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emergency is there? The numbers startle me and that’s why I’m uneasy.”
“Between now and Wednesday, 3.5 pounds [of PCBs] go into the Shenandoah for your lifetime and mine,” responded Butcher.
“Let’s assume they have a ease too," Markow debated. “If we shut them down now, we’ve done some irreversible harm to them. ”
Hughes stated in the affadavit that should the state’s motion for a temporary injunction be granted, the plant would have to shut down permanently.
A temporary shut down, which would take nearly one month to perform, would cost about $3 million, according to Hughes. Resuming operations, however, would cost an additional $30 million and would required several months.
R. Claire Guthrie, deputy attorney general, asked Judge Markow to consider requiring Avtex to begin the shut down process, since the state was bearing the risk of waiting until Wednesday.
Gardner responded that the company had limited financial resources available, and that funds would be “far better spent on clean-up than on plant closure. ”
Mounting fines and clean-up costs have made Avtex s financial situation among the main considerations for the court. Avtex has proposed a $1.3 million clean-up plan for the PCBs found on the Avtex site.
I don t understand, frankly, where the money’s coming from,” said Guthrie.
Hughes stated that if Judge Markow were to order the plant closed, the judge would eliminate Avtex s only source of funding for any fines or clean-up cost that might result from the case.
"I m not going to give that argument a whole lot of consideration," the judge informed the Avtex attorneys.
State samples taken on Sept. 1 revealed high levels of PCB on the plant’s roof, near the loading dock and at outfalls 003 and 004. The greatest concentration of PCBs recorded was 136,000 parts per million, a figure (58,000 times the level permitted in fish by the FDA.
“Certainly, we’re disappointed,” said Burt Rohrer, press secretary for the attorney general’s office, following the hearing. “We represented to the court that any delay is a serious impact to the river.”
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