City Hall officials are worried cancer-causing substances might be contained in some transformers in Empire Canyon, the popular swath of mountainous terrain on the southern end of Old Town, and the local government wants landowner Talisker Corp. to further investigate.
They acknowledge it is unclear whether the transformers have polychlorinated biphenyls, commonly called PCBs, but Ron Ivie, City Hall’s chief building official, says they could. Ivie, whose department handles many environmental issues for Park City, expects to find PCBs in transformers put in before 1979, when the federal government put tight restrictions on the substances. Ivie says it is likely each of the transformers was installed before 1979.
The land went to Talisker Corp. as part of its takeover of United Park City Mines, which was the modern-day successor to historic silver-mining interests in the area. The landowners have for years dealt with environmental issues linked to the mining, including hauling a vast amount of material containing other contaminants out of Empire Canyon. That work usually involved mining-era waste that worried environmental regulators, not manmade chemicals like PCBs.
The PCBs were added to oil that helps cool the transformers, according to Ivie.
Park City officials and Talisker are continuing their talks about the transformers, and Ivie hopes the two sides reach an agreement that will require Talisker to study the sites by Aug. 1.
He says there have been no reported health effects from the transformers on the Talisker land, and, to his knowledge, the PCBs have not entered the streams in Empire Canyon.
“Not many people camp out underneath the electrical-distribution system,” Ivie says.
According to a City Hall-released statement from David Smith, the Talisker attorney who handles the firm’s negotiations with the local government, the transformers are not known to contain PCBs. United Park understands transformers made with PCBs were removed in the early 1980s, the Smith statement says.
Smith did not immediately return a phone message seeking comment.
City Hall is worried about as many as 15 transformers — with some possibly having been removed previously — in four areas controlled by Talisker, including the Daly West historic mining area in Empire Canyon. Three of the transformers are in Daly West, according to a recent report from Jeff Schoenbacher, City Hall’s environmental officer.
Six of the other transformers are at what is known as the Ontario #3 site, the location of the abandoned Park City Silver Mine Adventure. Another six are spread between two sites in Thaynes Canyon.
Ivie says the transformers are likely on poles, but, through his understanding, they are not in use. Ivie wants Talisker’s upcoming investigation to uncover whether the PCBs leaked. He says the firm will probe the transformers and nearby soil.
He says investigators earlier found PCBs in soil near transformers at Silver Star, also a historic silver-mining site. The Silver Star developers cleaned the PCBs at that location as part of the construction of the project, situated on the slopes of Park City Mountain Resort, according to Ivie.
Ivie says he is unsure why state regulators did not study the transformers in Empire Canyon years ago.