Superfund

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is relying more and more on responsible parties--usually either current or former hazardous waste site owners, waste generators, or waste transporters--to study and clean up sites. But this approach requires EPA supervision to ensure that cleanups comply with Superfund regulations. Differences in the extent of treatment or containment at various sites with similar contaminants or histories raise concerns about the comparability of these cleanups. GAO's analysis of cleanup plans for fiscal years 1987 through 1990 revealed that cleanups managed by responsible parties tended to contain rather than treat waste more often than EPA-managed cleanups. Many responsible-party cleanup plans do not consistently document the extent of the cleanup, justify the strategy chosen, or identify the eventual cleanup remedy--raising questions about the long-term effectiveness of the cleanups and their ability to protect human health and the environment. Recent EPA initiatives show promise in overcoming many of these problems; given the decentralized nature of the cleanup plan approval process, however, EPA needs effective oversight to ensure that regions are accountable for approving complete and consistent cleanup plans. To this end, EPA needs cleanup remedy data that are accurate, reliable, and conducive to management analysis. GAO summarized this report in testimony before Congress; see: Superfund: Problems With the Completeness and Consistency of Site Cleanup Plans, by Richard L. Hembra, Director of Environmental Protection Issues, before the Subcommittee on Superfund, Ocean and Water Protection, Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, GAO/T-RCED-92-69, June 25, 1992 (13 pages), and before the Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight, House Committee on Public Works and Transportation, GAO/T-RCED-92-70, June 30, 1992 (13 pages).

GAO found that: (1) EPA believed that PRP-managed cleanups used waste treatment, rather than containment, methods in about the same percentage of cleanups as in EPA-managed cleanups; (2) analysis of ROD for fiscal years 1987 through 1990 showed that PRP contained waste in 43 percent of cleanups, while EPA contained waste in about 25 percent of its cleanups, regardless of site characteristics; (3) ROD based on PRP-conducted site studies consistently included more waste containment techniques than did ROD based on EPA-conducted site studies; (4) ROD frequently lacked key information detailing cleanup plan objectives, proposed cleanup levels, and selected cleanup remedies and cleanup goals that were specified in ROD varied considerably; (5) ROD frequently did not adequately explain and justify remedy selection and approval and did not always specify the selected remedy; (6) EPA regional offices do not consistently follow EPA guidance on documenting changes to ROD; (7) EPA has begun initiatives to decrease variations in cleanup goals, improve the consistency of risk assessments, develop new ROD guidance, and implement ROD quality reviews; (8) EPA has several information systems containing some Superfund cleanup data, but the systems are not automated and no one system contains all of the information needed for EPA to monitor trends or analyze ROD; and (9) EPA information systems also contain inaccurate, incomplete, and unreliable data.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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