USAID announced new USD 32 million contract to clean up dioxin in Bien Hoa Airbase

Under the contract, Tetra Tech will provide engineering design, construction management, and environmental monitoring of civil works and treatment activities for dioxin-contaminated soil and sediment to reduce the risk of exposure to people on the air base as well as in the bordering communities to restore the land for full use.

Dioxin contamination clean-up at Bien Hoa Airport (Photo: USAID Vietnam)

In March, during her visit to Vietnam, USAID Administrator Samantha Power joined other U.S. and Vietnamese government officials to announce another contract of up to $73 million awarded to Nelson Environmental Remediation USA, an American small business, to design and build a treatment facility to decontaminate soil and sediment on and around the Bien Hoa Air Base.

Since April 2019, USAID has worked with the Ministry of National Defense (MND) to remediate approximately 500,000 cubic meters of dioxin-contaminated soil and sediment on and around the Bien Hoa Air Base. In 2022, USAID completed remediation of an off-base lake (Gate 2 Lake) and returned it to the community for use as a recreational area, completed remediation of the first on-base area (Southwest area), commemorating this milestone with a U.S. government-funded park on the site, and completed the construction of the long-term storage facility for soil with low levels of contamination.

It may take ten years to complete the dioxin contamination clean-up at Bien Hoa Airport. (Photo: USAID Vietnam)

It takes around ten years to get the dioxin clean-up project in Bien Hoa Air Base done. The total cost for the project is estimated at USD 450 million. Up to the present, the U.S. Government has contributed USD 280 million to the project.

Translated by Tran Hoai