The Houston Chronicle:

The San Jacinto River waste pits are a known source of pollution in the Houston-Galveston region and a remedy should be one that is well planned, engineered and based on sound science to ensure long-term protection of natural resources and public health on the Upper Texas Coast. Local communities, local governments and local environmental organizations support full remediation of the waste pits. The pits should be isolated from the river, dewatered and excavated in a controlled environment before Mother Nature further disrupts the site.

When the waste pits were rediscovered in 2005, they presented a tremendous threat to public health and the environment, and something had to be done quickly to temporarily stop the release of highly carcinogenic waste until the EPA could determine a long-term remedy. The temporary cap has proven highly problematic in its five short years of existence. The cap has undergone several repairs; there are currently over 40 known deficiencies in the cap, and this past December a 22 foot-by-25 foot hole was discovered in the cap and the highest concentrations of dioxin (&43,000 ppt) to date were found just outside this hole.

If you aren’t familiar with this type of dioxin, it was the active ingredient in Agent Orange, the chemical warfare agent used extensively in the Vietnam War that has caused horrible harm to the people there and our veterans who were exposed to it. If the dioxin currently in the pits remains capped in place, it could take 700 years, and possibly much longer, for the toxicity to degrade. This is a serious problem that needs to be solved now and not one that should be passed on to future generations.

The responsible parties, International Paper and McGinnis Industrial Maintenance Corp. (a subsidiary of Houston-based Waste Management of Texas, Inc.), want to contain the large volumes of highly toxic waste in the delicate and dynamic environment of the San Jacinto River. Fortunately, that proposal doesn’t meet the EPA’s policies and past practices. A study identified seven Superfund sites similar to the waste pits in terms of toxicity and location in a tidal-influenced waterway. The EPA required removal of the highest concentrations of waste at all seven sites. The residents and environment of Harris and Galveston counties should be treated no differently.