cleanup · Erie County
Niagara Transformer
Cheektowaga
Active transformer works at 1747–1755 Dale Road where historic PCB-oil handling contaminated soil, groundwater, buried drains, and a downstream ditch system leading toward the Buffalo River. DEC also records a carefully qualified reported connection between Niagara Transformer waste oil and the Wide Beach cleanup.
The documented story
What happened here?
Niagara Transformer traces its corporate history to Erie Electric Corporation, founded by John H. Darby in 1924. The business built its first Niagara industrial transformer in 1933 and later became Niagara Power Transformer. The environmental record centers on the Dale Road property that Niagara Transformer purchased and developed in 1958.
Until 1980, the plant stored or used PCB-containing oils as insulating fluid in some liquid-filled transformers. Former employees told investigators that waste transformer oil was spread on the formerly unpaved parking lot and driveway for dust suppression and used along the fence beside St. Adalbert's Cemetery for weed control.
The site's importance extends beyond its property line. DEC documented movement through soil, shallow and deeper groundwater, buried drainage tiles, ditches, a retention pond, and a storm-sewer route that ultimately discharged to the Buffalo River.
Chronology in context
Turning points in the public record
1924–1958
The transformer business developed from Erie Electric Corporation; Niagara Transformer acquired the Dale Road property and built the plant in 1958.
1958–1980
PCB-containing transformer oils were handled at the plant. Employee accounts described waste oil spread for dust and weed control until the early 1970s.
1971
Reports described a tank rupture that released an estimated 2,000–4,000 gallons of non-PCB mineral transformer oil in the parking-lot area.
April 1990
Workers reported an oily seep in the ditch south of the property. The seep contained approximately 57,000 ppm PCBs, prompting a detailed investigation.
1990s
Investigators found highly contaminated soil, oily product, groundwater impacts, and PCB sediment in the downstream drainage system. Cleanup addressed source areas and approximately 11,500 cubic yards of contaminated drainage sediment.
Long-term management
The operating industrial property remains subject to containment, monitoring, inspection, and maintenance requirements.
News record
Major news events
Coverage selected here marks a turning point in public awareness, policy, enforcement, employment, or cleanup. Links open at the original publisher or archive; WNYAtlas does not reproduce restricted articles or images.
An oily ditch seep exposes a buried PCB pathway
Town highway workers reported oil seeping near the rail yard. Investigation found PCB-contaminated oil, sediment, groundwater, and old subsurface drain tiles that helped explain movement away from disposal areas.
New York State Department of Environmental Conservation ↗Chemical guide
Chemicals named in this record
These links explain potential hazards and exposure pathways. A chemical named in a record does not establish that anyone was exposed or harmed.
Environmental record
Documented impacts
- DEC reported roughly 10,000–280,000 ppm PCBs in surface soil between the plant and cemetery fence, with contamination extending onto part of the adjoining cemetery.
- A ditch seep contained approximately 57,000 ppm PCBs; one sample of dense oily product contained approximately 140,000 ppm, or 14 percent, PCBs.
- Old subsurface tile drains contained oily product and provided a preferential route through otherwise low-permeability clay from source areas toward the southern drainage ditch.
- PCBs and chlorinated benzenes affected groundwater. DEC reported no private drinking-water wells within one mile and did not document this as a municipal drinking-water contamination incident.
- Contaminated sediment moved through upper and lower drainage features to a storm sewer at Harlem Road whose drainage ultimately reached the Buffalo River.
Response
Cleanup and controls
- The remedy removed or contained heavily contaminated source soil and oily material and addressed affected drainage sediment beyond the factory parcel.
- Long-term management uses cover systems, collection or drainage controls, groundwater monitoring, inspections, and maintenance to preserve the remedy on an active industrial property.
- The downstream drainage cleanup was substantially completed in the 1990s; present conditions should be described from the newest periodic review rather than inferred from the original concentrations.
Then and now
The site today
Transformer manufacturing continues at Dale Road. The historical release is a managed cleanup record, not evidence that today's production repeats the former PCB-oil practices.