EPA is telling two very different stories

I have been following the situation in Ambler, Penn., for the last few years. The place is highly contaminated with amphibole fibers. It was the subject of a CERCLA cleanup finished in 1993.

Capping projects were apparently even more stringent than those of Libby using concrete to cover the asbestos fibers.  EPA left behind institutional controls similar to those proposed in Libby, to be managed by the local government and since then the cleanup has suffered large failures. The state and local government are unable to respond correctly or at all, and EPA isn’t scheduled for a checkup visit until 2017.

It is unclear what authority or finance ability EPA has returning to the site. The agency certainly has no motivation to bring much attention to their previous failures. In the meantime, a large residential construction project is planned directly on top of one of the left behind asbestos areas, and EPA says that when they do return they will have no authority over this site since it somehow became the State of Pennsylvania’s problem.

Although I do not have all the information for Ambler, I am certain that the site has been monitored over the years in a similar way to that proposed by the leaders of the cities of Troy and Libby, ambient air monitoring. If there is anything that the citizens of Libby should be well aware of by now, it is that ambient air monitoring for amphibole fiber does not work. At all. Environmental exposures to Libby amphibole, as they are with all tremolite and analog fibers, are extremely localized excursion exposures.

The construction of a new EPA fireplace inside a wall insulated with vermiculite, the replacement of a ceiling light or fan in a ceiling left with vermiculite insulation, the use of a back hoe for trenching, the gardening activities of residents, the mowing of lawns, and so forth will not show up at ambient air monitors.  Environmentally, it was never the fibers that would have shown up at air monitors that have caused the problems in Libby. It has always been the excursion levels of exposure that has led to disease and death.

There is widespread private talk among scientists and even EPA officials that institutional controls never work. That is certainly the case in Ambler. Local, regional and state politicians do not make their mark on society by going back and correcting again and again mistakes made by the federal government. They make their mark by building a new bridge, building or park, with a shiny bronze plaque placed at the site with their name on it.

Deeply related to Ambler, is the idea that the people must feel secure that EPA’s actions have provided safety to the public.  In Ambler, this came to be without merit. 

In Libby, they pitch the concept of 100,000 times cleaner, which is a nonsensical sales pitch, as demonstrated at a recent asbestos conference. At that conference Lynn Woodbury gave a presentation on behalf of EPA’s David Berry and Deborah McKean, who originally reported to the newspapers of Libby. 

Rather than go into detail of the presentation I am going to quote my question to her, to which there was no response. “You opened your presentation with the statement – ‘we are not reconstructing past exposure levels in Libby,’ but Libby newspapers you have said that Libby is 100,000 times cleaner today. Why would you tell the newspapers in Libby something completely different than you tell a room full of scientists?”

Why would the agency tell two different stories? 

— Terry Trent is a biologist and asbestos researcher. This is the first in a two-part series of guest columns from Trent regarding EPA actions in the Libby Superfund site.