The long debate over what to do about PCBs in the Hudson River ended 12 years ago. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency ordered dredging and GE agreed to conduct the project, now 70 percent complete and hailed as a national model.
Nonetheless, your March 9 article, "Dredging up the truth," seeks to rehash long-settled debates on the Hudson PCB issue. It relied on carefully selected excerpts from a few, 40-year-old documents to create the impression that GE "brushed off" warnings about PCBs. Closer examination of the facts reveals this is not true.
In 1969, GE appointed a task force of employees to examine PCB waste issues at its plants, including its Hudson River plants at Fort Edward and Hudson Falls. The task force produced recommendations for reducing PCB waste from these plants. By the early 1970s — the time of the memos cited by the Times Union — GE had implemented virtually all of the recommendations of the task force. Between 1970 and 1975, PCB discharges from GE's plants were reduced significantly.
Far from brushing off these early employee assessments of PCBs, GE acted quickly to improve manufacturing operations to contain PCBs, reduce its discharge of PCBs and then to discontinue their use altogether. By ignoring this work and the major cleanup programs GE has undertaken at its plants and on the Hudson River, you presented an incomplete and unfair picture of these issues to your readers.
Your story also cites a few 1970s-era GE documents to assert: "Records show that GE was warned about health threats of PCBs decades before anti-dredging campaign." The fact is that beginning in the mid-1970s GE engaged recognized external experts to deepen its understanding of the emerging issue of PCBs and human health, including commissioning the largest-ever study of workers. Conducted by a world-renowned PCB expert, this peer-reviewed study found that there has been no increased incidence of cancer or other diseases among more than 7,000 GE employees exposed to PCBs on the job. These employees have been followed for more than 40 years.
Whatever GE's position on the potential human health impacts of PCBs, EPA began treating PCBs as a regulated substance in the 1970s. GE has complied with those regulations. GE rightfully participated in a public debate on this topic, but that is in the past and we have moved on to the dredging project.
GE has dealt diligently and responsibly with the PCB issue. We will continue to do so.
Gary Sheffer is GE's vice president for communications and public affairs.