Ashville Texaco Faces ADEM-Required Cleanup Plan After Underground-Tank Release

The Alabama Department of Environmental Management has required a Corrective Action Plan for soil and/or groundwater remediation tied to a reported underground-storage-tank release at Ashville Texaco, 36950 Highway 231 West, in Ashville, St. Clair County.

ADEM’s July 16, 2026, public notice names IRA Phillips, Inc., of Gadsden, as the party required to implement the plan. The agency identifies the site as Facility I.D. 12534-115-011417 and the incident as UST22-09-07.

What ADEM’s notice says

The notice states that the release from an underground storage tank resulted in soil and/or groundwater remediation requirements. ADEM lists remediation by in-situ injection as the proposed method.

In-situ injection generally refers to treating affected material at the site by injecting a remediation substance or amendment underground. The public notice does not identify the substance, treatment volume, injection locations, monitoring-well requirements or projected completion date. Those details would need to be confirmed in the full Corrective Action Plan and related records.

Public-comment deadline

ADEM’s notice allowed written comments and written requests for a public meeting within 15 days following the notice’s publication date. The notice is dated July 16, 2026, so that 15-day period would ordinarily have expired by August 3, 2026. The notice says a public-meeting request must state the nature of the issues proposed to be raised.

ADEM says copies of the Corrective Action Plan are available through its public-notice system and for inspection at the agency’s Montgomery office. The agency’s UST corrective-action page also says the public may search scanned file material by incident number or arrange a file review with the department.

What happens next

ADEM’s program information describes a general sequence that can include preliminary and secondary investigations, groundwater monitoring, risk assessment, preparation and implementation of a corrective-action plan, and eventual issuance of a no-further-action letter if requirements are met. That general sequence does not establish which steps have been completed at Ashville Texaco.

The July 16 notice records a required plan and a proposed treatment approach. It does not establish that cleanup has been completed, that construction or injection work has begun, or that ADEM has issued a no-further-action determination.

What the notice does not establish

The notice does not say that Ashville Texaco is closed or that fuel sales must stop. It does not declare an immediate public-health emergency, and it does not establish that contamination has reached private wells, drinking water, nearby homes, waterways or public property.

The main accountability questions for future updates are whether IRA Phillips implements the Corrective Action Plan, what monitoring ADEM requires, whether the agency reports additional site findings and whether ADEM eventually determines that no further corrective action is needed.

Sources

• ADEM Ashville Texaco corrective-action notice, July 16, 2026