EPA Gets Cracking on Gowanus List of Polluters
Perhaps in an effort to quell concern that its stewardship of the Gowanus Canal would mean a dozen years of bureaucratic delays, the Environmental Protection Agency moved swiftly in the week after adding the waterway to the Superfund list to start naming companies it would target to recover damages to pay for the clean-up. “This…
Perhaps in an effort to quell concern that its stewardship of the Gowanus Canal would mean a dozen years of bureaucratic delays, the Environmental Protection Agency moved swiftly in the week after adding the waterway to the Superfund list to start naming companies it would target to recover damages to pay for the clean-up. “This is a historical puzzle we’re putting together here,” said EPA regional administrator Judith Enck. “This site has a very long legacy of toxic pollution.” In addition to figuring out which companies dumped which chemicals into the canal, the EPA also has to trace often-complicated chains of corporate ownership to determine who’s on the hook for actions taken decades ago. Some of the big names already getting dragged into the investigation include Bayside Fuel Oil, BP America, Honeywell, ConocoPhillips, Exxon and Citibank. “Some of these will be dead ends and they’ll say: ‘Nope, not me.’ Some of them, we’ll get live fish on the hook,” said Superfund director Walter Mugdan.
EPA Eyes 20 More Companies in Gowanus Superfund Hunt [NY Daily News]
Superfund Decision No Boost to Gowanus Rezoning [Brownstoner]
Toll Folds, Hudson Holds In Gowanus [Brownstoner]
Gowanus Superfund Coming to a Head [Brownstoner]
Photo by joe holmes
What do they mean the Gowanus is “polluted”? Didn’t they put clams there to grow a couple of years ago to show us that the water was super clean? And to think that I go fishing there on my spare time.
Won’t Bloomberg be on that list? As in The City of New York? (have something to do with his push for control?)
***Bid half off peak comps***
Does anyone think that we will see this canal cleaned in our lifetime?
Why do I think not?????
imby, and the pathmark next to lowes selling fruits and veggies etc is supposed to be clean???
I’m sorry, I meant Lowes… not that Dykes section of the canal is any cleaner.
Many times when the property changed hands there was “material” left in the buildings. EPA wants to know what happened to it.
They have to control the run off and repair the bulkheads. Dykes home improvement store is sitting on top of an old manufactured gas plant… pretty nasty contaminated soil and groundwater under that parking lot.
In addition to cleaning the canal itself, are there plans to clean all of the toxic land sites in the area? Is that part of the Superfund project?
good question dcb.
maybe they foreclosed on a loan and owned the business for a while?
it would be poetic justice to see our federally funded, *private,* and toxic bank pay for a federally funded toxic spill cleanup.
even if it would be the wrong toxic spill they clean up.
How did Citibank make the list of superfund polluters?
What could they have done? Flush taxpayer bailout money down the toilet?