Published: July 14, 2008 09:51 pm      

PORTER: Opposition piles up to PCB shipment

Both Porter Town Board and Assemblywoman Francine DelMonte express displeasure with plan

PORTER — A state agency may believe it’s a good idea.

Local officials think otherwise.

The decision by the state Department of Environmental Conservation to ship about 75,000 tons of toxic PCB waste from a cleanup site in Warren County to CWM Chemical Services gained more opposition Monday.

Both the Porter Town Board and Assemblywoman Francine DelMonte weighed in with their concerns on the plan, including the sheer size of the shipment and the increased truck traffic it would bring near local homes and the Lewiston-Porter School District campus on Creek Road.

“Why should the Town of Porter be the only dumping site for PCBs, especially contaminated PCBs, from this cleanup?” asked Town Supervisor Merton Wiepert at a Monday meeting where the Town Board voted unanimously to back the opinion of State Sen. George Maziarz, R-Newfane. On Friday, Maziarz delivered a letter to DEC Commissioner Pete Grannis opposing the decision and saying he plans to seek “every remedy possible to prevent it.”

Wiepert also invited Grannis to visit Porter to view the possible affect of more truck traffic locally and to view first-hand the nearness of CWM to the Niagara River and Lake Ontario. He said the shipment of PCBs now could set a dangerous precedent if a proposed dredging of a section of the northern Hudson River for PCBs is ever set in motion.

The cleanup site is at the former General Electric salvage yard in the Town of Queensbury. Wiepert said the ability to cleanup the waste exists at the actual site, but because the cost of public bids from contractors was too high, the DEC chose instead to haul nearly 3,000 truckloads of the site’s most contaminated waste to CWM.

Under the original plans, the shipments would have started in August and lasted about seven months, CWM District Manager Michael Mahar said at Monday’s meeting. It’s unclear for now what affect the local protests will have on the plans. Mahar also confirmed at the meeting that if it comes through, the plans will add 3,000 trucks over the next year, or about 15 more per day. In previous published reports, that number was closer to 1,500.

DelMonte voiced her displeasure in a letter to Gov. David Paterson, calling the decision “one more blatant example of a horrible (state) policy that encourages hazardous waste landfill disposal” and called on the DEC to complete its hazardous waste siting plan in a manner that “discourages the addition of any more land disposal capacity in New York state.”

The state is in the process of finishing its latest draft of that plan, the outcome of which could affect the proposed expansion of CWM’s local facility, RMU-2. CWM has maintained that its facility helps the environment by providing a place for hazardous waste once it’s cleaned up.

DelMonte credited technological advancements for reducing the production of hazardous waste in the United States.

“Many hazardous waste landfills have and will continue to close,” she wrote. “I urge you not to let the consolidation of the hazardous waste land disposal industry to take place in the (state).” Later, she added, “All agencies consider recycling or destruction of hazardous waste as preferable to storing it in landfills because hazardous waste landfills may leak and are not a permanent solution.”

Mahar said at Monday’s meeting the issue of the shipment is between the state and those who are currently voicing their opposition.

“We’re providing a necessary service,” he said. “So we’re here to provide it if the DEC decides to go that route.”