Chemical controversy goes underground.Chemical controversy goes underground The Environmental Protection Agency Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), independent agency of the U.S. government, with headquarters in Washington, D.C. It was established in 1970 to reduce and control air and water pollution, noise pollution, and radiation and to ensure the safe handling and (EPA EPA eicosapentaenoic acid. EPA abbr. eicosapentaenoic acid EPA, n.pr See acid, eicosapentaenoic. EPA, n. ) last week proposed new rules for the disposal of hazardous wastes in underground wells. At least one environmental group immediately threatened to sue the EPA, arguing that the new standards would allow poisons to contaminate con·tam·i·nate v. 1. To make impure or unclean by contact or mixture. 2. To expose to or permeate with radioactivity. con·tam·i·nant n. drinking water drinking water supply of water available to animals for drinking supplied via nipples, in troughs, dams, ponds and larger natural water sources; an insufficient supply leads to dehydration; it can be the source of infection, e.g. leptospirosis, salmonellosis, or of poisoning, e.g. sources. The rules would apply to the approximately 7 billion gallons of hazardous chemical wastes that are disposed of each year in "injection wells'--mile-deep underground chambers lined with cement, steel and rock. The controversy centers upon interpretation of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act The Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), enacted in 1976, is a Federal law of the United States contained in 42 U.S.C. §§6901-6992k. It is usually pronounced as "rick-rah" or "Wreck-rah. , amended by Congress in 1984. The act provides a timetable for ensuring that injection wells allow "no migration of hazardous constituents' into the ground. The EPA wants to define acceptable levels of hazard by balancing safety concerns with the high cost of completely preventing groundwater contamination. Environmentalists argue that such a "cost-compromised' standard is not what Congress intended, and that such a standard will allow dangerous levels of wastes to leak into the ground. |
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