February, 19 2020, 11:00pm EDT
Department of Defense Illegally Burning Stockpiles of Toxic "Forever Chemicals"
Communities challenge Trump administration’s PFAS incineration.
WASHINGTON
Today, environmental and community groups sued the Department of Defense (DOD) over its contracts to burn millions of gallons of unused firefighting foam containing PFAS in incinerators across the country. The DOD is the nation's largest user of firefighting foam containing PFAS, a class of highly persistent and toxic chemicals that are known to cause cancer, liver disease, infertility, and other serious health effects.
According to government documents Earthjustice obtained via Freedom of Information Act requests, PFAS burning already took place, or is taking place, in the towns of East Liverpool, Ohio; Arkadelphia and El Dorado, Arkansas; and Cohoes, New York. The contracts also authorize PFAS incineration in other locations, including Port Arthur, Texas, and Sauget, Illinois. Incineration may already be underway in those and other locations, too, but DOD has not fully responded to FOIA requests seeking a full list of incineration locations.
Earthjustice filed the lawsuit on behalf of Save Our County (East Liverpool, OH), Community In-Power and Development Association (Port Arthur, TX), United Congregations of Metro East (St. Louis Metro East), and Sierra Club, all of whom represent members in the communities where DOD has authorized PFAS incineration.
For years DOD used toxic firefighting foams containing FPAS during drills and fires in bases across the country. PFAS from these foams polluted the soil and water of neighboring communities. Facing multiple lawsuits and billions of dollars in potential liability from past releases, DOD chose to incinerate its unused firefighting foam. However, DOD failed to conduct any environmental review before approving this incineration, bringing into new communities the risk of PFAS emissions and other pollution that are proven to harm public health.
"As faith leaders, we believe that every life matters and that the government is responsible for protecting all people, especially our children. Our St. Louis-Metro-East Area already hosts multiple superfund sites and is profoundly impacted by air pollution. It is unconscionable to expect that we bear even more burden by allowing PFAS incineration in our home. This is another disaster waiting to happen," said Cheryl Sommer, vice president of United Congregations of Metro-East, a group of pastors, church members, and other community organizations throughout St. Louis Metro East.
"We don't take potential threats to our health and the safety of our community lightly. The incinerator in East Liverpool is a comprehensive health threat to those in the area, especially since they are now accepting this toxic military waste. The facility is a habitual violator of EPA regulations and continues to do so year after year. Bringing in yet another toxic chemical into our neighborhoods will have untold consequences without proper environmental review," said Alonzo Spencer president of Save Our County, in East Liverpool, OH.
"It is critical for local communities to be informed of potentially dangerous chemical operations that could impact the health of the residents. It's not just the families living near the incinerator, we don't even understand how many people living in this area could potentially be impacted or how far the emissions from burning PFAS might travel. We have a right to know what's in the air we are breathing, in order to decide what's best for ourselves and our families," said Hilton Kelley, founder and director of Community In- Power and Development Association in Port Arthur, TX.
"Burning toxic firefighting foam at hazardous waste incinerators is a huge mistake, posing public health risks to residents living near the incinerators and downwind from the incinerators. The incineration of this foam should be blocked by state and local officials. It is unconscionable that the Department of Defense has not informed local governments, state environmental agencies and the impacted public that they are doing this. It must be stopped immediately," said Judith Enck, former EPA Regional Administrator and a member of the Sierra Club.
"The DOD needs to investigate alternative treatment technologies that are not incineration or burial. We need to identify technologies that actually destroy these super-toxic chemicals," stated Jane Williams, chair of the Sierra Club National Clean Air Team.
"Incineration does not solve the Defense Department's PFAS problems; it just pawns them off on already overburdened communities," said Jonathan Kalmuss-Katz, a staff attorney with Earthjustice. "PFAS chemicals are used in firefighting foam precisely because they don't burn. Instead of destroying those chemicals, incinerating the foam releases PFAS and other toxins into the air. DOD's decision to authorize large-scale PFAS incineration without considering the health impacts is shortsighted and illegal."
PFAS resist incineration and do not break down under temperatures and conditions that are sufficient to destroy other toxic chemicals. Incomplete incineration may result in PFAS emissions, as well as other toxic chemicals like hydrogen fluoride, which is poisonous, corrosive and flammable.
The lawsuit, filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California, alleges that DOD's PFAS incineration violates the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010 (NDAA).
To read the complaint click here.
To read the full list of incinerators around the country that may be receiving PFAS from DOD click here.
Earthjustice is a non-profit public interest law firm dedicated to protecting the magnificent places, natural resources, and wildlife of this earth, and to defending the right of all people to a healthy environment. We bring about far-reaching change by enforcing and strengthening environmental laws on behalf of hundreds of organizations, coalitions and communities.
800-584-6460LATEST NEWS
UN Chief Warns of Israel's Syria Invasion and Land Seizures
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres stressed the "urgent need" for Israel to "de-escalate violence on all fronts."
Dec 12, 2024
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said Thursday that he is "deeply concerned" by Israel's "recent and extensive violations of Syria's sovereignty and territorial integrity," including a ground invasion and airstrikes carried out by the Israel Defense Forces in the war-torn Mideastern nation.
Guterres "is particularly concerned over the hundreds of Israeli airstrikes on several locations in Syria" and has stressed the "urgent need to de-escalate violence on all fronts throughout the country," said U.N. spokesperson Stephane Dujarric.
Israel claims its invasion and bombardment of Syria—which come as the United States and Turkey have also violated Syrian sovereignty with air and ground attacks—are meant to create a security buffer along the countries' shared border in the wake of last week's fall of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and amid the IDF's ongoing assault on Gaza, which has killed or wounded more than 162,000 Palestinians and is the subject of an International Court of Justice genocide case.
While Israel argues that its invasion of Syria does not violate a 1974 armistice agreement between the two countries because the Assad dynasty no longer rules the neighboring nation, Dujarric said Guterres maintains that Israel must uphold its obligations under the deal, "including by ending all unauthorized presence in the area of separation and refraining from any action that would undermine the cease-fire and stability in Golan."
Israel conquered the western two-thirds of the Golan Heights in 1967 and has illegally occupied it ever since, annexing the seized lands in 1981.
Other countries including France, Russia, and Saudi Arabia have criticized Israel's invasion, while the United States defended the move.
"The Syrian army abandoned its positions in the area... which potentially creates a vacuum that could have been filled by terrorist organizations," U.S. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said at a press briefing earlier this week. "Israel has said that these actions are temporary to defend its borders. These are not permanent actions... We support all sides upholding the 1974 disengagement agreement."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Sanders Says 'Political Movement,' Not Murder, Is the Path to Medicare for All
"Killing people is not the way we're going to reform our healthcare system," he said. "The way we're going to reform our healthcare system is having people come together."
Dec 12, 2024
Addressing the assassination of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson and conversations it has sparked about the country's for-profit system, longtime Medicare for All advocate Sen. Bernie Sanders on Wednesday condemned the murder and stressed that getting to universal coverage will require a movement challenging corporate money in politics.
"Look, when we talk about the healthcare crisis, in my view, and I think the view of a majority of Americans, the current system is broken, it is dysfunctional, it is cruel, and it is wildly inefficient—far too expensive," said Sanders (I-Vt.), whose position is backed up by various polls.
"The reason we have not joined virtually every other major country on Earth in guaranteeing healthcare to all people as a human right is the political power and financial power of the insurance industry and drug companies," he told Jacobin. "It will take a political revolution in this country to get Congress to say, 'You know what, we're here to represent ordinary people, to provide quality care to ordinary people as a human right,' and not to worry about the profits of insurance and drug companies."
Asked about Thompson's alleged killer—26-year-old Luigi Mangione, whose reported manifesto railed against the nation's expensive healthcare system and low life expectancy—Sanders said: "You don't kill people. It's abhorrent. I condemn it wholeheartedly. It was a terrible act. But what it did show online is that many, many people are furious at the health insurance companies who make huge profits denying them and their families the healthcare that they desperately need."
"What you're seeing, the outpouring of anger at the insurance companies, is a reflection of how people feel about the current healthcare system."
"What you're seeing, the outpouring of anger at the insurance companies, is a reflection of how people feel about the current healthcare system," he continued, noting the tens of thousands of Americans who die each year because they can't get to a doctor.
"Killing people is not the way we're going to reform our healthcare system," Sanders added. "The way we're going to reform our healthcare system is having people come together and understanding that it is the right of every American to be able to walk into a doctor's office when they need to and not have to take out their wallet."
"The way we're going to bring about the kind of fundamental changes we need in healthcare is, in fact, by a political movement which understands the government has got to represent all of us, not just the 1%," the senator told Jacobin.
The 83-year-old Vermonter, who was just reelected to what he says is likely his last six-year term, is an Independent but caucuses with Democrats and sought their presidential nomination in 2016 and 2020. He has urged the Democratic Party to recognize why some working-class voters have abandoned it since Republicans won the White House and both chambers of Congress last month. A refusal to take on insurance and drug companies and overhaul the healthcare system, he argues, is one reason.
Sanders—one of the few members of Congress who regularly talks about Medicare for All—isn't alone in suggesting that unsympathetic responses to Thompson's murder can be explained by a privatized healthcare system that fails so many people.
In addition to highlighting Sanders' interview on social media, Congressman Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) pointed out to Business Insider on Wednesday that "you've got thousands of people that are sharing their stories of frustration" in the wake of Thompson's death.
Khanna—a co-sponsor of the Medicare for All Act, led in the House of Representatives by Congressional Progressive Caucus Chair Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.)—made the case that you can recognize those stories without accepting the assassination.
"You condemn the murder of an insurance executive who was a father of two kids," he said. "At the same time, you say there's obviously an outpouring behavior of people whose claims are being denied, and we need to reform the system."
Two other Medicare for All advocates, Reps. Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.) and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), also made clear to Business Insider that they oppose Thompson's murder but understand some of the responses to it.
"Of course, we don't want to see the chaos that vigilantism presents," said Ocasio-Cortez. "We also don't want to see the extreme suffering that millions of Americans confront when your life changes overnight from a horrific diagnosis, and people are led to just some of the worst, not just health events, but the worst financial events of their and their family's lives."
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.)—a co-sponsor of Sanders' Medicare for All Act—similarly toldHuffPost in a Tuesday interview, "The visceral response from people across this country who feel cheated, ripped off, and threatened by the vile practices of their insurance companies should be a warning to everyone in the healthcare system."
"Violence is never the answer, but people can be pushed only so far," she continued. "This is a warning that if you push people hard enough, they lose faith in the ability of their government to make change, lose faith in the ability of the people who are providing the healthcare to make change, and start to take matters into their own hands in ways that will ultimately be a threat to everyone."
After facing some criticism for those comments, Warren added Wednesday: "Violence is never the answer. Period... I should have been much clearer that there is never a justification for murder."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Reports Target Israeli Army for 'Unprecedented Massacre' of Gaza Journalists
"In Gaza, the scale of the tragedy is incomprehensible," wrote Thibaut Bruttin, director general of Reporters Without Borders.
Dec 12, 2024
Reports released this week from two organizations that advocate for journalists underscore just how deadly Gaza has become for media workers.
Reporters Without Borders' (RSF) 2024 roundup, which was published Thursday, found that at least 54 journalists were killed on the job or in connection with their work this year, and 18 of them were killed by Israeli armed forces (16 in Palestine, and two in Lebanon).
The organization has also filed four complaints with the International Criminal Court "for war crimes committed by the Israeli army against journalists," according to the roundup, which includes stats from January 1 through December 1.
"In Gaza, the scale of the tragedy is incomprehensible," wrote Thibaut Bruttin, director general of RSF, in the introduction to the report. Since October 2023, 145 journalists have been killed in Gaza, "including at least 35 who were very likely targeted or killed while working."
Bruttin added that "many of these reporters were clearly identifiable as journalists and protected by this status, yet they were shot or killed in Israeli strikes that blatantly disregarded international law. This was compounded by a deliberate media blackout and a block on foreign journalists entering the strip."
When counting the number of journalists killed by the Israeli army since October 2023 in both Gaza and Lebanon, the tally comes to 155—"an unprecedented massacre," according to the roundup.
Multiple journalists were also killed in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Mexico, Sudan, Myanmar, Colombia, and Ukraine, according to the report, and hundreds more were detained and are now behind bars in countries including Israel, China, and Russia.
Meanwhile, in a statement released Thursday, the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) announced that at least 139 Palestinian journalists and media workers have been killed since the war in Gaza began in 2023, and in a statement released Wednesday, IFJ announced that 104 journalists had perished worldwide this year (which includes deaths from January 1 through December 10). IFJ's number for all of 2024 appears to be higher than RSF because RSF is only counting deaths that occurred "on the job or in connection with their work."
IFJ lists out each of the slain journalists in its 139 count, which includes the journalist Hamza Al-Dahdouh, the son of Al Jazeera's Gaza bureau chief, Wael Al-Dahdouh, who was killed with journalist Mustafa Thuraya when Israeli forces targeted their car while they were in northern Rafah in January 2024.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular