Compounding conservatisms: EPA's health risk assessment methods

Journal Article · Mon Mar 01 00:00:00 EST 1993 · Hazmat World; (United States)

OSTI ID:5519748

Stackelberg, K von; Burmaster, D E ^[1]

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1. Alceon Corp., Cambridge, MA (United States)

Superfund conjures up images of hazardous waste sites, which EPA is spending billions of dollars to remediate. One of the law's most worrisome effects is that it drains enormous economic resources without returning commensurate benefits. In a Sept. 1, 1991, front page article in The New York Times, experts argued that most health dangers at Superfund sites could be eliminated for a fraction of the billions that will be spent cleaning up the 1,200 high-priority sites across the country. Even EPA has suggested that the Superfund program may receive disproportionate resources, compared with other public health programs, such as radon in houses, the diminishing ozone layer and occupational diseases. Public opinion polls over the last decade consistently have mirrored the public's vast fear of hazardous waste sites, a fear as great as that held for nuclear power plants. Fear notwithstanding, the high cost of chosen remedies at given sites may have less to do with public health goals than with the method EPA uses to translate them into acceptable contaminant concentrations in soil, groundwater and other environmental media.

• OSTI ID: 5519748
• Journal Information: Hazmat World; (United States), Vol. 6:3; ISSN 0898-5685
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

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