2. Stop the Open Air Burning at Army Ammunition Sites

Laura Olah is Executive Director of Citizens for Safe Water Around Badger. The mission of the group is to support, unify and strengthen citizens concerned for the safety of water resources in and around the Badger Army Ammunition Plant; to effect expedient cleanup of any contamination caused by negligent handling of toxic waste; and to exercise means as necessary to guarantee water resources are totally free of toxic contamination for us and the generations to follow.

Virtually every day, the Department of Defense and its contractors burn and detonate unused munitions and raw explosives in the open air with no environmental emissions controls, often releasing toxins near water sources and schools. The facilities operate under legal permits, but their potentially harmful effects for human health aren’t well researched, and EPA records obtained by ProPublica show that these sites have violated their hazardous waste permits thousands of times.

Most active sites, which currently burn or detonate waste into open air, are run by the military and its contractors, according to the EPA and the Pentagon. The Radford Army Ammunition Plant in Virginia, for example, supplies explosives for almost every American bullet fired overseas and is allowed to burn up to 2.9 million pounds of waste every year.

Citizens for Safe Water Around Badger’s challenge is to assure that the Pentagon fulfills its commitment to the complete cleanup of toxins that have placed ecological and human health at risk – has been no small task.

With Laura we discuss the negatives of open air burning, PFAS and alternatives, actions they’ve taken on a local, state, and federal level, other communities who are polluting through open air burning

Contact and connect with Laura: [email protected]

Citizens for Safe Water Around Badger: https://cswab.org/

Open air burning: https://www.cbsnews.com/video/how-burn-pits-in-iraq-and-afghanistan-may-have-put-veterans-at-risk/#x

https://projects.propublica.org/graphics/burn-sites

Bio accumulation of PFAS: https://cfpub.epa.gov/si/si_public_record_Report.cfm?dirEntryId=349938&Lab=CCTE https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0269749106006038

Alternatives - supercritical water oxidation: https://www.waterworld.com/environmental/article/16204253/supercritical-water-oxidation-presented-as-alternative-to-incineration https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/B9780128104996000103

EPA rules to open air burning: https://www.epa.gov/burnwise/backyard-recreational-fires https://www.epa.gov/hwpermitting/list-example-hazardous-waste-permits-open-burning-and-open-detonation