Hugh Kaufman: EPA whistle-blower
Kaufman believes the Environmental Protection Agency is missing the chance of a lifetime to mine a vein so rich it could help fund the cleanup of old hazardous waste sites and force industry to manage its waste more carefully in the future. Kaufman helped write the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act, better known as Superfund. Superfund, passed in 1980 and amended in 1986, gives the agency the legal tools it needs to go after companies that refuse to pay to clean up hazardous waste sites they have created. If a company refuses to pay, the agency can begin cleanup immediately by tapping the money Congress appropriated when it passed the law and then seek treble damages later. But the law has never been fully enforced: The EPA has begun treble-damage proceedings in just six cases, with none going to trial, and has only reluctantly began suits under Superfund's other legal provisions. As a result, according to a House Appropriations Committee report released last spring, the government is footing the bill for 70 percent of the EPA's Superfund cleanup studies and 55 percent of its cleanups. At this rate, the Superfund will easily be exhausted long before even half of the nearly 1,200 sites on today's National Priorities List are cleaned up. Meanwhile, dangerous wastes are still dumped illegally; most sites still don't get cleaned up; the EPA still doesn't force companies to pay for cleanups and Kaufman is still mad.
- OSTI ID:
- 6975345
- Journal Information:
- Sierra; (USA), Vol. 73:6; ISSN 0161-7362
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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