Projo 7 to 7 News Blog

PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- A $200,000 grant from the state Economic Development Corporation will help clean up polluted soil at The Steel Yard, the complex off Valley Street that houses a trade school and artists' studios.

Like the owners of most former industrial properties, the founders of The Steel Yard inherited contaminated dirt when they bought the Providence Steel and Iron building, at 27 Sims Ave., in 2001.

Nick Bauta and Clay Rockefeller excavated, treated and removed the worst soil, tainted with lead from the paint used on steel beams. Cement was later added to less hazardous soil to prevent lead from leaching into ground water. But the state Department of Environmental Management has asked the nonprofit group that now owns the property to cover the remaining soil by building on top of it, adding at least 2 feet of clean dirt or paving it. The EDC grant will pay for that process.

"The capping limits exposure," Kelly J. Owens, a supervising engineer in the DEM's Office of Waste Management, said Thursday. "People won't be in contact with the high lead levels."

 Tags  Economic Development Corporation

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