General Electric ran a large industrial plant in Pittsfield, Massachusetts from the early 1900s, making power transformers and defense equipment. From 1932 to 1977, GE used polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, in transformer manufacturing. Improper disposal spread PCBs across the plant site and down the full 150-mile length of the Housatonic River into Connecticut and Long Island Sound. The EPA banned PCB production in 1979 after finding the chemical harms both wildlife and human health.
PCBs are the primary contaminant of concern. They show up in river sediment, floodplain soil, and groundwater. Concentrations in the river reach as high as 668 parts per million in sediment and 874 parts per million in floodplain soil. Total PCB mass in the river and floodplain ranges from roughly 100,000 to nearly 600,000 pounds. PCBs resist natural breakdown, with full degradation taking hundreds of years. They also build up in animals through bioaccumulation, reaching concentrations thousands of times higher than in the surrounding water or soil. Health effects linked to PCBs include cancer and serious harm to the immune, reproductive, nervous, and endocrine systems.
Cleanup of 20 contaminated areas outside the river is complete. Workers removed about 186,000 cubic yards of soil and sediment. Roughly 296,000 cubic yards of material generated through 2017 were either placed in capped, monitored on-site consolidation areas or hauled off-site. Fifty acres of cleaned-up land were transferred to the Pittsfield Economic Development Authority for redevelopment. The Upper Half-Mile Reach and the 1.5-Mile Reach of the river have both been cleaned, with PCB reductions of more than 99 percent and 98 percent respectively. Three groundwater management areas remain under long-term monitoring.
The largest remaining task is the Rest of River, covering nearly 125 miles from Pittsfield to the Connecticut border. Active remediation there is estimated to take 13 years. The EPA issued a Revised Final Permit in December 2020 after a public comment period that drew roughly 2,000 pages of comments from 140 commenters. Appeals against the permit were filed but denied in February 2022. Fishing and fish consumption in affected stretches of the Housatonic have been banned since 1977. Massachusetts has issued fish consumption advisories, and restrictions will stay in place until PCB levels drop to safe levels. Community members can stay involved by watching for future EPA public comment periods tied to ongoing remediation decisions along the Rest of River segment.
