[B]ENNINGTON — With state funding in place, Bennington is close to beginning design work to extend water lines to the remaining properties contaminated with PFOA.
The question remains, however, whether the firm considered the responsible party will agree to pick up a multi-million dollar tab for both design work and the water-line project itself.
An appropriation in the new state budget provides $750,000 for engineering design or related work to prepare for a project to provide clean water to more than 200 Bennington properties. Those are roughly east of Route 7A within a state-determined perfluorooctanoic acid contamination zone around two former ChemFab Corp. factories deemed the source of the pollution.
The funding was proposed by Bennington Sens. Dick Sears and Brian Campion and other local lawmakers to ensure the design could proceed this year, regardless of any settlement with Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics. Officials hope that Saint-Gobain, which acquired ChemFab in 2000 and is considered the responsible party, will cover project costs — estimated in the range of $20 million.
The firm agreed last summer to provide that same amount to extend water lines to affected properties to the west of Route 7A, and negotiations now are in progress concerning the eastern sector.
“We are close to where we feel we have given Saint-Gobain sufficient time to evaluate the [engineering backup] material we gave them,” said Peter Walke, deputy secretary of the state Agency of Natural Resources.
The question, Walke said, is whether the firm “will be willing to negotiate based on what we believe are the findings on what is occurring.”
Wherever it is technically feasible, he said, the state believes new water lines are the preferred solution, but the company has not challenged that new lines are the best long-term method. What Saint-Gobain is primarily disputing, he said, is whether the former ChemFab factories were the only significant pollution source.
If no settlement can be reached soon, Walke said a decision would be made on the necessity of taking the matter to court.
He added that the state would like to know whether Saint-Gobain is going to fund water-line project design — as it did in the western sector — before using the $750,000 allocated by the Legislature.
Concerning the eastern sector, the company contends there are other likely sources of PFOA, including a former town landfill off Houghton Lane and background sources, such as contamination that might have traveled through the atmosphere over distances, especially from other industrial sources around the region. That contention was included in a lengthy Barr Engineering report commissioned by Saint-Gobain, which DEC officials say contains faulty PFOA distribution or other engineering models or draws incorrect conclusions about PFOA in the Bennington area.
The state contends other work has shown that the overwhelming source was the former ChemFab factories, primarily spread through the air from factory exhaust stacks when the company coated fabrics with Teflon and dried it at high temperature.
Saint-Gobain closed the final plant on Water Street in North Bennington in 2002 and moved those operations to New Hampshire.
“We are negotiating with Saint-Gobain and have shared our [engineering] work with them,” said Richard Spiese, the DEC hazardous waste management project director.
Within the next several weeks, Spiese said, the state will determine whether the company is receptive to a settlement to fund new water lines to zone two.
He said the DEC’s goal is to have a project design “no later than mid-winter, no matter what happens,” to allow a spring 2019 construction start. The design is expected to be done by MSK Engineering and Design, which performed that task for the ongoing extension of the Bennington water system.
Work in the western contamination sector began last year and is expected to be completed this fall.
Blood draw funding
Also in the budget that became law last month is up to $200,000 to conduct blood-draw clinics during 2018 for current and former Bennington residents who were exposed to PFOA, primarily through drinking contaminated water.
While blood draws were conducted after the PFOA pollution was discovered in early 2016, those affected, their supporters and local lawmakers have advocated for long-term medical monitoring for current blood levels and for diseases associated with PFOA exposure. Those include high cholesterol, ulcerative colitis, thyroid disease, testicular cancer, kidney cancer and pregnancy-induced hypertension.
PFOA levels, which were found in many residents to be well above the national average for the common industrial chemical, decline slowly only over many years.
Walke said he learned Monday from the state Department of Health that officials there are working out a plan to provide those blood-draw sessions.
“We both fought hard to have these allocations in the budget and keep them there,” Sears said this week of the legislative effort. “There was some hesitantly in the House but we dealt with those in conference [committee],” of which he was a member.
“The ANR strongly supported the design work, which helped during budget negotiations,” Sears said.
“It’s great to see construction underway to hook-up residents to municipal water,” Campion said. “Additionally, I am pleased that funds were allocated in this year’s budget for health monitoring and planning.”
He added, “That said, we cannot lose sight that we need to deliver a long-term fix in the second [project] phase. I know we are all eager for the state and Saint-Gobain to find a resolution.”
Referring to a report released by the federal Environmental Protection Agency on PFOA and related chemicals, Campion said, “This is an issue facing the nation, and we have to take every step possible to protect Vermonters. The governor’s disregard and lack of leadership on this issue is shameful. The Legislature, on the other hand, will continue to lead and must resend the two PFOA response bills that were vetoed this year.”
Sears and Campion, both Democrats, were principal supporters of legislation that would have strengthened regulation of hazardous materials and would have made it easier for residents to sue for long-term medical monitoring if they were exposed to contaminants.
The proposals were opposed by Gov. Phil Scott, who said in part that he thought they would make it more costly for companies to remain or locate in the state, likely resulting in a loss of jobs.
