"Government Seeks Answer to Costly, Dirty Secret"
By David Armstrong
The United States government, which acts as steward and protector of the nation's environment, is itself the worst polluter in the land.
Federal agencies have contaminated more than 60,000 sites across the country and the cost of cleaning up the mess is officially expected to approach $300 billion, nearly five times the price of environmental destruction caused by private companies.
But the real cost is likely tens of billions dollars more, according to government audits.
Nearly every military base and nuclear arms facility in the country is contaminated....
...Much of the pollution is historical residue that can be blamed on some of the century's defining moments: America's quest to put a man on the moon to winning the Cold War against the former Soviet Union....
...Despite the legacy of pollution, federal agencies remain exempt from some environmental laws....[L]ast month, Congress added language to a budget bill that would make it virtually impossible for the EPA to fine the military for environmental violations....
...Federal agencies are still exempt from many state environmental laws, which in some cases are more stringent than federal requirements. The U.S. Navy, for instance, is immune from state laws and Coast Guard regulations governing oil spills. In Washington, state regulators have repeatedly complained of Navy spills spoiling Puget Sound. Last year, 6,000 gallons of jet fuel from the aircraft carrier USS Kitty Hawk fouled the sound, one of three Navy spills in 1998....
...The situation is similar in California, where the Navy is the largest spiller of oil, according to state officials. In San Diego, environmental activists say information has been withheld on some incidents, including a 6,000-gallon oil spill at a Navy pier last year and the 1996 release of mercury into the bay from a submarine....
...Instead of toughening standards for federal agencies, environmental officials are worried pollution standards are being softened....
...The recent reorganization of the Department of Energy, prompted by concerns of security breaches at top-secret weapons plants, also has had the effect of placing those plants outside the grasp of environmental regulations.
President Clinton approved the new arrangement last month...including the section exempting the country's nuclear weapons complex from environmental regulation. The new arrangement so worried state environmental prosecutors that 43 of the 50 state attorneys general in the country signed a letter warning Congress of the consequences.
"For over four decades, DOE and its predecessors operated with no external oversight of [the] environment," they wrote. "Over the past 12 years or so, the disastrous consequences of self-regulation have become plain. DOE now oversees the largest environmental cleanup program in the world."
And last month,...Congress approved a defense spending plan that would "prohibit the payment of environmental fines or penalties unless authorized by law."...
...DOE's budget for environmental cleanup has repeatedly been cut during this decade. The Federation of American Scientists, a Washington arms-control group, projects a shortfall of $4.4 billion in the agency's cleanup budget through fiscal 2006.
This year, Congress drastically slashed the budget for cleaning up military bases scheduled for closure.... And within the Department of Defense, the amount needed to restore contaminated sites is being underreported, according to several audits.
Officials say the most expensive cleanup will occur at weapons plants operated by the Department of Energy, where a half century of nuclear missile and bomb production has contaminated 475 billion gallons of ground water.
DOE this year told Congress it will spend at least $147 billion to clean up 113 sites across the country -- and that the work will take another 75 years to complete. Former workers across the country are charging in lawsuits that they were sickened and colleagues died from years of exposure to radioactive waste....