General Electric and the EPA have responded to an appeal of the agency's plan to clean up the rest of the Housatonic River.
So far, the first two miles south of the former GE plant in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, have been cleaned up. The plan for the rest of the Housatonic calls for a PCB disposal site near the river in Lee.
The appeal, filed by the Housatonic River Initiative and Housatonic Environmental Action League, includes a geological report of the disposal site, describing it as a “textbook example of where not to locate a landfill.” The report describes the sediments as highly permeable, which would allow PCBs to migrate.
In its response, filed this week, the EPA said the report by the geologist is "procedurally improper" because it was not submitted earlier, and should be struck from the record.
The agency also said the disposal facility will have a cap and double liner with low permeability, and that GE is required to "inspect, monitor and repair" the disposal system, if needed.
Attorney Andrew Rainer, who represents the environmental groups, said eventually the PCBs will leak back into the river.
"Who knows where GE will be 50 years from now, let alone 100 or 400 years from now?" he said. "I mean, this idea that GE is going to be there to deal with this is — nobody has any idea where GE will be."
The EPA and GE declined interviews.
In a statement, the EPA said it "stands behind the permit issued in December as the best suited remedy for addressing the risks posed by the PCBs in the Housatonic River and its floodplain."
In a separate statement, a spokesperson for GE said, "Under the revised permit we will remove more contaminated sediment and floodplain soil than under the EPA's 2016 cleanup plan and will accelerate the work years ahead of the original schedule."
The environmental groups have until May 20 to file a reply.
If they lose the appeal, Rainer said, they'll take it to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit.
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