This Jan. 25, 2022 photo shows a large trash incinerator in Rahway, N.J. Community groups in New Jersey and California are suing the US Environmental Protection Agency trying to force it to update emission standards for trash incinerators across the country _ many of them in minority communities _ so that they are required to emit less pollution.
The groups are asking a court to order the agency to update its standards for large incinerators, saying the EPA was supposed to do so at least 10 years ago. "We've found a consistent pattern of these facilities, many of them old, being sited in environmental justice communities," said Ana Baptista, an environmental justice expert at The New School in New York and an Ironbound board member. “These lawsuits are important to address that.”
The most recent deadline for an update was in 2011, but the EPA has failed to act, the lawsuit alleges. Baptista grew up in that neighborhood, describing it as frequently smelly and heavily industrialized. The tainted smoke turned out to be the result of the plant mistakenly burning materials that contained iodine from a Newark chemical company, according to Covanta, the company that operates the facility. In a report to New Jersey environmental regulators, the company said several instances of pinkish or purple mist were due to material containing iodine between 2018 and 2020, adding it has stopped accepting such material.
Yes!! Defund the EPA!
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