The Change Mariner

Superfund Program Virtually Bankrupt

CSMonitor:
But now, the government fund that's paid for that cleanup at a cost of more than $1 billion a year is virtually bankrupt. At the same time, it's becoming harder and harder to clean up the remaining, really nasty sites.

As a result, the number of high-priority Superfund sites cleaned up annually has declined for three years running.

The Environmental Protection Agency announced last week that 40 high-priority hazardous waste sites had been cleaned up during the fiscal year just ended. That brings the total number of such cleanups to 886 since the Superfund program began in 1980, shortly after the infamous Love Canal episode in western New York. Still, that leaves 1,203 sites on the "National Priorities List" that haven't been fully cleaned up.