with operation of
the sewage plant. My undergraduate university had a neutralization plant at
its science site.

And what's with the solvents dumped down the drain? Only water-soluble
material is disposed of through sewage, with constraints on biological oxygen
demand. Solvents don't go into sewage, they are burned, and some halogenated
solvents are exquisitely toxic to the biological stage in the treatment plant,
but that is known. Also, the sewage engineers would notice.

With semiconductor plants it's usually halogenated solvent plumes. No leaky
sewage lines involved.

~~~
dekhn
This all happened in the 60s and 70s when Fairchild was getting started.
AFAICT, they just ignored all the rules.

Note that this was before "semiconductor plants" as a thing existed: Moore
invented a lot of the technology underlying semi plants at Fairchild.

~~~
HarryHirsch
They really shouldn't have skipped the rules, a common source of solvent
plumes in groundwater is drycleaners. When did they start using halogenated
solvents, in the 1930s?

~~~
kbenson
At this point it should be obvious that those starting out an industry, or
those disrupting it so much as to make it in their image, have all the
incentive in the world to break rules in small to medium ways consistently and
pay for it later (if at all) from a position of dominance. Not only can they
afford it later, but enough elites usually get in on the deal to make money on
the way up help shield it from any major blowback.

Just look at Uber for a recent example. I'd bet you could pick any decade of
the last 150 years and it wouldn't be that hard to find obvious, well known
examples.

~~~
jacquesm
Those aren't 'small to medium ways'.

~~~
kbenson
While I mostly agree, I was mainly trying to distinguish ignoring regulations
and fraud and generally being horrible from murder, kidnapping, treason, etc
which some people's minds might have gone to otherwise.

That said, I don't doubt some companies fitting my initial criteria also
dabbled in these more extreme crimes occassionally to get what they wanted.
I'd like to think it's much less common though.

------
dbt00
Previously covered:

2001, salon:
[https://www.salon.com/2001/07/30/almaden1/](https://www.salon.com/2001/07/30/almaden1/)

2013, the atlantic:
[https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/07/not-e...](https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/07/not-
even-silicon-valley-escapes-history/277824/)

2015, gizmodo: [https://gizmodo.com/the-secret-history-of-silicon-valley-
and...](https://gizmodo.com/the-secret-history-of-silicon-valley-and-the-
toxic-remn-1743622225)

2017, kqed:
[https://www.kqed.org/futureofyou/388730](https://www.kqed.org/futureofyou/388730)

I've lived here off and on since 1999, but that Atlantic article was the first
one to really get my attention.

~~~
gabaix
I also lived in College Terrace in Palo Alto, where one of the superfund is.
At the time very few residents knew about the issue. I believe it is the same
today.

My neighbor Aaron Greenspan (also known for fighting his classmate Mark
Zuckerberg on trademark issues) asked local authorities to do more to inform
residents. It did not go anywhere. He eventually moved out, and so did I.

Here's one of his blog posts from back in 2013:
[http://www.aarongreenspan.com/writing/20130404/in-search-
of-...](http://www.aarongreenspan.com/writing/20130404/in-search-of-the-
cookie-dough-tree/)

~~~
sjg007
I think Google is on top of a superfund site.

~~~
cdibona
The main HQ isn't actually on top of a superfund site, but an ex-dump. We
derive a fair amount of methane from the decaying matter underneath
shoreline...

~~~
DrScump
The Shoreline Amphitheater (yes, the idiots who ran Mtn. View back then
couldn't tell an amphitheater from a theater) was built over the dump.

The first few events revealed the danger when people sitting on the lawn
portion actually _set the lawn afire_ with their lighters, due to methane
seeping through the soil.

------
aj7
I worked at Spectra-Physics when the contamination occurred. It was below a
plating line that did alodine prior to painting aluminum laser and instrument
housings. The building pictured is Bldg 5, where I had my first serious job.
This was a clean building where ion laser tubes were manufactured and
scientific lasers, including the first high power single frequency, and
ultrafast (picosecond) lasers were final tested. Spectra-Physics was bought
and sold many times, and is now a division of a company that perfected a
relatively simple vacuum gauge that relied on the movement of a stai steel
diaphragm. Spectra was the first laser IPO, but it never really flourished; it
was kind of ruined by Stanford MBAs. It’s competitor, Coherent, became a
powerhouse, largely because it retained its technical leadership. My building
5 is now a Korean church. Now that’s a profitable business!

------
fkj_9
How weird - I used to live in that same house that's featured in that article.
1908 Colony St. in Mountain View, CA. I remember the landlord made me sign an
agreement that indemnifies them from legal responsibility in the event I get
sick from drinking the water, or leaky vapors, or whatever. It basically read
that if I get sick for any reason, I can't sue anyone for it. What a lovely
and generous place SV is!

~~~
gowld
Would you prefer I sue you if I get sick for any reason?

Do you want to pay the cost of environmental remediation in your rent? I'm
sure your landlord would be willing to allow that.

~~~
fkj_9
I would prefer you not sue me if you get sick for any reason. Though I am not
a multi-million dollar corporation responsible for toxic waste under your bed.

I don't want to pay the cost of environmental remediation through my rent. I
would rather an agreement was reached to either deem the area uninhabitable or
clean it thoroughly and deem it safe, in which case the non-liability clause
oughtn't be necessary. I dislike the lack of guarantee either way.

I didn't mean to trivialize a complicated issue. It was more so hyperbolic
musing that in an area that supposedly epitomizes Western civilization,
technological progress and elevates humanism, we can't even guarantee basic
safety from the elements.

~~~
stevenwoo
It's mentioned in the link to the Atlantic article people are sharing that
tech industries in the valley were specifically requested to hide all
traditional outward signatures of industry like smokestacks and storage tanks
to make the industrial buildings more acceptable to suburban folks - and it
actually worked.

------
sadface
A startup/lifestyle company I used to work for several years ago aggregates
the GIS data of these superfund sites (and other environmental points of
interest) and makes it available at [1].

The site is pretty old and some of the links need updating, but they still
link to the monitoring profiles of these sites. For example, here[2] is the CA
Water Board page for the Page Mill HP site.

[1][https://whatsdown.terradex.com/](https://whatsdown.terradex.com/)
[2][http://geotracker.waterboards.ca.gov/profile_report.asp?glob...](http://geotracker.waterboards.ca.gov/profile_report.asp?global_id=SL720511210)

------
jpm_sd
This is pretty thin on content. More information:

[1] [https://qz.com/1017181/silicon-valley-pollution-there-are-
mo...](https://qz.com/1017181/silicon-valley-pollution-there-are-more-
superfund-sites-in-santa-clara-than-any-other-us-county/)

[2] [https://www.nbcbayarea.com/investigations/Toxic-Plumes-
The-D...](https://www.nbcbayarea.com/investigations/Toxic-Plumes-The-Dark-
Side-of-Silicon-Valley-258942561.html)

[3] [https://www.epa.gov/vaporintrusion/vapor-intrusion-
superfund...](https://www.epa.gov/vaporintrusion/vapor-intrusion-superfund-
sites)

~~~
tobinfricke
> This is pretty thin on content.

Note that this is a photography project and appears in the "Lens" section of
the NYT.

------
gumby
After it was an HP building that soccer field in the photo was a gas station,
which was likely worse.

And people are taking steps: in Santa Clara (the city, not county),
residential areas are receive Hetch Hetchy water while areas zoned industrial
get groundwater. When I had an office there I was able to look this up on the
city's web site. The only time I've been willing to pay for bottled water.

Much of Moffett Field is a superfund site (the main reason it's still a
government facility) because back during the cold war the Navy used to dump
toxic de-icing chemicals on those sub flights that took off from there every
hour...from an area right next to the marsh.

Back in the 80s I remember visiting the Intel fab (also in santa clara) and
watching a farmer harvesting wheat next door. I always wondered what happened
to that wheat since it was obvious back then that the leachate would be a
problem (nowadays the water coming out of the fabs is cleaner than the water
that come in...but the damage is done).

And it's not all bad. I remember sitting in Cadence HQ (early 90s) watching an
old guy work in the cherry orchard next door. I'd have eaten those cherries.
And before SGI and Alza HQs moved in (to where Google HQ is now) that area was
all bean fields. We used to cut through there to get to the shoreline...though
back then the park and concert hall was the mountain view dump, so also
probably pretty bad.

SV actually managed to maintain the ag vibe for a long time. I believe the
last operating farm in East Palo Alto just shut down within the last five
years.

------
russellbeattie
I have friends who like to eat from their garden and fruit trees in their
yard. I have to remind them that they're living in Silicon Valley and who
knows what sort of crazy industrial solvents are seeping up through the
ground.

~~~
colin_mccabe
The main industrial solvent described in superfund sites in the south bay is
TCE (trichloroethelyine), which does not bioaccumulate. The fruit won't
contain it, even if you live right on the superfund site.

I'm not aware of a major soil contaminant around here that does bioaccumulate.
I guess lead from the old leaded gasoline, which we stopped using in the
1970s. (Areas around roads that were active prior to the 1970s will have
higher soil lead levels). But that's the same as any place in the US.

~~~
inferiorhuman
Leaded gasoline wasn't phased out in California until 1990.

~~~
derekp7
I think mid to mid-late 70's was when most cars could no longer take leaded
gasoline (the pump nozzle wouldn't fit, and catalytic converters would get
plugged). Leaded gas was still available, but as older cars died not much
leaded gas was pumped (cars back then didn't have as long of a life cycle, so
probably by 85 or so more cars than not were on unleaded).

~~~
inferiorhuman
You started to see smog equipment in '75 but initially not everyone used
catalytic converters. Some, like BMW and Mazda, used thermal reactors. Leaded
fuel was common enough that part of the smog check was to ensure that a leaded
nozzle couldn't fit.

------
jboy55
Its interesting, I've always been asked what the 'official' definition of
Silicon Valley is, or if some specific city is 'in' Silicon Valley or out.
Like say, Redwood City.

By looking at this map here, [https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/plume-
minimal/index.html#](https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/plume-
minimal/index.html#) you can easily tell by wether the city has a Superfund
site.

~~~
2bit
This data is only for cities in Santa Clara County:

    
    
      This map shows the sites of toxic chemical "plumes" in Santa Clara County, CA

~~~
jboy55
Besides one in SF (and a couple in Oakland), all the "Superfund" sites in the
"Bay Area" are in Santa Clara County.
[https://epa.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=...](https://epa.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=33cebcdfdd1b4c3a8b51d416956c41f1&query=Superfund_National_Priorities_List__NPL__Sites_with_Status_Information_7557,SITE_EPA_ID=%27CAD048634059%27)

------
shadowtree
I'd add Hunter's Point to this list as it is being redeveloped right now - but
that former Naval Shipyard has quite a story.

Some details here:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Francisco_Naval_Shipyard](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Francisco_Naval_Shipyard)

If you enjoy higher cancer rates due to radiological contamination, this area
is for you.

Latest fun: San Francisco accepted Hunters Point shipyard land that may still
be radioactive

EPA, state health regulators approved transfer in 2015 despite awareness of
fraud allegations [https://sf.curbed.com/2018/3/13/17081188/san-francisco-
hunte...](https://sf.curbed.com/2018/3/13/17081188/san-francisco-hunters-
point-shipyard-radioactive-toxic-navy)

~~~
205guy
In 2008, I looked at renting on Treasure Island, back when it was just
starting to be developed from a derelict military base into a neighborhood.
The townhomes being rented were the old military housing, in rows along the
streets. One section, identical to others nearby being lived in, was fenced
off with portable fences and a radiation hazard sign every 100 yards or so.
The information was available at the time, but you had to go looking for it.
Now that it is transferred to the city of SF and redevelopment is proceeding,
I see a bunch of articles about it again.

Needless to say, I didn't rent there. I ended up on the Peninsula, but a few
weeks after moving in, I noticed there was an old gas station along El Camino
Real that was fenced and had venting pipes and equipment--leaking gas tanks
are no picnic either.

[https://www.google.com/search?q=treasure+island+radiation](https://www.google.com/search?q=treasure+island+radiation)

------
terravion
This seems like the NY times continuing anti-SV coverage. For example, while
Santa Clara has some number of super-fund sites supposed the most in the
country, would we expect this based on historical manufacturing GDP? Is it out
of line?

There seems to be a suggestion of something sinister about Silicon Valley with
mentions of the work culture--as though it was monolithic--and calling it
toxic. Commenting on the clothes people wear--to what end? can't trust a guy
who wears a hoodie?

I'm not sure social media is so much worse if this is journalism.

~~~
gowld
SV is unique in the USA in that it's a major industrial area that evolved into
a huge urban center, not a small rural town. So the impact of each bit of
pollution is much larger.

~~~
mcguire
Also, the electronics industry is usually viewed as ecologically friendly,
although I'm not sure why.

~~~
LifeLiverTransp
Eco-friendlyness and general kharma in the public eyes is usually dependant on
how many vendor-layers you are away from the horrifyng layers of reality.

Chicken-Stable-Cleaner - horrifying.

Egg-Delivery-Truck-Driver - acceptable.

Hotel-Breakfast-Cook - never met a nicer person.

If the horror is additional well distributed, and humanity is secretly
addicted to your product and wont imagine live without it- you get a free ride
on the kharma slide.

>>Coltan from african warlords mined by enslaved children in every cellphone!
Will humanity give up cellphones to save the innocent? Click here - to find
out.<<

It would be a interesting project to find out the actual kharma-cost of a
product though. Imagine the inheritance, if the industry relies on a lot of
kharmatic lower services- or propells other low-kharma activitys onwards.

Though it could end up, showing that the it- is actually a net-positiv to
humanitys kharma, after all i drastically reduces what humanity would have
usually done with its spare time.

~~~
galdosdi
> It would be a interesting project to find out the actual kharma-cost of a
> product though

I'm having trouble finding it and would love if someone else found it, but a
couple years ago someone did an academic paper doing just that for the iphone,
tallying up all externalities (abuse of workers and the environment for
example) involved in manufacturing the product and coming up with a "real"
cost of making it. I recall they concluded an iphone would cost $1000 to $2000
if the true costs were included.

I seem to remember the phrase "dark value" but it hasn't been helpful in
googling for the paper.

------
eyeareque
This makes me wonder: If SV only has 20 something superfund sites from back
when tech was very small, how many superfund sites does china have with their
massive factories?

~~~
briandear
The entirety of China should be a Superfund site. I lived in Suzhou for about
a year or so and Lake Tai nearby is pretty much radioactive [1] (figuratively,
but it wouldn't surprise me if it were literally.) It seems that much of the
surface water in China is extraordinarily polluted -- and I saw people fishing
out of canals or waters near industrial sites as if they were in the Alaskan
wilderness or something.

There's likely a huge under-reporting of pollution-related illnesses. I know
that respiratory illness statistics are an actual state secret -- you can't
get access to the actual data on pollution-related illnesses.

Chinese pollution is beyond crisis levels. All of this worry about the Paris
agreement and CO2 -- that's nonsense: China has problems with actual pollution
that kills people, such as benzene and other highly toxic chemicals and
particulate pollution.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Tai#Pollution](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Tai#Pollution)

~~~
dragonwriter
> The entirety of China should be a Superfund site.

That would require a sizable expansion of EPA jurisdiction that might run into
a few issues.

~~~
toomuchtodo
It might be a welcome change of pace from attempting to export “democracy” and
“freedom” though.

------
pfarnsworth
Large swathes of Mountain View are poisoned because of chemicals used at
Moffett Field to clean the airplanes. They spread down into Mountain View such
that some areas have higher cancer rates than others and was designated
Superfund sites even 15 years ago when I lived in the area.

~~~
philipkglass
There's a common culprit between contamination from Moffett Field, old
semiconductor sites, and even old dry cleaning sites: chlorinated solvents,
trichloroethylene in particular. TCE is non-corrosive, non-flammable, cheap, a
great solvent for many non-water-soluble compounds, and it evaporates cleanly
and rapidly. It also has a relatively low acute toxicity to humans. It was
commercialized in the 1920s as a surgical anesthetic, and still sees some
medical use:

[http://apps.who.int/medicinedocs/en/d/Jh2929e/4.5.html](http://apps.who.int/medicinedocs/en/d/Jh2929e/4.5.html)

I even found it sold by the can in a hardware store as recently as 2002.

Unfortunately, it's a carcinogen and can cause neurological problems with
heavy or chronic exposure. It breaks down slowly in soil or water. (Though it
breaks down rapidly once volatilized into the atmosphere - half life of one
week.) It migrates easily through soil and into water. As of 2005, TCE was
detected in 5% of American public water systems supplied by groundwater and in
15% supplied by surface water.

[https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/toxprofiles/tp19.pdf](https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/toxprofiles/tp19.pdf)

------
api_or_ipa
holycrap, is the soccer pitch the one on the corner of Page Mill & El Camino?
That's nuts that I drive right next to a superfund site every day.

~~~
jboy55
My rule of thumb, if its in SV, its a superfund site. I used to work by the VA
hospital, there was a sign that said pregnant women shouldn't touch the grass.

~~~
seanp2k2
Don’t forget all the Prop 65 earnings in apartment complexes! It’s mostly for
asbestos in the case of apartments.

------
gnachman
The first paragraphs here are horrifying: [https://www.mv-
voice.com/morgue/2001/2001_01_19.supe19.html](https://www.mv-
voice.com/morgue/2001/2001_01_19.supe19.html)

> According to Alana Lee, the EPA project manager for the site, the air
> stripper on the Netscape campus was constructed in 1989, and because of a
> grandfather clause, is permitted to emit 24 pounds per day of toxic
> material. > > The current limit for air-strippers is 1 pound per day.

------
stevewilhelm
I worked in one of the buildings built atop this HP site[1]. It had a big
water pump in the parking lot treating the ground water.

The story went that the HP instruments used to detect the ground water
pollution levels were first built at the very site.

[1]
[https://cumulis.epa.gov/supercpad/SiteProfiles/index.cfm?fus...](https://cumulis.epa.gov/supercpad/SiteProfiles/index.cfm?fuseaction=second.Cleanup&id=0902134#bkground)

~~~
Taniwha
what the essentially did in the 90s was to dig giant trenches around entire
city block, way down to the impermeable clay layer ... then fill the trenches
with a similar impermeable clay creating a giant block sized container which
they are still now pumping water through to slowly clean out the polutants

------
tikhonj
I remember seeing a great post about this a few years ago: "In Search of the
Cookie Dough Tree"[1] by Aaron Greenspan. It stands out all these years as a
vivid, personal account of an issue I simply hadn't thought about before.

[1]: [http://www.aarongreenspan.com/writing/20130404/in-search-
of-...](http://www.aarongreenspan.com/writing/20130404/in-search-of-the-
cookie-dough-tree/)

------
noetic_techy
As someone who was born and raised in the SV, this is just something they trot
out every once in a while to scare the newcomers.

Almost no one is on well water and the chemicals are relatively low toxicity
in most cases. You are probably getting harmed more by the smog in the air
than any leakage from these sites. Yes, bad stuff was happening in the 70's
environmentally. SV is NOT an isolated case.

------
smaili
I'd love to understand more clearly the risks of these contaminated sites.
Would just the mere presence of, say playing on a Superfund soccer field
expose you to those chemicals? Or is it more around if you were to drink the
water from these sites then you would be at risk? Same goes for any offices
that happen to be sitting on Superfund sites.

------
hedgehog
Reminds me of this previously posted essay about contamination in College
Terrace: [http://www.aarongreenspan.com/writing/20130404/in-search-
of-...](http://www.aarongreenspan.com/writing/20130404/in-search-of-the-
cookie-dough-tree/)

------
mmagin
Fortunately (with rare exceptions) nobody uses well water in Santa Clara
county (see
[https://pubs.usgs.gov/circ/circ1182/pdf/05SantaClaraValley.p...](https://pubs.usgs.gov/circ/circ1182/pdf/05SantaClaraValley.pdf)
) and a lot of these chemicals are relatively low toxicity, the greatest
danger seems to be vapors released from the soil.

As far as risks via things like gardening, I actually wonder about the levels
of arsenic or mercury in the soil, compounds of which were used many decades
ago on fruit trees (which were very common here).

------
flyGuyOnTheSly
>The world’s capital of tech innovation prefers to keep its superlatives, good
and bad, under wraps.

Can anybody explain to me what "superlatives" means in that opening sentence?
As it doesn't seem to match any of the standard definitions. [0]

[0]
[http://www.dictionary.com/browse/superlative](http://www.dictionary.com/browse/superlative)

~~~
sjm-lbm
I read it as definition #4 on your link.

Basically, it's saying that SV likes to keep both it's very very good things
(new life-changing tech) and it's very very bad things (these Superfund sides)
under wraps.

~~~
flyGuyOnTheSly
Thank you, yes, that does make sense now!

------
mtreis86
There are far more superfund sites across the country than I would have
expected. [https://www.epa.gov/superfund/search-superfund-sites-
where-y...](https://www.epa.gov/superfund/search-superfund-sites-where-you-
live)

------
davidjnelson
I always wondered what the empty lot next to an apartment complex I lived in
was. Did some research and it was the Jasco superfund site. I read the entire
lease agreement and it didn’t mention anything about it. We need a disclosure
law for that. Ended up moving.

------
sbov
I grew up a couple miles from the fairchild site. Back then it was an
abandoned building with a fence around it. Our parents always told us to stay
out, but my friends and I used to jump the fence and explore the building. Fun
times were always had.

------
DrScump
The infamous _Lorentz Barrel and Drum_ site is right across the street from
Spartan Stadium and the ice center (now called Sharks Ice) at the southwest
corner of 10th and Alma.

------
jacquesm
Nothing like a little externalization to boost the bottom line.

------
JudasGoat
Does anyone care to comment on other countries and their handling of the
hazardous waste from semiconductor manufacturing? Also are the unsafe
practices long outdated?

------
thinkloop
"Superfund" seems to be what we call contaminated land from industrial waste?

~~~
dqpb
That's a really stupid name (or maybe really smart if your a politician).
Should be called Supertoxic.

~~~
gowld
Superfund refers to the super amount of funds spent to clean up the messes.

~~~
klipt
But they haven't cleaned them up?

~~~
galdosdi
Once they're totally cleaned up they're no longer superfund sites.

This is like looking at my list of _open_ bug tickets and complaining that not
a single one of them is done.

That said, it can be hard to get a lot of these sites all the way to 100%
cleaned up, and there's a lot of non-engineering obstacles. There's landowners
and neighbors with all kinds of differing incentives, as in a Queens, NY site
where they want to dig up and get rid of some radiation but there are
businesses who have already been built atop it and would have to be destroyed.

------
rb808
Maybe NY Times should check its own backyard first.

[https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/91/Superfun...](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/91/Superfund_sites.svg)

EDIT: What I meant was yes SV has a bunch of superfund sites, but they are far
fewer than other parts of the country, especially the North East.

~~~
mwfunk
The purpose of the article is not to make NY look better than SV. The purpose
of the article is to point out the Superfund sites in SV that a lot of people
who live here would be surprised to learn about.

