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EPA Knew Wood Piles Were Contaminated, Did Nothing LIBBY, MONTANA
Et tu, Brute? The very government agency responsible for cleaning up the town of Libby, Montana, after it had been contaminated with asbestos from a W.R. Grace vermiculite mine that killed an estimated 400 people and sickened approximately another 2,000, said and did nothing for over three years while tons of wood chips and bark were used by residents, and sent around the country for landscaping.
An Associated Press (AP) story showed that a study by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 2007 found potentially deadly asbestos fibers in four of 20 samples taken from piles of scrap wood. Those piles, primarily wood and bark chips, came from a now-defunct timber mill that took thousands of trees from a forest tainted with asbestos from the W.R. Grace mine.
According to the AP, the wood and bark chips were popular with homeowners wanting to add some landscaping touches to their backyards, and for contractors who packaged it and sold it around the country.
Local officials estimate that 1,000 tons were used in landscaping and erosion control in Libby. Over the past decade, as much as 15,000 tons were sold and hauled out of town to destinations unknown, according to the economic development official who was selling it.
Libby has been declared the worst Superfund cite in the nation's history, and a tragedy of gargantuan proportions. In acting on its charge to clean up the pollution in Libby, the EPA has spent over $370 million over the past 11 years. Contractors in moon suits are commonly seen carting off tainted materials.
Why, then, would EPA officials in charge allow tons and tons of contaminated material to be spread across the lawns of Libby and shipped across the U.S. to contaminate others?
The EPA is now scrambling to gauge the public health risk and is preparing to issue guidelines about how residents should handle the wood, including warning not to move or work with the material when it's dry to avoid stirring up asbestos. But the agency has decided it won't track down where the chips went. It says it no longer has jurisdiction because the material is now classified as a commercial product.
The EPA made no comment about its moral obligation.
Readers of Hearth & Home and members of the hearth industry should be well acquainted with the plight of Libby, and the hearth industry's role in changing-out close to 1,200 old wood stoves there. The project required approximately two years and $2 million in cash or products. It also required a tremendous amount of time from the staff of the Hearth, Patio & Barbecue Association.
Now there's another connection to the hearth industry. The AP story said that EPA regulators were told that most of those wood chips were used to make fuel pellets that are bagged and sold nationwide at major retailers. Agency officials said it was unknown how dangerous it would be to burn those pellets, since the amount of asbestos in the material was never completely quantified.
Eureka Pellet Mills said the material was unsuitable for fuel pellets, so it went to a power plant in Canada. Officials at the company refused to offer specifics to verify that claim, and regulators said they had no intention of tracking down the material.
"We thought we were coming to an end and now we have this issue all over again," said Lerah Parker, a Libby resident who spread dozens of truckloads of the material around her property.
As recently as last fall, truckloads of the chips and bark were still being shipped around the country. The pile, according to local witnesses, was originally as high as a four-story building and covered five acres. That's all gone now. A second pile still towers at least 20 feet.
It was known for years that forests around the W.R. Grace mill were contaminated. To what degree was the question. Records show that trees on more than 9,000 acres have been harvested from the vicinity of the mine since it was acquired by W.R. Grace in 1963.
Studies by the EPA and university researchers have found the forests around Libby are tainted with asbestos at least eight miles from the mine. The barbed asbestos fibers lodge themselves in cracks and crevices in the bark until they are released when disturbed or burned.
tonyward<http://ih.constantcontact.com/fs009/1102650311091/img/285.jpg>
Tony Ward
"We're talking about millions of fibers per square centimeter of bark surface area," said University of Montana researcher Tony Ward. "Thequestion is: What is the dangerous level? There's a lot of people sick up there and you can't argue with that.
"Theoretically, it takes just one fiber to get sick."
Et tu, Brute? The very government agency responsible for cleaning up the town of Libby, Montana, after it had been contaminated with asbestos from a W.R. Grace vermiculite mine that killed an estimated 400 people and sickened approximately another 2,000, said and did nothing for over three years while tons of wood chips and bark were used by residents, and sent around the country for landscaping.
An Associated Press (AP) story showed that a study by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 2007 found potentially deadly asbestos fibers in four of 20 samples taken from piles of scrap wood. Those piles, primarily wood and bark chips, came from a now-defunct timber mill that took thousands of trees from a forest tainted with asbestos from the W.R. Grace mine.
According to the AP, the wood and bark chips were popular with homeowners wanting to add some landscaping touches to their backyards, and for contractors who packaged it and sold it around the country.
Local officials estimate that 1,000 tons were used in landscaping and erosion control in Libby. Over the past decade, as much as 15,000 tons were sold and hauled out of town to destinations unknown, according to the economic development official who was selling it.
Libby has been declared the worst Superfund cite in the nation's history, and a tragedy of gargantuan proportions. In acting on its charge to clean up the pollution in Libby, the EPA has spent over $370 million over the past 11 years. Contractors in moon suits are commonly seen carting off tainted materials.
Why, then, would EPA officials in charge allow tons and tons of contaminated material to be spread across the lawns of Libby and shipped across the U.S. to contaminate others?
The EPA is now scrambling to gauge the public health risk and is preparing to issue guidelines about how residents should handle the wood, including warning not to move or work with the material when it's dry to avoid stirring up asbestos. But the agency has decided it won't track down where the chips went. It says it no longer has jurisdiction because the material is now classified as a commercial product.
The EPA made no comment about its moral obligation.
Readers of Hearth & Home and members of the hearth industry should be well acquainted with the plight of Libby, and the hearth industry's role in changing-out close to 1,200 old wood stoves there. The project required approximately two years and $2 million in cash or products. It also required a tremendous amount of time from the staff of the Hearth, Patio & Barbecue Association.
Now there's another connection to the hearth industry. The AP story said that EPA regulators were told that most of those wood chips were used to make fuel pellets that are bagged and sold nationwide at major retailers. Agency officials said it was unknown how dangerous it would be to burn those pellets, since the amount of asbestos in the material was never completely quantified.
Eureka Pellet Mills said the material was unsuitable for fuel pellets, so it went to a power plant in Canada. Officials at the company refused to offer specifics to verify that claim, and regulators said they had no intention of tracking down the material.
"We thought we were coming to an end and now we have this issue all over again," said Lerah Parker, a Libby resident who spread dozens of truckloads of the material around her property.
As recently as last fall, truckloads of the chips and bark were still being shipped around the country. The pile, according to local witnesses, was originally as high as a four-story building and covered five acres. That's all gone now. A second pile still towers at least 20 feet.
It was known for years that forests around the W.R. Grace mill were contaminated. To what degree was the question. Records show that trees on more than 9,000 acres have been harvested from the vicinity of the mine since it was acquired by W.R. Grace in 1963.
Studies by the EPA and university researchers have found the forests around Libby are tainted with asbestos at least eight miles from the mine. The barbed asbestos fibers lodge themselves in cracks and crevices in the bark until they are released when disturbed or burned.
tonyward<http://ih.constantcontact.com/fs009/1102650311091/img/285.jpg>
Tony Ward
"We're talking about millions of fibers per square centimeter of bark surface area," said University of Montana researcher Tony Ward. "Thequestion is: What is the dangerous level? There's a lot of people sick up there and you can't argue with that.
"Theoretically, it takes just one fiber to get sick."
