The EPA suggested that General Electric should pay to clean up PCBs that were allowed to get into the Hudson River. General Electric has objected

Question

The EPA suggests that wildlife is being affected more than can be explained by leaks in the factories; the company counters that dredging will release even more. Discuss this controversy with as much objectivity as you can.

Answer 1

It is difficult to be objective here. GE did not consider the PCBs dangerous when
it began to use them in 1946 . The compounds were considered inert (which is why they
were useful as an insulator). So there was no original intent to do harm. Nevertheless, the
compounds were found to be harmful quite some time ago, and GE continued to use them
up until 1977 when they were banned.
Because GE benefited from production, it seems fair that it pay for remediation. The
company is correct that dredging may bring some PCBs to mix with water from the material
being dredged and affect the local fauna. The EPA's analysis shows that the gains outweigh
the losses, while GE's experts claim the opposite. What is clear is that if the PCBs are left
in place, natural causes might arise that could lead to additional animal exposure, even in the
absence of human intervention, so PCB remediation will guarantee that that could never
happen.