EPA Whistleblower: Cover-up on Toxic Dispersants in Gulf

[Update: 7/30/10 – from MSNBC (video)

EPA Whistleblower Hugh Kaufman: We’ve Now Poisoned Thousands of Square Miles of the Gulf

O’DONNELL: Now, were you and others at the EPA making this case within the system, that arguing that we shouldn’t be using dispersants there? And what was the response?

KAUFMAN: Well, the working level troops in research, some of the toxicologists who have experience and education, were trying to get management to pay attention to the data that EPA had and has had for decades, but to no avail. There was a political decision made to let BP take the lead as opposed to the government being proactive, as we used to be.

O’DONNELL: Now, when you say a political decision, are you saying that that decision was made by EPA administer, Lisa Jackson, a Barack Obama appointee? Or was it made outside of the EPA?

KAUFMAN: The decision was made outside of the EPA, by political appointees. But I don’t have the vision to see how high up that was made. My vision is limited, because I’m in the middle of the bureaucracy.

Longtime EPA employee and truth teller Hugh Kaufman called the EPA handling of toxic dispersant “Corexit” in the Gulf a “coverup” and called for a Congressional investigation.

Last week, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson faced tough questions in a Senate oversight hearing, particularly by Maryland Senator Barbara Mikulski, who suggested that Corexit could be the agent orange of the Gulf cleanup.

According to MotherJones story:

Kaufman, a senior policy analyst in the EPA’s Office of Solid Waste and Emergency Response, alleges that agency administrator Lisa Jackson sidestepped the issue last week in her answers to questions about whether the agency has the authority to call off use of dispersants in the Gulf. The agency, he says, is deliberately downplaying the threat”and its own role in regulating the chemicals”to protect itself from liability and keep the public from getting too alarmed.

Kaufman, as EPA Ombudsman, conducted the investigation of false statements by EPA that air in southern Manhattan was safe to breath after 9/11. He was fired by Christie Whitman for that investigation.

Kaufman appeared on Democracy Now! – it is a must watch video: (transcript available at that link too).

PEER’s DC Office has been working closely with several scientists and whistleblowers on scientific integrity and gulf response – see: News You Wont Get From The Hometown Cheerleaders. EPA’s failure to block Corexit are a focal point in those efforts.

Lisa Jackson has some explaining to do – but I have no faith that Congressional Democrats will conduct appropriate in depth investigation and oversight.

So it is up to the media to investigate EPA’s rubber stamp of BP’s plans to use Corexit – a move that saved them billions of dollars in cleanup liability and poisoned the Gulf ecosystem an thousands of workers and residents.