EPA Re-Evaluates the Risk from Fluoride Exposure

There has long been a debate about the use of fluoride in drinking water, pitting those who strongly believe in the benefits of fluoride to dental hygiene against those who even believe that there is no safe exposure level for fluoride. Recent EPA risk analyses of fluoride in groundwater will likely result in lower drinking water standards for fluoride. While the major impacts of these efforts will likely be to drinking water fluoridation and the use of fluoride-based insecticides in agriculture, industries with environmental issues that include fluoride will also feel the backlash, resulting in greater investigation and remediation costs. Click here to Read More.

Will EPA Meet Its 2020 Goals for the RCRA Corrective Action Program?

EPA recently reported in its annual performance report for 2010 that remedy construction has been completed at 37 percent of the 3,746 facilities on the RCRA Corrective Action 2020 baseline. To meet the goal of the 2020 Initiative, EPA and authorized states need to have achieved remedy construction status at 95 percent of the baseline facilities by the year 2020. With only nine years to go, what are the chances of meeting this ambitious goal?
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Is Excavated Soil Considered Hazardous?

Through the use of the Area of Contamination (AOC) policy, soil contaminated with a listed waste or exhibiting a hazardous waste characteristic which is excavated during pipeline work or construction may not need to be managed as hazardous if the soil is kept within the immediate area and returned to the trench. Read More