Addressing Health-Related Problems in the USA - Research Paper Example

How Will the EPA Clean up Superfund Sites if there are No Funds? Executive Summary Superfund allows for clean up of hazardous waste sites. Certain superfund reforms and policies have aimed to expedite site cleanups to help reduce cleanup costs, promote consistency and better protection of human health and environment. Despite this, there is a lack of quick and efficient clean up services of Superfund sites. One reason for this may be a lack of funding by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). This paper examines how the EPA can clean up hazardous Superfund sites despite a lack of funds and what are the possible alternatives. Privatization, reinstating Superfund taxes, creating a management system and creating economic incentives for businesses to clean up are some of the options considered in this brief. Statement of the Issue/Problem Considering the financial problems faced by the EPA and the associated responsibilities of cleaning up hazardous wastes, it is important to consider how the EPA can have an efficient and effective clean up processes if there are no sufficient funds? Background A Superfund site is any land in the United States that has been contaminated by hazardous waste and identified by the EPA as a site for cleanup because it poses a risk to human health and/or the environment. For the Superfund cleanup process to begin, a potentially hazardous site is discovered in the initial stage, and the EPA is notified of possible releases of hazardous substances. Sites may be discovered by various parties, including citizens, State agencies, and EPA Regional offices. Following identification, these sites are entered into the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Information System (CERCLIS), which is the EPAs computerized inventory of potential hazardous substance release sites. The EPA then evaluates the potential for release of hazardous substances from the identified site using assessment, screening, remedial investigation, site listing process and construction completion. One of the top priorities for the EPA is to find those responsible for the contamination (the potentially responsible parties or PRPs) to clean up the site. If the PRP is not found, is not viable, or refuses to cooperate; EPA, the state, or tribe may cleanup the site using Superfund money. EPA may seek to recover the cost of clean up from those parties that do not cooperate.1 The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), commonly known as Superfund, was created on December 11, 1980 to clean up the worst hazardous waste sites across the country and. recover the expenses from the PRPs. Over $1.6 billion was authorized for five years. However, there is a high level of concern over the time required to clean up Superfund sites by the EPA, although despite the concerns there has been no solution to the problem. Clean up of sites on the Superfund’s National Priorities List (NPL) may be too complex or even too costly and the EPA’s statistics on duration of clean-ups have not been too consistent. CERCLA was amended by the Superfund Amendments and Reauthorization Act (SARA) on October, 17, 19862. This added an environmental income tax to increase revenues for the trust fund. It authorized $8.5 billion over five years. In 1991, the trust fund was extended to September 30, 1994 and an additional $5.1 billion was authorized. SARA also required EPA to revise the Hazard Ranking System (HRS) to ensure accuracy in assessment of the relative degree of risk to human health and to the environment posed by uncontrolled hazardous waste sites that may be placed on the National Priorities List (NPL)3. The EPA has indicated in a report (2003) that long term cleanups have been completed at nearly 900 NPL sites and more than 7,000 emergency or short-term cleanups have also been conducted since the inception of the Superfund. The EPA emphasises that the program is providing widespread benefits in terms of both human health and environmental risk reduction and also providing opportunities for future beneficial land use. EPA estimates that there are 294,000 sites in seven remediation programs that will need to be cleaned up and this can even go as high as 355,000. This includes the 77,000 hazardous waste sites that have already been discovered plus 217,000 yet-to-be-discovered sites. This figure does not however include sites where cleanup is completed or on-going. A recent EPA report shows that it will take between 30 and 35 years and $253 billion dollars to cleanup most of the nation’s known and yet-to-be-discovered toxic waste sites. For the EPA, there is an increasing backlog of sites that needs cleaning up but the budget seems to remain the same. It can take up to 12-15 years to decontaminate a hazardous waste site and the time consuming process only points to the rising costs, need for funds, complexity of cleaning up and the challenges faced by the EPA. According to the report, the $253 billion price tag will be borne predominately by the polluters or PRPs. The EPA administrator has recently suggested two other possible approaches that may help stretch Superfund’s dismal $450 million budget: creating economic incentives for businesses to clean up sites; and creating a management system that would allow communities to have a realistic view of cleanup costs and priorities4. The studies indicate that EPA has not been able to implement changes to its policies according to the waste generation rate in the US: This can be given with the following chart5: Statement of the Legislature’s Interest in the Issue: In California, Sacramento County five hazardous waste sites have been identified by the EPA and the CERCLIS ID or Site name for these sites are6 Aerojet General Corp - CAD980358832 Jibboom Junkyard - CAD980737613 Mather Air Force Base - CA8570024143 McClellan Air Force Base (GW Contam) -CA4570024337 Sacramento Army Depot - CA0210020780   Construction Completion has been reported for the Jibboom Junkyard and Sacramento Army Depot and the EPA has deleted the Jibboom Junkyard from its NPL list in 1991. However potential hazardous sites in the Sacramento county do remain and considering EPA’s financial situation, the clean up problem for these sites needs to be addressed. The Waste Management performance ranking of the states can show the position of CA which seems to be below several other states7 STATES: PRE- IMPORT/ EXPORT PRE- LIMINARY RANK POST IMPORT/ EXPORT FINAL RANK South Dakota (0.400) 2 =0.400 1 Wisconsin (1) (0.448) 4 =0.580 2 North Dakota (0.628) 9 =0.628 3 Colorado (0.649) 11 =0.649 4 Oklahoma (0.663) 12 =0.663 5 Minnesota (0.591) 7 =0.679 6 Idaho (2) (0.732) 16 =0.765 7 Louisiana (0.769) 20 =0.776 8 Maine(1) (0.636) 10 =0.784 9 Washington (0.604) 8 =0.830 10 Connecticut (0.694) 13 =0.848 11 Dist. of Columbia (.0427) 3 =0.872 12 Alaska (0.853) 26 =0.876 13 New Mexico (0.712) 14 =0.888 14 New Jersey (0.560) 5 =0.907 15 Nebraska(1) (0.881) 29 =0.928 16 Rhode Island (0.372) 1 =0.929 17 Massachusetts (0.784) 21 =0.958 18 Florida (0.966) 32 =0.966 19 Kentucky (0.813) 23 =0.982 20 Maryland (0.742) 17 =0.988 21 California (0.976) 34 =0.989 22 Pre-Existing Policies Since 1996, the governments reserve for cleaning up Superfund sites has been steadily depleted. The reserve decreased from $3.8 billion to an estimated $159 million in 2003. The overall budget is now $450 million for cleaning up, according to latest EPA release which is nowhere close to the much needed $253 billion specified. Therefore, Congress needs to implement measures to improve the financial conditions of the EPA. The Congress must increasingly draw off general tax revenues to finance the annual Superfund appropriation. General Revenues make up 50% of current funding and was expected to increase to as much as 80% for fiscal year (FY) 2004, according to the Congressional Research Service. Eventually, the fund reserves were expected to hit zero and general appropriations could fund Superfund in its entirety.8 The federal sponsorship is not sufficient for EPA funding and it projects that no money will be available in the fund in a few years. According to EPA policies and guidance, the costs of cleaning up for sites are determined and supported on the basis of several factors. Each Region’s indirect cost pool, including appropriate Regional support costs, is divided by the Region’s direct costs incurred for site-specific activities to determine the Region’s indirect cost rate for the fiscal year, which is expressed as a percentage of direct site costs. The Region’s indirect cost rate is multiplied against the direct costs incurred for a particular Superfund site to determine the amount of indirect costs that will be allocated to that site. By adding the direct site costs and the indirect costs allocated to a particular site, or group of sites, the total cost for that site or group of sites is determined. Monitoring of hazardous waste sites and risk assessment guidance seem to be important and even related to cost considerations9. Some of the policy directions are focused on the following objectives: Development of a monitoring plan and monitoring decisions and objectives Development of risk assessment plans and implementation of such programs Evaluating direct and indirect costs of the clean up process Considering the cost perspective, in 2003, the Senate rejected Lautenberg Amendment No. 408, which called to require polluters to pay for cleanup of toxic waste sites by reinstating the original superfund taxes. Policy Options The National Strategy to Manage Post Construction Completion Activities at Superfund Sites emphasizes that (1) the budgetary constraints facing local, tribal, state, and federal governments may affect their capability to maintain and oversee remedies at sites, and (2) as more sites are entering the PCC (Post Construction Completion) phase of cleanup, the potential scopes of O&M (operation and maintenance)10. Some of the measures that could be suggested are that the federal government could reinstate the Superfund tax on chemicals and petroleum to generate the funds. Another option is to privatize Superfund sites, by collecting the expenses from the PRPs11. There is a general slowdown in the number of Superfund cleanups throughout the country. Because of health risks such as cancer, asthma, birth defects, heart problems, and neural disabilities, Superfund sites need to be cleaned up quickly and efficiently12. Thus policy options could include: Reinstate the original Superfund taxes so that there are funds to clean up the sites. Privatize Superfund Apart from reinstating superfund taxes to generate funds, collecting expenses from PRPs and privatizing Superfund sites; some of the policy options that have been proposed in recent times include: Creating economic incentives for businesses to clean up sites; Creating a management system that would allow communities to have a realistic view of cleanup costs and priorities. Advantages and Disadvantages of Policy Options Reinstating Superfund taxes and generating funds from the potentially responsible persons seem to be a viable option for the EPA8. The advantages of this could be the process of generating and collecting funds, which would raise the $1.5 billion in 2005 to $16.2 billion through 2014. However there is considerable opposition to this bill, due to the tax implications. The advantages of privatization of superfund are that this will help to increase efficiency, harness individual knowledge and initiative, ensure competition, and allocate resources efficiently. Any privatization of Superfund involves complicated legislative processes and cannot be done too easily. Creating economic incentives for businesses to clean up sites could be advantageous but may prove to be expensive for the EPA. Spreading community awareness by creating a management system could be a viable option but will require a through implementation plan and a structured policy approach. Conclusions/Recommendation Since the likelihood of reinstating the original Superfund tax is small, the government should consider privatizing Superfund through incremental reforms. This should solve the budget crisis and clean up the sites quickly and efficiently. This would also decrease the health risks in affected populations. Considering the pros and cons of these policy options, creating economic incentives for businesses to clean up sites may be expensive for the EPA, thus creating management systems allowing communities to have a realistic view of costs and priorities could be recommended. Sources Consulted/Recommended Boxer, Barbara. "Letter to EPA Administrator Leavht." Available On-line: http://jeffords.senate.gov/Oct%2028Leavitt.pdf. December 2, 2004. U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. "Majority and Minority Press Releases." Available On-line: http://epw.senate.gov/searchresults.cfm?search=superfund. December 4, 2004. EPA. "Superfund." Available On-line: http://www.epa.gov/superfund/index.htm. December 4, 2004. Schmidt, Charles W. "Not-So-Superfund: Growing Needs vs. Declining Dollars." Environmental Health Perspectives. Vol.111. Number 3. March 2003. DeLong, James V. Privatizing Superfund: How To Clean Up Hazardous Waste. Cato Policy Analysis No. 247. December 18, 1995. Lybarger, Jeffrey A. Medical Costs and Lost Productivity from Health Conditions at Volatile Organic Compound-Contaminated Superfund Sites. Environmental Research, Section A. 79, 9-19 (1998). Article No. ER 983845. National Priorities List Sites in California – Available On line: http://www.epa.gov/superfund/sites/npl/ca.htm, retrieved 2005 Key Dates in Superfund – available online http://www.epa.gov/superfund/action/law/keydates.htm EPA, retrieved 2005 OMB watch – Superfund Lacks Funds to Clean up Toxic Wastes, 2005 http://www.ombwatch.org/article/articleview/2575/1/219?TopicID=1 Laws, Policies & Guidances – Superfund EPA, 2005 http://www.epa.gov/superfund/action/index.htm Zerowaste America online, 2005 http://www.zerowasteamerica.org/MunicipalWasteManagementReport1998.htm Read More