PFOA Fix Could Cost $13.7 Million

Bennington, Vt. (vpr) — It could cost up to $13.7 million to extend the Bennington water system to the homes with private wells that are contaminated with PFOA, according to an engineering report the Department of Environmental Conservation received this week.

PFOA is contaminant that the Environmental Protection Agency says could cause birth defects as well as cancer and other health issues. The report on the Bennington water system only covers a portion of the 227 wells that are contaminated with PFOA above Vermont’s advisory level of 20 parts per trillion.

The chemical has been detected in private wells in North Bennington and Bennington and in a municipal water system in Pownal.The company Saint-Gobain owned the former Chemfab plant in North Bennington, which is the suspected source of the contamination.

Court Rules Against Vermont Yankee In Overtime Case

Vernon, Vt. (vpr) — A federal appeals court says Entergy Vermont Yankee violated the Fair Labor Standards Act when it failed to pay overtime to its security shift supervisors.

The 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals this week ruled in favor of four VY employees who said they were owed more than 5,500 hours of overtime pay.

David Banford, Scott McGratty, Robert Miller and Gary Stratton have been working as security shift supervisors since 2009. The employees previously worked for a private security firm hired by Entergy, but they became employees of the owners of the Vernon reactor after Yankee moved its security services in house.

Not only did the appeals court find that the company failed to pay its employees, but the ruling said Entergy willfully violated the law. Lead counsel Joshua Diamond said the ruling could bring the guards $535,000 in back pay.