Some members of the public are worried that a cleanup of a former plastics factory in Bennington would send chemical contaminants to Vermont’s only landfill, and that the PFAS class of chemicals would end up in nearby Lake Memphremagog, a drinking water source where these contaminants have already been detected.
But according to a state-approved cleanup plan, the landfill in the Northeast Kingdom town of Coventry doesn’t qualify as the dumping ground.
Members of the environmental group Don’t Undermine Memphremagog’s Purity, or D.U.M.P., have expressed concerns that Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics would dispose of waste from its defunct North Bennington factory at the Coventry landfill.
The factory was once famous for producing fiberglass fabrics used on structures such as sports stadium domes. The fiberglass fabrics were coated in Teflon, which was made using PFOA, or perfluorooctanoic acid, a type of PFAS. PFOA has since been found to have contaminated residential water wells in the Bennington area, and some residents blame it for causing health problems.
Under a 2019 settlement agreement with the state, the French multinational Saint-Gobain will be responsible for cleaning up designated buildings at its two former factories in the town of Bennington.
The industrial sites, formerly owned by ChemFab, closed in 2002, two years after Saint-Gobain acquired them.
The first factory cleanup, in North Bennington, is scheduled to start in the spring.
Saint-Gobain said in its cleanup plan that the landfill where the factory waste will be disposed of will be specified once the company has chosen a contractor for the project. The cleanup plan also states that the waste will be brought to a landfill that accepts hazardous waste, or one that is classified as a Subtitle C landfill under the federal Resource Conservation and Recovery Act.
The landfill in Coventry is classified as a Subtitle D landfill, or one designated for non-hazardous waste.
“We have stated clearly in our Corrective Action Plan that waste materials will be disposed at a permitted RCRA Subtitle C facility, and we intend to adhere to this state approved plan,” Saint-Gobain told VTDigger on Monday.
The company said that once it chooses a contractor this winter, the contractor will work closely with the state Department of Environmental Conservation on the cleanup project, including waste disposal.
Richard Spiese, a department project manager who is overseeing the project, said Vermont only considers liquid waste as hazardous if it contains PFAS, or perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, at greater than 20 nanograms per liter. PFAS-contaminated liquids below this threshold, and PFAS in solids, are not considered hazardous waste in Vermont, he said.
“My job is not really to tell people who want to be more stringent than regulations require,” Spiese said. “That’s what they’ve chosen to do, that’s what we’re going to make them do.”
Casella Waste Systems, which operates the Coventry landfill, said Saint-Gobain’s cleanup plan shows it’s managing the factory waste as hazardous waste.
This is due to “the nature of the concentration as a direct discharge of the chemical itself,” versus the PFAS-maade materials accepted at Coventry that “are a much lower concentration than a direct discharge,” Casella spokesperson Jeff Weld said.
Lake Memphremagog, which extends from Newport to the Canadian town of Magog, supplies drinking water to more than 175,000 Canadians. In 2021, Canadian officials found traces of PFAS in a drinking water intake area connected to Lake Memphremagog though they were lower than legal limits and toxicity levels.
Often called “forever chemicals” because they take thousands of years to break down, PFAS is linked to a range of harmful health impacts, such as reproductive issues, cancers and a diminished immune system.
