in the wake of Hurricane Harvey, which flooded
more than a dozen Superfund sites in the
Houston area, with breaches reported at two.
At the time, an EPA spokesman derided AP’s
reporting as “fear-mongering.”
GAO investigators looked at 1,571 Superfund
sites — locations around the country
contaminated by hazardous waste being
dumped, left out in the open or otherwise
improperly managed. That number does not
include Superfund sites owned by the Defense
Department and other federal agencies.
At least 945 of the sites are in areas identified as
at greater risk of floods, storm surge from major
hurricanes, wildfires or sea-level rise of 3 feet (0.9
meters) or more, the GAO says.
Broken down, that includes 783 Superfund sites
at greater risk of flooding under climate change,
234 Superfund sites at high or very high risk
from wildfires and 187 sites vulnerable to storm
surge from any Category 4 or 5 hurricane, the
researchers said.
Senate Democrats asked for the Gao review. A
dozen senior congressional Democrats urged the
agency to follow the GAO recommendations.
“By refusing to address the worsening impacts
of climate change – from flooding to wildfires
to more frequent extreme weather events
- at our nation’s Superfund sites, this EPA is
putting public health at risk,” Sen. Tom Carper of
Delaware, the ranking Democrat on the Senate’s
Environment and Public Works Committee, said.
GAO investigators cited California’s 150-year-old
Iron Mountain mine, where Superfund operators
daily prevent tons of toxic sludge from pouring