Attorney General Terry Goddard joined 11 other states Wednesday in a lawsuit against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency over new regulations reducing public access to information about toxic chemicals.
The lawsuit seeks to invalidate the EPA’s revised regulations and return to the former reporting requirements so that public access to environmental information is not restricted, according to a press release from the attorney general.
The suit involves the country’s only public database of toxic chemical use, storage, and release. Companies are required to provide information for the database, including the types and amounts of toxic chemicals stored at the company’s facilities and the quantities they release into the environment.
“These new regulations put our communities at risk,” said Goddard in a prepared statement.
“In Arizona, we’ve seen fires involving toxic chemicals, and knowing what chemicals are involved helps firefighters and public safety personnel take the necessary precautions to protect themselves as well as the surrounding neighborhoods. Without this information, our public safety personnel and our neighborhoods are at much greater risk of being exposed to unknown hazards during a fire or chemical spill,” he said.
In December 2006, the EPA issued revised regulations that, according to the attorney general, have weakened the utility of the public database by reducing the amount of information companies must report about the toxic chemicals covered by the program. For many toxic chemicals, the EPA’s new regulations substantially increased the quantity of chemical waste a facility can generate without providing details about it, Goddard said.
“Citizens have a right to know about these dangerous substances, and agencies and emergency responders need to have this information to protect the health and safety of our communities,” said Arizona Department of Environmental Quality Director Steve Owens in a press release.
Congress enacted, and President Ronald Reagan signed into law, the Toxics Release Inventory program (the public database) in 1986, after the Bhopal toxic chemical catastrophe in India. In 1984, a deadly cloud of methyl isocyanate accidentally released from a Union Carbide plant in Bhopal, India, and killed or seriously injured more than 2,000 people. Shortly thereafter, a serious chemical release occurred at a sister plant in West Virginia.
The 11 other states involved in the suit are: California, Connecticut, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania and Vermont.
A copy of the complaint is available on the Attorney General’s Web site at www.azag.gov. The lawsuit was filed today in U.S. District Court in New York State.
