Panel agenda for Air Quality After 9/11 conference, March 2004

NYC 9/11 Public Portal Document

September 14, 2001. EPA senior chemist, Cate Jenkins related the following in a September 3,

2003 letter to Congressman Jerrold Nadler describing EPA’s cleanup of a building at 114 Liberty

Street:

“On 9/11/01, EPA Region 2 evacuated its office building at 290 Broadway in lower Manhattan because it found traces of asbestos in settled dust. The tests were only qualitative - EPA had no idea how concentrated the asbestos was. EPA only knew there was asbestos at some undetermined level. For all EPA knew, it could have been at levels lower than backgroimd. The thickness of the dust was so small that there was not enough for testing actual concentrations.”

“But this was enough to set off a panic by EPA Region 2 to evacuate its building for two weeks for professional abatement. EPA also bought respirators for its own employees.”

“What is relevant is the fact that all the many, many air tests at 290 Broadway from September through December showed no asbestos at all above the detection limit, with one exception: In one TEM air test, the level was 25 structures per square millimeter (25 s/mm2), right at the detection limit, and far below what EPA was telling the public was safe (70 s/mm2). In press statements at the time, EPA clearly stated that the air concentrations at its building at 290 Broadway were safe. However, EPA Region 2 was silent to the press about the fact that it had found asbestos in settled dust at 290 Broadway.”

“It is a double standard for EPA to now claim that the dust testing at 114 Liberty St. by the residents is irrelevant to risks. The risk from settled dust may not be accurately quantifiable to exact risk levels, but it does clearly represent a risk. EPA policy and government statutes state that any exposure to asbestos is unsafe.”

Although EPA issued assurances that it was safe for residents, workers and school children to

reoccupy buildings in Lower Manhattan, the agency disclaimed any responsibility for identifying

and cleaning up indoor contamination by saying that it did not have the authority or the

obligation to do so. According to EPA, the responsibility for contamination identification and

clean-up belonged to local city agencies (NYCDOH & NYCDEP) which failed to ask for federal

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