Military presses to exempt millions of
acres from environmental laws
Both sides armed with science and
studies in conflict over health risks
Written by Peter Eisler
Written by Peter Eisler
CAMP EDWARDS, Mass. -- When soldiers from
the Army National Guard show up here for artillery
training, they fire their howitzers indoors -- on
simulators.
ABERDEEN PROVING GROUND, Md. -- Each
day, a bit more perchlorate from beneath this vast
Army installation leaches into the well fields that
give the city of Aberdeen its drinking water.
The EPA ordered a halt to live artillery training at
Edwards in 1997 because munitions chemicals were
leaching toward the aquifer that provides drinking
water for all of Cape Cod -- more than 500,000
people in summer.
Perchlorate is a pollutant from munitions used for
decades at the 75,000-acre weapons-testing facility.
In the past two years, the chemical has shown up in
all 11 of Aberdeen's city wells.
Now the restrictions here are the Pentagon's Exhibit
A in a controversial campaign for legislation that
would exempt more than 20 million acres of
military land from key facets of the Clean Air Act
and the two federal laws governing hazardous-waste
disposal and cleanup.
The top environmental officials of nearly every state
oppose the legislation, as do 39 state attorneys
general. And the Bush administration's own
environmental officials have tried to limit the
exemptions plan.
In a memo to White House officials last year on a
draft of the legislation, the EPA complained that
some provisions "could interfere with the ability of
states to enforce air pollution and drinking water
(rules) that protect public health."
The memo, obtained by USA TODAY, urged
revisions so regulators could "address imminent and
substantial endangerment" from military pollution.
The White House refused, and the EPA had no
choice but to endorse the legislation.
The Pentagon began its push for exemptions from
environmental and conservation laws in 2002.
Only by blending water from the most contaminated
wells with flows from those with just trace levels
has the city kept perchlorate concentrations in
"finished" drinking water below 1 part per billion
(ppb). That's the point at which the state warns of
health risks.
The city of 13,500 people also buys 500,000 gallons
of clean water a day from the county.
Now city officials say they need to spend $250,000
to install filter systems on the most tainted wells.
But the Pentagon refuses to clean up perchlorate at
Aberdeen and dozens of other sites nationwide. It's
part of a battle with the EPA over how much of the
chemical can safely be left in soil and water.
The dispute highlights a Defense Department push
to take regulatory fights into the laboratory. State
and federal environmental agencies are using new
scientific studies to make a case for tighter limits on
military pollutants, which would add billions to
Pentagon cleanup costs. At the same time, the
armed services are enlisting their own scientists and
funding research to challenge those studies.
Since then, Congress has granted exemptions from
five laws. For example, the armed services got
leeway to train on military land that provides
wildlife habitat protected by the Endangered
Species Act. They also were freed to conduct sea
exercises using equipment that might harm animals
covered by the Marine Mammal Protection Act.
The big battles involve perchlorate and
trichloroethylene, or TCE, a solvent used in military
vehicle maintenance. The EPA's latest studies say
health risks from exposure to both chemicals are
higher than previously believed. After the Pentagon
complained to the White House about the studies,
the EPA decided that its research, already checked
by independent panels, should go to the National
Academy of Sciences for more study.
Three remaining exemption requests govern
Alex Beehler, assistant deputy undersecretary of
hazardous-waste disposal, hazardous-waste
cleanups and air pollution.
So far, Congress has balked at the remaining waiver
requests. But Republican leaders say they are
committed to passing them. And the Pentagon still
is pushing hard -- with White House support.
"There are immediate and unquestionable (military)
readiness risks associated with how these three
environmental statutes are being interpreted," says
Paul Mayberry, deputy undersecretary of Defense
for readiness.
Yet regulators have never used the laws to limit
military activities. Even the restrictions at Edwards,
while cited by the Pentagon, were ordered under a
drinking-water statute not covered by the waiver
proposal.
Last year, then-EPA administrator Christie
Whitman complained to Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld that Pentagon officials were misleading
Congress in hearings on the exemptions legislation.
In a letter to Rumsfeld, obtained by USA TODAY,
Whitman said she was "very concerned" that
Defense officials were creating an "erroneous
impression . . . that EPA has prevented vital military
training."
The three remaining requests for exemptions would
reduce state and federal regulators' long-held power
to force the military to deal with pollution on
"operational" land -- unless the contamination
already had spread off site. That's too late,
regulators say, to protect neighbors from health
risks.
Pentagon officials say the exemptions are needed to
ensure that regulators don't use hazardous-waste
rules to demand cleanups on training ranges littered
with used ordnance, which can leach chemicals such
as TNT into soil and water. They also fear that
clean-air rules could be used to block the transfer of
aircraft to bases where air pollution from power
plants and other sources already exceeds the Clean
Air Act's emissions limits.
Defense for environment, says the military wants to
be "a responsible player" in regulatory debates.
Diving into the science, he says, "is one small but
appropriate way we can do so."
Environmental groups disagree.
The Pentagon "is using the White House to come
from the top," says Lenny Siegel of the Center for
Public Environmental Oversight in California.
"Rather than having the same standing as states,
communities, industry groups or anyone else,
they're above everybody."
The EPA has not complied with Freedom of
Information Act requests filed by USA TODAY
seeking copies of its communications with the
White House and Pentagon.
EPA research chief Paul Gilman says the agency
was not forced to go to the National Academy of
Sciences. "In both instances," he says, "it was our
idea."
No one owns more properties contaminated with
perchlorate and TCE than the Pentagon, federal
records show. And the military is leading the charge
against efforts to clamp down on the pollutants:
* Perchlorate. The EPA's disputed risk study finds
that small doses raise risks of thyroid problems and
related ills in fetuses and infants. The study suggests
that 1 ppb of perchlorate in drinking water -- the
equivalent of a half-teaspoon in an Olympic-size
swimming pool -- is a safe limit for pregnant
women and children.
The armed services have argued that levels up to
200 ppb are safe.
Col. Daniel Rogers, an Air Force environmental
lawyer, told the National Academy last year that the
EPA's study is "biased . . . and scientifically
imbalanced" because it ignores other research that
has found no proof of ill effects among people
exposed to perchlorate.
Even if environmental agencies continue to defer to
military needs, Defense officials say, activists could
sue to force regulatory action.
The academy review means the EPA probably won't
set pollution limits on perchlorate before late 2006,
officials say. Meanwhile, some states are
considering their own limits of under 10 ppb in
drinking water.
Regulators have a different concern: The military
* TCE. The EPA's new risk study suggests a need
could use the exemptions to duck legitimate
environmental orders.
Regulators also note that the president already can
exempt military sites from the laws at issue. Last
year, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz
directed the armed services to "give greater
consideration to requesting such exemptions" to the
laws if they hinder training. But no requests have
been submitted.
Meanwhile, the military still cites the live-fire
restrictions at Camp Edwards as proof that it needs
relief from the clean-air and hazardous-waste laws.
As far back as 2001, Maj. Gen. Robert Van
Antwerp, then an Army assistant chief of staff, told
Congress that the Army was "very concerned" about
the Edwards precedent. "If applied to a major
training installation" he said, "the results could be
catastrophic."
But officers at Edwards say they have adapted to the
restrictions, using the howitzer simulators and
sending troops to other bases a few times a year for
live fire exercises.
"I wouldn't say training has been curtailed," Capt.
Winfield Danielson says. "Most of the training the
units did before, they can still do."
GRAPHIC: PHOTOS, B/W, Sean Dougherty for
USA TODAY (2); GRAPHIC, B/W, Karl Gelles,
USA TODAY, Source: Air Force Center for
Environmental Excellence (ILLUSTRATION);
GRAPHIC, B/W, Karl Gelles, USA TODAY
(MAP); On Cape Cod: Spc. Andrew Hawthorne
demonstrates loading an artillery piece at Camp
Edwards in Massachusetts. Live-fire training was
halted there in 1997; now simulators are used.
<>Filtering: A soil-cleaning operation is underway
at Camp Edwards, where pollution from live
munitions endangered drinking water.<>How
pollution can enter the water supply (graphic)
for tighter limits on contamination. It concludes that
TCE vapors from contaminated soil and
groundwater can seep into buildings and boost
cancer risks.
The EPA's independent Science Advisory Board
checked the study and "was largely supportive of
the approach and conclusions," says review leader
Henry Anderson, chief medical officer for
Wisconsin's Division of Public Health.
But the Pentagon says the study is "based on the
ardor and hypotheses of the EPA authors, rather
than sound scientific evidence."
Some states already are tightening their TCE
regulations, but the EPA is waiting to adjust federal
rules until the academy finishes its review -- in
2007.
The groundwater feeding Aberdeen's well fields has
perchlorate levels up to 24 ppb, but officials at the
proving ground are bound by the Pentagon's freeze
on cleanups.
"Generally, we'd be doing something to address it at
this point, with it showing up in the wells," says
Ken Stachiw, the base's environmental restoration
chief.
The EPA could order a cleanup if the perchlorate
posed a "substantial hazard" to drinking water. But
the agency has resisted staff suggestions to do so
because perchlorate levels in Aberdeen's "finished"
water haven't exceeded 1 ppb.
"Nobody is standing up for the community," says
Glenda Bowling, a local activist.
"We could wake up one day and it could be 20 parts
per billion in that water, and we wouldn't be able to
drink it."
GRAPHIC: PHOTO, B/W, James Kegley for USA
TODAY; GRAPHIC, B/W, USA TODAY (MAP);
Chemicals turning up in wells: Ken Stachiw,
environmental restoration chief at Aberdeen
Proving Groundin Maryland, checks a map of well
sites. Behind him, engineers Gordy Porter and
Naren Desai run tests.