Tag: superfund sites

Climate Change, Eco, Environment, Ethics, soil March 13, 2021May 14, 2023

Hanford Superfund Site, Part 2: Worry About It for 24,100 Years

Washington (ONGC) Analysis | March 13, 2021 by Attorney Michael Wells

Do you ever think about the vastness of space? Or do you ponder if the universe never ends and is expanding for eternity? On a more personal level, perhaps Earth will be destroyed by an exploding star one day. Maybe you worry about such things, but here on Earth there are known threats, namely the Hanford Superfund Site that will be a problem for possibly 24,100 years, which is the half-life of Plutonium contained on the site, the source of Plutonium used to make the atom bomb dropped on Nagasaki that ended World War II. And the Hanford site is filled with Plutonium, which is buried in 177 storage tanks within sight of the Columbia River.

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Climate Change, Eco, Environment, Ethics, soil March 4, 2021May 14, 2023

Hanford Superfund Site: An American Chernobyl Waiting to Happen

Washington (ONGC) Analysis | March 4, 2021 by Attorney Michael Wells

Before COVID-19 hit some Americans probably believed a magic forcefield shielded the country from events other less fortunate nations endured. Not anymore. In the fall of 2019, critics scoffed after watching the hit Netflix show, Cherynobyl, that Cherynobyl could not happen in the United States because Americans would be too well prepared. The Hanford Superfund nuclear site in Washington state has 56 million gallons of waste from plutonium, will take 50 years to clean up, and has caused cancer, dementia, and death. Ronan Farrow called it in a 2016 article, “an American Chernobyl.”

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Climate Change, Eco, Environment, Ethics, soil February 12, 2021April 26, 2022

Don’t Drink Poisonous Water | The Shocking Hack

Washington (GGM) Analysis | February 12, 2020 by Michael Wells

Drinking poisonous water leads to cancer and other things that will kill you. Everyone knows that, but what if you do not know you are drinking water contaminated with poison? Surely such a thing cannot happen. Laws and regulations exist, and the government protects people. Unless the government knew about the poisonous water and covered it up for decades. If you doubt this, then ask the possibly one-million people who drank the poisonous water surrounding the Camp LeJeune superfund site. Or at least you can ask the ones who were not killed.

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Climate Change, Eco, Environment, Ethics, soil January 29, 2021May 14, 2023

Superfund ‘Timebombs’ Threaten to Explode

Washington (ONGC) Analysis | January 29, 2021 by Michael Wells

All organic life requires air, water, a place to exist, and a food source. But all of these things must be clean or there cannot be life, at least not long term. Throughout the United States, thousands of ticking environmental “timebombs” called Superfund sites are ready to explode. The poisons and other pollutants contained in these sites threaten all organic life in the United States and throughout the Earth.

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Climate Change, Health, National Security November 18, 2019January 7, 2020

Weather Bombs & the Superfund Sites

Washington (GGM) Analysis | November 18, 2019
by Noreen Wise

There’s no better example of climate injustice in the Unites States than those Americans living near Superfund sites. Superfund sites came to be in 1980, and are
labeled with this classification based on hazardous waste contamination.

The United States currently has 1,344 Superfund sites on the National Priorities list
An additional 48 sites are in the process of being added
There are 2 million Americans who live near Superfund sites
A large number of the sites are near populated coastal communities — Portsmouth, NH, Boston, New York City as well as both coasts in Florida.
Hurricane Harvey flooded over a dozen Superfund Sites in the Houston area

Following World War II, it was common practice for corporations to dump their waste into the ground. No one thought much of it at the time. But eventually, medical conditions began to spike, and we grew to learn that toxins cause major health risks and in many cases lead to cancer, heart problems and birth defects. So the EPA was tasked to clean up these life-threatening toxic locations.

And then along came climate change extremes. Weather bombs are fierce deluges over a relatively short period of time that result in major flooding. Flooding near a Superfund site results in water spreading the toxins far and wide, endangering the well-being of millions more people. The toxins are usually invisible. So, once spread, it’s nearly impossible to retrieve, and families are left unaware that they’ve now been impacted.

There now needs to be a major push in congress to address this calamity immediately. The health consequences of not moving quickly, are extreme and incalculable.