New report says Uncle Sam is nation's most damaging environmental villain
WASHINGTON, DC -- Who's the worst polluter in the United States? The federal government, charges a new investigative report: It has a sordid history of leaking radioactive waste into drinking water, dumping sewage into national parks, spewing jet fuel into the ocean, and pouring PCBs into rivers.
In fact, federal agencies have contaminated at least 61,155 sites around the USA, produce more toxic waste annually than the nation's five largest chemical companies, and have polluted 475 billion gallons of ground water, the Libertarian Party noted today.
"There is no doubt: The federal government is the greatest environmental villain in the nation," said Steve Dasbach, the party's national director. "When it comes to polluting the land and water, granting immunity to environmental criminals, and passing the costs on to taxpayers, the federal government is an environmentalist's worst nightmare."
According to a major, four-part investigative report in the Boston Globe, the federal government is "the worst polluter in the land" -- and the estimated cost of cleaning up the damage done by federal agencies and the military could pass $300 billion. That's five times the cost of environmental harm done by all private businesses combined.
Even more chilling, many federal agencies are exempt from environmental laws such as the Clean Water Act; individual bureaucrats are immune from criminal prosecution; and Congress has even passed a law that protects the military from having to pay environmental fines. As a result, the Globe noted, the federal government "has a license to pollute."
Some of the more egregious examples of environmental destruction uncovered by the Globe include:
* The Environmental Protection Agency's laboratories in Lexington, Massachusetts were discovered leaking mercury into ground water.
* In Yellowstone National Park, "tens of thousands of gallons of raw sewage" have been dumped into pristine lakes and streams. Although this would be a crime if committed by a private company, the Park Service is exempt from the Clean Water Act.
* In Washington's Puget Sound, the U.S. Navy's aircraft carrier USS Kitty Hawk dumped 6,000 gallons of jet fuel into the water. A private ship would have been fined $90,000 for that crime; the Navy paid nothing, and refused to allow state environmental inspectors to board its ships.
* The Department of Defense generates 750,000 tons of hazardous waste annually -- which is more than the country's five largest chemical companies.
* The Department of Energy has polluted 475 billion gallons of ground water, thanks to years of missile and bomb production.
* The U.S. Mint has "released hazardous chemicals into the air" while producing commemorative coins.
* The cost to taxpayers to clean up the federal government's 61,155 toxic sites is estimated at $300 billion -- compared to an estimated cost of only $57 billion to clean up all the pollution caused by chemical and oil companies.
* NASA has admitted to 913 potential contaminated sites in 10 states.
* In the Shenandoah River in Virginia, a military contractor has been dumping toxic PCBs into the river for 50 years with the approval of -- and subsidies from -- the federal government.
* It will take at least 75 years to clean up 113 radioactive sites created by the Department of Energy -- which is also facing lawsuits from workers who were sickened by exposure to nuclear weapon radiation.
* In 1996, 27% of all government facilities were not in compliance with clean water laws. In fact, federal facilities are "more likely to violate water standards" than private companies.
"It's the biggest, dirtiest secret in the environmental movement," said Dasbach. "The federal government -- which people naively expect to protect us from environmental hazards -- is actually putting Americans at risk with an astonishing onslaught of radiation, chemicals, and other toxins. And the politicians and bureaucrats are immune from the laws they pass, and immune from the criminal penalties ordinary people face.
"Remember that fact the next time you ask politicians to protect you from environmental ravages from corporations and private business. It's not like asking a fox to guard the hen house; it's like asking a radioactive, PCB-tainted, sewage-dripping government fox to guard the hen house -- and then being charged $300 billion for the privilege."
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