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NYC 9/11 Public Portal Document

challenging EPA’s testing methods and “clearance levels” for hazardous materials, which she argues belie an honest assessment of safety.

Other government officials also provided the EPA with data challenging Ms. Whitman’s safety assurances. For example, the above mentioned GZTF report by Chatfield and Kominsky was given to EPA officials by the researchers (who are long­ time EPA contractors) on October 12,2001. To this day, the EPA has neither commented on nor taken any action with respect to the findings of elevated levels of hazardous materials in this report. According to an analysig by Dr Catp TpnVingj Cbtitfiplri and Kominsky found 9 asbestos strands to every one found by the EPA. She went on to argue that those levels of asbestos in Lower Manhattan are comparable or in excess of those found in Libby, Montana, a recently-designated federal Superfund site.^” Some of the asbestos utilized in the World Trade Center was made in Libby, Montana. A plethora of news reports have detailed the widespread public health problems experienced by Libby residents such as lung cancer, asbestosis and mesothelioma.

Beyond downplaying its own findings, and ignoring other contradictory findings presented to it, the EPA has withheld important data from the public. Specifically, it took a FOIA request by the New York Environmental Law and Justice Project to get test results showing dangerous levels of hazardous materials in outdoor ambient air. The EPA claimed that its failure to make this information available was an “oversight”^*

Additionally, the St. Louis Post Dispatch reported in February that the United States Geological Survey (USGS), using the country’s best detection equipment and methods, found pH levels in World Trade Center dust that are “.. .as corrosive as drain cleaner” and passed this information along to health experts at the EPA on a “government-only” website. In the article, Andrew Schneider (the paper’s Pulitzer Prize­ winning environmental journalist) charges “the USGS data was not released by the EPA nor apparently were the environmental agency’s own test results on the dust.” The EPA claims to have released this data to the public, but when Schneider reviewed all of the EPA’s statements made since 9/11, he found nothing that warned of these high pH levels. According to the New York Committee for Occupational Safety and Health (NYCOSH), such dust “once it’s in contact with moist tissue - the throat, the mouth, nasal passages, the eyes and even sweaty skin - it becomes corrosive and can cause severe bums.”“ To be clear, the EPA admits that it had this data, but continued to state that the air was safe.

Jenkins, Cate, (Ph.D., Environmental Scientist WIB, HWID, Office of Solid Waste, U.S. EPA) “Memorandum, December 19, 2001.” See also Jenkins, Cate, (Ph.D., Environmental Scientist WIB, HWID, Office of Solid Waste, U.S. EPA) "Memorandum, Subject: Status of Air and Dust Asbestos Testing After WTC Collapse, March 11,2002." * 20 Jenkins, Cate, (Ph.D., Environmental Scientist WIB, HWID, Office of Solid Waste, U.S. EPA) “Memorandum, Subject: Preliminary Assessment, January 11, 2002.” See also Jenkins, Cate, (Ph.D., Environmental Scientist WIB, HWID, Office of Solid Waste, U.S. EPA) "Memorandum, Subject: Status of Air and Dust Asbestos Testing After WTC Collapse, March 11, 2002." ^Haughney, Christine, “In N.Y., Taking a Breath of Fear: Illnesses Bring New Doubts About Toxic Exposure Near Ground Zero,” Washington Post, January 8,2002. Schneider, Andrew, “Public Was Never Told That Dust from Ruins is Dangerously Caustic,” St. Louis Post Dispatch, February 10, 2002. Also see asbestos effects noted in U.S.EPA Federal Register, Vol 51,

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