NEW BEDFORD - A parcel of land along New Bedford's waterfront will undergo an environmental cleanup beginning next week.

Eversource spokesman Mike Durand tells WBSM News the work will be performed in an 18,000 square foot site that once housed NStar's service center before the company changed it's name to Eversource and moved the center to the New Bedford Business Park in the far north end.

"That's the area where we're going to be remediating under the ground," said Durand of the site on MaCarthur Drive. "That (contamination) is a result of an early 20th century manufactured gas plant that deposited coal tar there that we are going to be removing beginning next week."

Durand says the plan is to remove the pavement and up to five feet of clean topsoil before pouring a mixture of cement and grout into the hole. The mixture will incorporate itself with the remaining soil and harden, rendering the coal tar "immovable and impenatrable," says Durand.

The cleanup is estimated to cost $5 million, and will be fully funded by Eversource. The cleanup does not include the land where a power plant, owned by Sprague Energy, currently sits.

The cleanup will take an estimated three months to complete. Durand says once the cleanup is completed and the lot is paved, it will be ready to place on the real estate market for sale.

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