Taconic’s Work Plan Approved For Remedial Investigation
By Alex Brooks
Members of the DEC team working on the PFOA investigation in Petersburgh came to the PVMCC Hall on Tuesday evening April 17 to update the public on what’s going on with their investigation.
The latest news is that DEC approved on April 16 the Remedial Investigation Work Plan submitted by Taconic. The document, which is the blueprint for the investigation to be carried out over the next year and a half, will soon be available for public inspection in all the usual document repositories, such as the Town Hall and the Library.
James Bowers from NYSDOH said although there has not yet been any formal announcement, a second round of blood testing, or what he called “phase 2 biomonitoring,” is planned for some time this spring.
DEC Regional Director Keith Goertz said DEC has expanded the number of perflourinated compounds that it is testing for in water samples and in the soil and groundwater around the Taconic plant, including GEN-X. GEN-X, the compound now used to replace PFOA in the manufacturing process, has not been detected even in the raw water from the wells.
Goertz said DEC is negotiating with Taconic now to include a study seeking an alternative PFOA-free water source to be included in the work plan, but he said a study of that kind is usually done after the Remedial Investigation is completed, because a thorough knowledge of the nature and extent of the contamination is very helpful when trying to locate a nearby spot that will be free of contamination. He said in Hoosick Falls they started that study right at the beginning, which he said is neither the usual nor the optimal way to do it.
Joe Dunlop, who is on the Water District Committee in Petersburgh, said that the Water District is planning to drill a new well into an aquifer that is known to be contaminated with PFOA because two of the existing wells are failing, at a cost in the neighborhood of $100,000, and if we had more information about where uncontaminated water could be found we might be able to avoid doing that. Water District Superintendent Ben Krahforst said he is not in favor of drilling a new well in a PFOA contaminated aquifer, but he acknowledged that there is a problem with getting enough water if the District’s primary well (#2) were to fail for any reason.
The DEC person in charge of the Petersburgh investigation, Susan Edwards, said this is new information to her, and they would see if they can help with this situation.
Heinz Noeding asked if those who are now using POET systems to decontaminate their well water can look forward to any better solution in the long run. Edwards said “We will evaluate whether we can do anything more,” but she then said, “It may be that the POETs will be the permanent solution.”
Edwards was asked if she thought the PFOA in Petersburgh was transported only through the groundwater, of if it also may have been dispersed through the air from contaminants coming out of Taconic’s smokestacks. She said she doesn’t know at this point in the investigation, but that “it likely could be both.”