In your recent article on the cleanup effort proposed for PFAS contamination caused by Saint-Gobain, this quote jumped out: “When asked where waste from the cleanup will be dumped, Saint-Gobain said it ‘will be disposed at a lined landfill that is approved by the state to handle materials of this type.’”
Likely, that landfill is the state’s only landfill in Coventry, already an environmental threat to the Lake Memphremagog region, sited uphill and within a mile of the lake, a drinking water reservoir for hundreds of thousands of Quebec neighbors.
PFAS chemicals already are measurable, exceeding the drinking water standard, in monitoring wells and landfill underdrains, which aren’t supposed to contain any PFAS chemicals but do, consistently- a sign that the landfill is leaking, affirmed by experts in the field.
So now this landfill and surrounding communities, “out of sight and mind” in the far reaches of Vermont, will be further burdened by tons of toxic waste, increasing the risk to the environment and the injustice to this Northeast Kingdom region that contributes a mere 7% to the annual solid waste deposited on site. The rest of Vermont generates 73% of the annual total; the remaining 20% is imported from out of state.
It is time to remedy this injustice, and get serious about protecting Vermont’s environment, by planning now to develop regional, geologically safe, state-of-the-art solid waste depositories closer to where most of the state’s solid waste is generated.
Environmental protection and environmental justice require nothing less.
Peggy Stevens
Charleston
