According to PPL, a project that began in 2018 involves remediation of the former Shenandoah Manufactured Gas Plant site, which was located in the area of 331 South Main Street, Shenandoah, where Burger King is now located.
The plant was operated by a predecessor company of PPL Electric Utilities
from the late 1800s until sometime in the 1950s, at which time it was decommissioned.
Since the Spring of 2018, PPL EU has been addressing the environmental impacts that resulted from the former plant’s historical operations. PPL says that coal tar was a byproduct of the plant, which heated coal to produce gas. The early stages of the project at the time were to investigate the impacts from the coal tar, coal tar residues, and oils in the soil and groundwater.
A second phase of the project began in August of 2019, when PPL Electric Utilities began removing structures on multiple properties that it had purchased in preparation for the final environmental remediation work.
Those properties includes the following addresses on South Market Street: 309, 311, 313, 315, 317, 322, and 324.
That demolition work included garages on the former Reading Anthracite property now owned by PPL Electric Utilities at the triangle of S. Market St. and S. White St. Much of that work was done over the summer by FMG Construction.
PPL say the next phase of remediation is anticipated to begin in the first quarter of 2020, pending receipt of necessary state approvals.
All work is being performed in accordance with applicable Pennsylvania regulations, including Pennsylvania’s Land Recycling Program (Act 2), and with full engagement of the
Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (PADEP).