"Sustainable Remediation" – Another New Greenwashing Marketing BS Buzzword?

I had suggested that because it takes resources to perform remediation, there might be a net negative environmental impact from some soil and groundwater clean-ups at some point in their lifecycle.

Sustainability wasn’t really a “thing” a few short years ago – it’s a relatively new concept in that’s taken hold the last decade.? So, sustainability being relatively new, unfortunately regulations and agency personnel don’t consider it in remediation. ?It’s also a word that is abused more and more these days.? Sustainability concepts are good until we get into GREENWASHING where entities commandeer sustainability for marketing or spin.? A lot of the manufacturing industry abuses the word sustainability, so some people now look askance when it’s used.?

So should you be skeptical if I use the words “remediation sustainability”?? I get it, but I’ll give a few clear examples. All examples will be from my former projects and are real.? They’re in the public record and can be easily located at State agency electronic repositories from your desk without too much trouble.? I can give anyone more details if interested, publicly or privately, just let me know.? I am glad to help (for free, again, I have nothing to sell you, I’m retired!).

So what does sustainable remediation look like?? Remediation sustainability has to do with correcting past sins but not sinning even more to try to “undo” a past sin.? One can punish the offender if they are still financially viable, that’s fine (pun intended).? And the offender can and should pay to “fix” the contamination to bring the earth back to what it was for the public’s future benefit.? However, there needs to be a holistic approach to contamination management to include sustainable practices in remediating vital resources in a strategic way that protects existing resources.? Let’s restrain ourselves from wanting punitive damages so badly and for the earth to be returned to purity from our guilt that we do the exact opposite thing that we are fighting for – don’t pollute even more to clean up to the n’th degree.? The net math doesn’t work, and pollution is increasing as we try to remediate in some cases.

My first example is particularly painful and embarrassing as a US taxpayer.? My former employer owns a closed manufacturing site that had radioactive contamination.? The US government took responsibility for this contamination because its source was from the Manhattan Project, the US atomic bomb research that took place during World War II.? The site is in a rural part of northeast Ohio.? The best and safest thing to do, based on the low levels and types of radioactive isotopes would have been a thin cap. The government could have purchased the site for very cheap, and capped the contamination which would have been totally acceptable from an environmental and health standpoint...but NO, not from a policy or stigma standpoint.?

Had a capped area been turned into a recreational area, I would have let my kids play on it (yes, I do love my kids).? Again, very low levels of radiation that a cap would have safely addressed.? But it’s RADIATION!? Oh my!? How unacceptable!? Yes, sarcasm.

So, the Army Corps cleaned up the site under the FUSRAP program by excavating (risk contact with personnel and contaminating equipment) and transporting radioactive soil across the US (risk of incidents and public exposure) for disposal elsewhere (relocate the risk, albeit to a more secure resting place for a future generation to deal with).? Not only that, but my Ohio EPA contact and I estimated that nearly $100MM in taxpayer dollars were spent on this project to date.? How sustainable was all of that when you do some net math? Sadder yet is that they are not done.?

If you don't like sustainability and think it's either BS or abused, think of the dollars. How much better could that $100MM been used for the nation’s environmental health elsewhere?? (Maybe this was a national GDP play, although it was taxpayer dollars that were recirculated.) ?

I’m not government bashing.? This one was just an easy example to convey and understand.? I have many other examples from industry.? Next time I’ll share one particularly egregious example where the contamination was SO bad from over 40 years ago that the regulators, the community and politicians, and even my employer today still can’t see past it to consider how unsustainable any further remediation actually is going forward.? The earth is losing ground to punitive and restorative “feelings” and policy.