Ashley Gjovik
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Apple's Secret Silicon Fab Next to a Playground & Thousands of Homes

3250 SCOTT BLVD | GOVERNMENT PORTAL DASHBOARD
  • US EPA RCRA: CAR000278176 (Active LQG; haz waste)
  • US EPA TRI: 95051NTRSL3250S (2020)
  • US EPA EIS: 1278911, 19490911
  • US EPA Biannual Report: 2017, 2019
  • US EPA FRS: ​110001168254 (overall facility)
  • CalEPA BAAQMD: ​22839 (air pollution)
  • CalEPA CERS: ​385316 (haz waste & HazMat)
  • CalEPA DTSC HWTS: CAR000278176 & CAT000623983 (haz waste manifests) 
  • CalEPA DTSC Envirostor: 71003503

COMMUNITY UPDATES
On Oct. 27 2025, US EPA entered a Consent Agreement & Final Order with Apple over some of the hazardous waste violations from Aug. 2023 and Jan. 2024.

​View the EPA Docket here:
 In re Apple, Inc., US EPA Docket No. RCRA-09-2026-0006. (See, In the Matter of Apple, Inc., U.S. EPA Docket No. RCRA-09-2026-0006, Consent Agreement and Final Order (EPA Region IX Oct. 27, 2025).

US EPA, EPA Takes Action Against Apple for Inadequate Hazardous Waste Management, Nov. 18 2025. 
​
The environmental Citizen Suit was filed on Sept. 2 2025. View the docket and filings here: ​https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/71272728/gjovik-v-apple-inc/.

There was a rally and press conference about the facility, including about this incoming Citizen Suit, on August 16 2025. There is a recording of the event and it was also covered by NBC Bay Area.

There is an ongoing Change.org petition regarding the facility and you can view/sign it here: Shut Down Apple's Deadly Semiconductor Fabrication Next to Apartments & Playgrounds. There's a GoFundMe dedicated to the Citizen Suit litigation expenses which you can view/support here: Litigation Fund: Citizen Suit re Apple's Skunkworks Fab.

ENFORCEMENT UPDATES
CITIZEN SUIT
Citizen Suit Complaint (Sept. 2 2025)
gov.uscourts.cand.455764.1.0.pdf
File Size: 4413 kb
File Type: pdf
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        > Court Docket: CourtListener
Sixty Day Notice of Citizen Suit (​June 30 2025)
3250_scott_fab_-_sixty_day_notice_of_citizen_suit.pdf
File Size: 738 kb
File Type: pdf
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Receipts of Service of Sixty Day Notice
3250_scott_blvd_-_apple_inc_-_us_epa_enf_action.pdf
File Size: 187 kb
File Type: pdf
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US EPA RCRA
EPA Consent Agreement & Final Order (Oct. 27 2025)
apple_inc._rcra-09-2026-0006_3250_scott.pdf
File Size: 1329 kb
File Type: pdf
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        > EPA Enf. Docket: Yosemite
        > Complaint/Tip Source: PDF
ed_019838_00000527_formal_wie.pdf
File Size: 432 kb
File Type: pdf
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EPA Notice of Enforcement Action (June 26 2025)
gjovik_citizen_suit_service_20250731_20250718_combined_final_certified.pdf
File Size: 10141 kb
File Type: pdf
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US EPA RCRA - Apple Inc - 2024 04 30 - Inspection Report - 3250 Scott
File Size: 6596 kb
File Type: pdf
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US EPA RCRA - Apple- 2024 04 30 - Inspection Report - 3250 Scott - Attachments
File Size: 49213 kb
File Type: pdf
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Gjovik's US EPA Tip & Complaint (June 2023)
3250_scott_complaint_-_final.pdf
File Size: 1031 kb
File Type: pdf
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OVERVIEW
In 2015, Apple began semiconductor fabrication activities in a facility located at 3250 Scott Boulevard in Santa Clara California. The building is less than two hundred feet from thousands of homes, a public park, and a children's playground. For years, Apple knowingly vented its exhaust of solvent vapors and toxic gases straight from the roof and into the ambient outdoor air, with little or no abatement. Further, the factory was only one story, while the apartments were four to five stories tall, nearly ensuring the factory exhaust created a lingering vapor plume that would enter the apartments through windows and the 'fresh air intake' vents.

​Gjovik lived at these apartments in 2020 and found herself in the emergency room within one week, disabled by symptoms of solvent and toxic gas exposure. Later in 2020, Gjovik conducted air testing and bio-monitoring which found the presence of Apple's factory exhaust inside her home, and inside her body. Among other haunting results, she documented arsine gas exposure in her bedroom, at 3AM on Sept. 2020, including real time vitals, video, and lab results showing arsenic in her blood at 9AM.

Before learning about the fab, Gjovik initially suspected her exposure to chemicals was due to the Brownfield clean-up site the apartments were built on, and/or the Superfund chemical plume historically under the apartments - however the known concentrations of chemicals at those sites did not provide a plausible explanation for the severity of her symptoms with any of the possible vectors.

In February 2023, while reviewing Public Records Act request documents, Gjovik discovered Apple was engaged in semiconductor manufacturing activities at 3250 Scott Blvd. She began researching the facility more in depth and found more and more evidence confirming that it was actually Apple who made her sick in 2020. Apple made her so sick she thought she was dying, and apparently she was dying, and Apple could have literally killed her. Apple then retaliated against her, fired her, and tried to ruin her life. Apple should divert its efforts to regulatory compliance and the relocation of this facility far away into some heavy industrial zone and away from children and bedrooms.

Read Gjovik's June 12 2023 tip and complaint to the US EPA about the site. You can also review the US EPA's April 30 2024 Enforcement & Compliance inspection report summarizing what they found when they conducted formal inspections based on Gjovik's complaints and evidence. ​All of those RCRA files are also on DropBox.

image of 3250 Scott Blvd Apple office next to seven large apartment buildings
3250 Scott Blvd, Meadow Park, Creekside Park, & the Santa Clara Square Apartments
View on Google Maps aerial view (link).
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Photo by Ashley Gjovik on April 11 2026. Image of 3250 Scott Blvd from Creekside City Park in Santa Clara, California.
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Photo by Ashley Gjovik on April 11 2026. Image of exterior stormwater drain in front of 3250 Scott Blvd in Santa Clara, California.
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Photo by Ashley Gjovik on April 11 2026. Image of exterior of 3250 Scott Blvd in Santa Clara, California.
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Photo by Ashley Gjovik on April 11 2026. Image of 3260 Scott Blvd in Santa Clara, California.

PROPERTY HISTORY
Apple's been a tenant at 3250 Scott since around 2014-2015. The structures at 3250 Scott was built around 1974. It was an Intersil ​building by at least 1982 and until at least 1990. By that time GE had acquired Intersil, so it was also owned by General Electric. Intersil specialized in complementary metal–oxide–semiconductors and small integrated circuit designs. GE sold Intersil to Harris around 1988 and Harris spun off Intersil as an independent company in 1999. Harris was a defense contractor specializing in surveillance and microwave / electronic warfare.  Around 1998, the owner/tenant of the properties became MIRCEL-Synergy Semiconductor who held the properties until 2007, but shut down the fab in 2003 and it sat vacant until Apple took an interest around 2013.

Apple is doing semiconductor fabrication at 3250 Scott Blvd.

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Apple has been illegally exhausting toxic chemicals into the ambient air around the facility.

Aug. - Sept. 2024 BAAQMD Notice of Violations
Search California EPA Air Resource Board data: Facility No. ​22839

Apple's RIsk Management Plans and Lack of Plans

SB01 Risk Management Plan 3-year Compliance Audit (2019)
2019_rmp_apl-gaelg_00003222.pdf
File Size: 1636 kb
File Type: pdf
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Combined RMP (2019)
2019_rmp_apl-gaelg_00003271.pdf
File Size: 17664 kb
File Type: pdf
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Process Hazard Analysis SB01 Facility (Sept 2020)
2020_process_safety_apl-gaelg_00003357.pdf
File Size: 1503 kb
File Type: pdf
Download File

Arsenic, Respirable, and Total Dust Industrial Hygiene Assessment – Aria Site – 3250 Scott Boulevard, Santa Clara, California – BSI Project No. 629519
bsi_2019_arsine_arsenic_apl-gaelg_00003041.pdf
File Size: 6449 kb
File Type: pdf
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Apple tried to claim that it was reducing the amount of hazardous waste it generatored - when it "diverted" the waste from TSDFs and instead illegally dumped the waste into the air around thousands of homes, like the air was a sewer. 

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Apple's illegal dumping directly harmed people, property, and the environment. 

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Download the flier in PDF here:
3250_scott_apple_fab_flier.pdf
File Size: 1286 kb
File Type: pdf
Download File

Saratoga/San Tomas Aquino ​Creek Photos & Field Tests

All photos in this section were taken by Ashley Gjovik and are licensed under CC-BY (Creative Commons Attribution) 4.0.
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Photo by Ashley Gjovik on April 11 2026 at Saratoga/San Tomas Aquino Creek under Scott Blvd in Santa Clara, California.
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Photo by Ashley Gjovik on April 11 2026 at Saratoga/San Tomas Aquino Creek under Scott Blvd in Santa Clara, California.
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Photo by Ashley Gjovik on April 11 2026 at Saratoga/San Tomas Aquino Creek under Scott Blvd in Santa Clara, California.
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Photo by Ashley Gjovik on April 11 2026 at Saratoga/San Tomas Aquino Creek under Scott Blvd in Santa Clara, California.
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Photo by Ashley Gjovik on April 18 2026 at Saratoga/San Tomas Aquino Creek under Scott Blvd in Santa Clara, California.
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Photo by Ashley Gjovik on April 18 2026 at Saratoga/San Tomas Aquino Creek under Scott Blvd in Santa Clara, California.
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Photo by Ashley Gjovik on May 1 2026 at Saratoga/San Tomas Aquino Creek under Scott Blvd in Santa Clara, California.
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Photo by Ashley Gjovik on May 1 2026 at Saratoga/San Tomas Aquino Creek under Scott Blvd in Santa Clara, California.
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Photo by Ashley Gjovik on May 1 2026 at Saratoga/San Tomas Aquino Creek south of Scott Blvd, around Coronado Dr, in Santa Clara, California.
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Photo by Ashley Gjovik on May 1 2026 at Saratoga/San Tomas Aquino Creek south of Scott Blvd, around Coronado Dr, in Santa Clara, California.
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Photo by Ashley Gjovik on May 1 2026 at Saratoga/San Tomas Aquino Creek south of Scott Blvd, around Coronado Dr, in Santa Clara, California.

Stormwater from 3250 Scott Blvd outflows to the lower San Tomas Aquino Creek main stem — just upstream from a drop structure and the Scott Boulevard overpass — shows water chemistry consistent with substantial anthropogenic loading that intensifies sharply in the lower watershed and is not present at upstream reference stations. Researcher field measurements at the drop structure on April 18 and May 1, 2026 documented pH of 8.9 to 9.5, total residual chlorine of 3 to 20 mg/L, and copper at approximately 0.2 mg/L — values that exceed regulatory or screening thresholds by roughly one to three orders of magnitude, and the only pH values above 8.5 anywhere in this seven-source inventory spanning 1936 to 2026.

Monitoring samples from this location show total ammonia at 2 to 24 times higher than at upstream San Tomas and Saratoga tributary stations, peaking at 1.2 mg/L at station 205R03843 in May 2018 — a value that triggered formal Section 303(d) listing of the creek for ammonia (decision 151012) and toxicity (decision 142736) in the 2024 Integrated Report cycle. Detectable nitrite at lower-watershed stations across multiple years, contrasted with at-or-near non-detect levels upstream, is a chemical signature consistent with recent and recurring ammonia inputs. Visual documentation across three site visits in April and May 2026 shows persistent surfactant-pattern foam accumulating at the drop structure and against the channel walls, olive-green water consistent with heavy algal load, and yellow-tinted foam slicks coinciding with the highest field-measured chlorine and pH values.

The contrast between the lower watershed and the surrounding hydrologic system is sharp on parameter after parameter. Lower-watershed surface conductivity, chloride, and alkalinity are approximately twice the values at upstream surface stations and three times the pre-industrial groundwater baseline established at three DWR-monitored wells within the field-site footprint sampled 1966 to 1970. Lower-watershed phosphorus is two to five times upstream values.

Benthic chlorophyll-a and ash-free dry mass at lower-watershed sites are above commonly cited nuisance thresholds for California streams, and dissolved-oxygen saturation runs from 78% to 252% across years and from 93% to 186% during a single mid-January 2024 winter daytime sampling event — consistent with chronic eutrophication driven by sustained nutrient enrichment. Benthic invertebrate (CSCI) bioassessment scores at lower-watershed San Tomas sites have remained essentially unchanged at 0.387 to 0.388 across six years and are well below the 0.62 "likely altered" threshold, indicating persistent and severe biological impairment.

​The pattern across all seven inventoried data sources is internally consistent and points in the same direction: a creek, downstream of industrial parcels along Scott Boulevard, displays chemistry, biology, and visual conditions outside the range of natural variation, outside the range of upstream and tributary reference conditions, and outside regulatory and screening thresholds for protection of aquatic life. The State Water Resources Control Board has formally recognized impairment at the waterbody scale through the 2024 Section 303(d) listings for ammonia and toxicity. The field-site data documented here further localize the strongest signals to the lower-watershed reach within the study area, where the divergence from upstream reference conditions is large and consistent across multiple parameters and multiple sampling events.
Data summary:
san_tomas_data_inventory_final_20260504.pdf
File Size: 451 kb
File Type: pdf
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Other Operations, Violations, & concerns 

Santa Clara Fire Department Incident Reports (excerpt): 
Your browser does not support viewing this document. Click here to download the document.
3250_scott_-_leak_and_spill_incident_reports_-_reduced.pdf
File Size: 4648 kb
File Type: pdf
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Santa Clara City - Public Records Request
  • https://santaclara.nextrequest.com/requests/20-50
  • https://santaclara.nextrequest.com/requests/23-127​
  • https://santaclara.nextrequest.com/requests/23-199
  • https://santaclara.nextrequest.com/requests/23-517
  • https://santaclara.nextrequest.com/requests/23-518
  • https://santaclara.nextrequest.com/requests/23-548
  • https://santaclara.nextrequest.com/requests/23-1209​
(more)
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2020 Video-Blog at the Apartments

I recorded some video-blogs of my experience at the apartment complex in 2020, and published a compilation on YouTube in 2022. I would not discover until 2023 that what I was experiencing was probably not vapor intrusion, it was likely Apple's silicon fab factory exhaust.
Ashley M. Gjovik, I thought I was dying: My apartment was built on toxic waste, SF Bay View (March 26, 2021)

Read decisions and orders from LSI Logic v Santa Clara (1995-2000):
Your browser does not support viewing this document. Click here to download the document.
This was another zoning/siting failure on Scott Blvd where the city of Santa Clara was insisting on location a school, daycare, and church next to fabs. In this case, the city was subject to multiple court orders mandating that it not do that unless it can prove that it could be safe, and the city could not prove that it could be safe.
lsi_v_santa_clara_1995_court_of_appeals_decision.pdf
File Size: 1344 kb
File Type: pdf
Download File


​References: Santa Clara Square Apartments

Documents related to the Santa Clara Square Apartments in Santa Clara city, developed and managed by The Irvine Company.
​

Existing Public Resources:
  • ​City ESA:
    • https://www.santaclaraca.gov/Home/Components/BusinessDirectory/BusinessDirectory/324/2571?alpha=S
  • EKI/2013 EIR: 
    • https://www.envirostor.dtsc.ca.gov/public/final_documents2?global_id=60002212&doc_id=60395782
  • Final: Impact Sci/2015:
    •  https://www.santaclaraca.gov/home/showdocument?id=17071
  • Final Response Plan: 
    • Apartments: https://www.envirostor.dtsc.ca.gov/public/deliverable_documents/7405093133/FinalResponse%20Plan_1-6-16_Reduced.pdf
    • Retail: https://www.envirostor.dtsc.ca.gov/public/final_documents2?global_id=60001968&doc_id=60355389
  • Response Action Completion Report Phase II:
    • Phase I (Apartments) 
    • https://www.envirostor.dtsc.ca.gov/public/deliverable_documents/9652333140/SCSA%20Phase%20I%20Completion%20Report%2020180706.pdf
    • Phase II (Apartments): https://www.envirostor.dtsc.ca.gov/public/deliverable_documents/1200880289/Final%20SCS%20Apt%20Phase%20II%20Completion%20Report_4-15-19.pdf
  • Land Use Restrictions Covenant: 
    • https://www.envirostor.dtsc.ca.gov/public/deliverable_documents/7759395778/Recorded%20Land%20Use%20Covenant.pdf
    • https://www.envirostor.dtsc.ca.gov/public/deliverable_documents/1525210320/CLRRA%20for%203255%20scott%20LLC%20fully%20executed.pdf
    • https://www.envirostor.dtsc.ca.gov/public/deliverable_documents/6047320306/Signed%20LUC.pdf
  • Soil Characterization Reports:  
    • https://www.envirostor.dtsc.ca.gov/public/final_documents2?global_id=60002212&doc_id=60395808

FOIA Request: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency​
  • (EPA-R9-2021-004244) Topic: I would like to please request any reports and/or documented decisions related to the Zeta superfund site (CAD049233570) in Santa Clara, CA (R9). I cannot find any records about it other than this listing: https://cumulis.epa.gov/supercpad/cursites/csitinfo.cfm?id=0900216 . Submitted: 05/11/2022; Granted: 06/11/2022​
  • Link: https://foiaonline.gov/foiaonline/action/registered/submissionDetails?trackingNumber=EPA-R9-2021-004244&type=Request

​Google Drive: 3250 Scott Blvd Santa Clara PRA & FOIA Documents

THE SANTA CLARA SQUARE APARTMENTS
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SYNERTEK, INC. BUILDING 1, SANTA CLARA, CA
US EPA Superfund site (webpage).

 

 

 

 

 

Original Content Copyright © Ashley M. Gjovik

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  • Home
  • Contact
  • Updates (RSS)
  • Interviews & Press
  • Support
  • Ashley's Apple Saga
    • Gjovik v Apple (Legal)
    • About Ashley's Apple Saga
    • Termination Transcript
    • Justice at Apple
  • Saratoga Creek System
    • Clean Water Act Sixty Day Notice
    • Santa Clara Baylands
    • North Central Santa Clara Geology
    • Saratoga Creek & Bayside History
    • The Santa Clara Greenbelt
  • 3250 Scott Blvd (Chip Fab)
  • Triple Site
    • Triple Site (Superfund)
    • HAZWOPER Reading Room
  • South Bay/Boston Marsh
    • History of South Bay, South End, & Fort Point (19th-21st Century)
    • Boston History (Pre-19th Century)
    • The Hidden Hydrology of Boston & South End
    • South Bay Geotechnical Review
    • Geology of Boston
    • The Cesspool & Sewage Pollution
    • Sewer infrastructure and CSO Systems
    • South Bay Incinerator & Dump Site
    • Biological & Medical Hazards
    • Industrial History & Landfilling
    • Biota & Ecosystem
    • Declarations & Enforcement Actions
  • Journal of Ecology & Evolution