EPA is pitching its plan to review contaminated sites that have remained on Superfund’s proposed National Priorities List (NPL) but have never been finalized as NPL sites as part of the Trump EPA’s Superfund reforms, even as sources familiar with the issue say such reviews have occurred periodically and do not warrant labeling as a reform exercise.
A bipartisan group of six former EPA administrators is endorsing a series of recommendations from former agency staff and political officials to “reset” the agency so that it can tackle looming major environmental issues such as climate change with a forward-looking plan that includes removing politics from its scientific and economic analyses.
The state’s attorney general is expanding an investigation of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) contamination in the state to include natural resource damages.
Two federal circuit courts have ruled recently in favor of allowing a degree of flexibility in determining the triggers for two different statutes of limitations when filing Superfund cost recovery actions or contribution actions, rejecting lower court decisions that held the actions were time-barred.
The Defense Department (DOD) is defending its decision to use a categorical exclusion from environmental review requirements for a contract to dispose of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) through incineration, disputing environmentalists’ lawsuit citing extra-record material and trying to apply defense law limits on such burning.
EPA and Utah have agreed to settle the state’s legal claims over the massive 2015 Gold King Mine wastewater spill that was set off by an agency-led cleanup project, with the agency agreeing to provide Clean Water Act (CWA) cleanup grants for affected areas and setting deadlines to begin cleanups under the Superfund program.
New York’s adoption of a first-in-the-nation drinking water limit for the emerging contaminant 1,4-dioxane could set a potential model for other states as they contemplate regulating the chemical, after EPA this past February deferred a decision to set such a standard in order to await additional data.
A key House lawmaker backing a measure to force EPA to regulate per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) through various environmental laws is arguing the fight over the provision is not over despite its recent exclusion from a House defense bill, saying the measure is likely to reappear -- particularly if Joe Biden is elected president.
With pressure mounting to find safe disposal methods for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), a waste management company official is urging state regulators to consider lined landfills as a method for sequestering remediation and soil PFAS waste, even as environmentalists have expressed concern about landfill disposal options.
Rhode Island is urging a federal district judge to reject Shell Oil’s bid to dismiss a novel suit claiming the company is violating two major environmental laws by not accounting for climate change impacts on a facility it owns in the state, arguing the Conservation Law Foundation (CLF) has met all the legal requirements for filing its case.
