Is the EPA Playing Dumb on Dispersants?

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Is the EPA Playing Dumb on Dispersants?

— _US Coast Guard_

(http://cgvi.uscg.mil/media/main.php?g2_itemId=524487 & g2_imageViewsIndex=1)

A career whistleblower says the agency knows more than it's letting on

about the risks of the oil-spill clean-up chemicals.

— By _Kate Sheppard_ (http://motherjones.com/authors/kate-sheppard)

_7 Comments_

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Tue Jul. 20, 2010 3:00 AM PDT

An Environmental Protection Agency staff member is accusing his employer of

being coy when it comes to dispersant use in the Gulf. Career

whistleblower Hugh Kaufman says EPA officials know that the chemicals present a

threat

to public health and the Gulf ecosystem and should be banned; they just

don't want to say so.

Kaufman, a senior policy analyst in the EPA’s Office of Solid Waste and

Emergency Response, alleges that agency administrator sidestepped

the issue last week _in her answers to questions_

(http://motherjones.com/blue-marble/2010/07/senate-pledges-dispersant-reform-it-\

too-little-too-late)

about whether the agency has the authority to call off use of

dispersants in the Gulf. The agency, he says, is deliberately downplaying the

threat—

and its own role in regulating the chemicals—to protect itself from

liability and keep the public from getting too alarmed.

This is far from the first time Kaufman has raised concerns about the EPA's

handling of a major national disaster. In fact, he has been blowing

whistles on the EPA since he began working there in 1971, just a few months

after

it was founded. He criticized the administration's handling of

hazardous waste issues, including the infamous _Love Canal example_

(http://www.spokesmanreview.com/news-story.asp?date=122001 & ID=s1073110) in the

late

1970s and is credited with _spurring the formation_

(http://articles.mcall.com/1992-10-01/news/2894888_1_superfund-hazardous-begley)

of the Superfund

program. In 1982 he _went after the Reagan administration_

(http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,925874-3,00.html) for not

enforcing laws

on hazardous waste and toxic chemicals as well, and helped send deputy EPA

administrator Rita Lavelle _to jail for perjury_

(http://www.nytimes.com/1985/01/19/us/around-the-nation-conviction-of-ex-officia\

l-of-epa-is-upheld.html

) in 1983. The 2002 book _Whistleblowing_

(http://www.amazon.com/Whistleblowing-Works--a-Ann-/dp/1588261395/r\

ef=sr_1_1?s=books & ie=UTF8 & qid

=1279474918 & sr=1-1) includes an entire section on Kaufman.

Most recently, Kaufman exposed the agency's efforts to hide information

about _health risks_

(http://archives.cnn.com/2002/TECH/science/02/24/rec.wtc.air.quality/) from air

pollution for responders at the World Trade Center

site after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. At that time, he

was the chief investigator in the office of the EPA ombudsman—but soon after

he blew the whistle, then-EPA administrator Christie Todd Whitman decided

to _eliminate the ombudsman's office altogether_

(http://www.peer.org/news/news_id.php?row_id=967) , a move Kaufman says was

meant to silence his

complaints. He's still at the agency, but has been shifted away from his

watchdog

role.

" What's going on in the Gulf is the same cover up that was going with the

9/11 environmental issue, " said Kaufman. " The Bush White House ordered EPA

to lie about the environmental and public health situation at the World

Trade Center because of economic ramifications. So they did. "

" I've been through this before, " he continued. " It was the same kind of

crap. " ....

Kate Sheppard covers energy and environmental politics in Mother '

Washington bureau. For more of her stories, _click here_

(http://motherjones.com/authors/kate-sheppard) . She Tweets _here_

(http://twitter.com/kate_sheppard) .

Sharon Noonan Kramer