Scott Pruitt, Superfund, and Communities
JACOB CARTER, RESEARCH SCIENTIST, CENTER FOR SCIENCE AND DEMOCRACY | MARCH 1, 2018, 4:36 PM EST
There is a smoldering fire raging below the surface of the West Lake landfill, located in the St. Louis, Missouri suburb community of Bridgeton, where tons of radioactive material remain. The Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Superfund program web page describes how “In 1973, around 8,700 tons of leached barium sulfate from the Manhattan Project, a World War II nuclear bomb development program, was mixed with approximately 38,000 tons of soil and used to cover trash being dumped during daily operations.” The site was listed as part of EPA’s National Priorities List in 1990 ...
EPA administrator Scott Pruitt has claimed that cleaning up superfund sites is a priority for him. If Administrator Pruitt is serious about prioritizing Superfund clean-ups, then it is interesting that he hired Albert Kelly, a former banker who has been banned from the industry and has had no environmental policy experience, to lead those efforts. And while Administrator Pruitt commissioned a task force to address superfund clean-ups, he claimed that no records of deliberation among the task force existed bringing up issues of program transparency. Administrator Pruitt also has claimed to want to go “back to basics” of air and water pollution mitigation, but his actions have yet to follow. The EPA has been losing significant portions of its workforce, enforcement of air and water quality laws is down from previous administrations, and Administrator Pruitt has taken steps to undermine science-based air and water quality standards, like dismantling and dismissing EPA’s science advisory committees ...
https://blog.ucsusa.org/jacob-carter/scott-pruitt-superfund-and-communities-a-burning-desire-to-remediate-the-west-lake-landfill-superfund-site
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