EPA Directs $240 Million for Accelerated Superfund Cleanups in Twelve Legacy Industrial Communities

WASHINGTON — Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Michael Regan announced on Monday the distribution of $240 million in federal infrastructure funding to initiate and accelerate physical environmental remediation across twelve long-neglected National Priorities List (Superfund) toxic waste sites.

The investments, financed through reinstated chemical excise taxes under the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, target historic lead smelters, chemical manufacturing dumps, and abandoned wood treatment facilities located in historically disadvantaged communities across ten states.

Eliminating Generational Toxic Exposure for 500,000 Residents More than 500,000 Americans live within one mile of the twelve funded sites, where toxic heavy metals such as arsenic, lead, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), and trichloroethylene (TCE) have contaminated residential backyards and municipal drinking water aquifers for decades.

"No community in America should have to live in the shadow of toxic industrial pollution left behind by corporate polluters," EPA Administrator Michael Regan said during an announcement in East Chicago, Indiana. "With this $240 million investment, we are putting heavy excavation equipment to work to remove hundreds of thousands of tons of contaminated soil, clean up local groundwater, and return blighted industrial properties back to productive community and economic use."

High-Priority Remediation Sites Funded Major project allocations include:

• USS Lead Superfund Site (East Chicago, IN): $45 million to complete residential yard soil excavations and lead barrier installations.
• Lower Duwamish Waterway (Seattle, WA): $40 million for riverbed contaminated sediment dredging and capping.
• Diamond Head Oil Refinery (Kearny, NJ): $30 million for deep chemical stabilization and groundwater extraction wells.
• Tar Creek Superfund Site (Ottawa County, OK): $35 million for chat pile excavation and wetland restoration.
• Eight additional industrial sites in Alabama, Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Texas receiving between $10 million and $25 million.

Local mayors, environmental justice organizers, and public health physicians praised the funding, noting that Superfund remediation directly lowers childhood blood lead levels and unlocks downtown economic redevelopment.