The investigative arm of Congress, the General Accountability Office (GAO), today released a report admonishing the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for their failures to use health-based standards to test sites that previously had been a processing or receiving facility for contaminated vermiculite ore and to adequately notify the public of the health risks from this particularly hazardous form of naturally occurring asbestos.

    The report was requested by U.S. Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) in 2005 after reports in Times of Trenton showed that the public may not have received timely and accurate information from state, local and federal agency officials about the level of contamination at the now closed W.R. Grace facility in Hamilton, New Jersey. The Hamilton site is one of over 250 sites across the country that received asbestos contaminated vermiculite ore from a mine in Libby, MT owned by W.R. Grace & Co. 

    “The GAO’s report confirms that the EPA failed to put people’s health first,” said Smith. “The government used a totally flawed testing method that is riddled with errors and failed to adequately notify the public that these contaminated sites—like the old W.R. Grace facility in Hamilton—carry significant risks to their health. That can never happen again.”

    Smith continued, “This is a devastating report for the EPA. To regain public trust, they must follow the GAO’s recommendations to re-evaluate each site with health-based testing methods instead of using criteria they seemingly pulled out of thin air.”

    The Smith-requested GAO report blasts the methods used by the EPA to test for contamination in the sites that received vermiculite ore from W.R. Grace’s mine in Libby, MT. In testing the sites, the EPA used a standard of 1% asbestos by weight to determine the extent of contamination. The report states that this standard was established based as a result of the outdated technology used to test the soil, not as a result of any health standard. 

    Smith had strong words for the EPA’s standard, saying “In this instance, the agency established to protect people from environmental risks failed to even properly identify the risks. Congress must hold it accountable and make sure changes are made swiftly.”

    The report also takes the EPA to task for failing to adequately notify the public of the health hazards that the contaminated sites posed to their communities.

    As an example, the report cites the EPA’s purchase of a small ad in Hamilton-area newspapers that did not identify the type of contamination nor the exact location as the only action the agency took to notify Hamilton residents of the asbestos contamination at the old W.R. Grace site.

    Smith called the EPA’s failures in Hamilton a “microcosm of what is a nationwide problem.”

    “It is shocking that the EPA is so seemingly cavalier with people’s lives,” said Smith. “The EPA has an obligation to ensure that they put public health first. Truth is important, especially for those at risk, so the EPA must go above and beyond the call of duty to inform people of health risks in a thorough and uniform manner across all regions of the country.”

On the web:

Read the GAO report on the EPA's and sites receiving asbestos contaminated ore from Libby, Mt