Editor’s note: This article is by Keith Whitcomb Jr. of the Bennington Banner, in which it was first published Sept. 18, 2014.
BENNINGTON — A contaminated site off Bowen Road has been added to a federal list, which will fund its study and cleanup.
According to an email from Raquel Snyder, congressional liaison from the Environmental Protection Agency Office of Congressional Affairs, the Jard site has been added to the National Priorities List of Superfund sites.
Town Manager Stuart Hurd said the EPA approached the town earlier this year asking it to support the listing, which it did. For a property to be added to the list, the state’s governor must support it, and the governor generally does not do that without the town’s blessing. The purpose behind the program is to remove health hazards from areas and make them economically viable again, if possible.
No town money is being spent, he said, and what the EPA plans to do will likely take many years.
In the 1970s and early 1980s, Jard Company Inc. built capacitors, a process which involved polychlorinated biphenyls. The PCB compounds bind themselves to other materials, such as sediment, and are known to cause cancer.
Hurd said the EPA has done work on the Jard site before, spending more than $1 million to put a cap over where the manufacturing building once stood and remove some contaminated material. Today it looks like a grassy hill not far from the state Highway Department garage.
Unfortunately, the pollution was found to have spread, contaminating the duck pond off Park Street and some residential basements.
Hurd said the EPA has cleaned out the cellars of affected properties as well as capped basement wells.
There likely will not be any visible work done this winter. The EPA will gather what information is already known about the Jard site and the extent of its contamination. After that it will do tests to determine the scope of the problem.
Hurd said cleaning everything up may involve pumping out groundwater at the site, but until the studies are done no one will know the extent of what is needed.
What is known is that the work will be costly, well out of the town’s ability to pay, which is why the Superfund listing is important and welcome, he said.
When possible, the EPA looks to those responsible for the pollution to pay for its cleaning, but the Jard company no longer exists. Oddly, it still owns the 12 acres of contaminated land, but according to Hurd the mortgage is held by a speculator. He said the EPA has not made it clear if it will seek out the estates of the former owners or draw funding from elsewhere.
The original Jard site was 36 acres, but the town has come to own the non-contaminated portion.
Contact Keith Whitcomb Jr. at kwhitcomb@benningtonbanner.com or follow him on Twitter @KWhitcombjr.
