EPA orders ‘pause’ of derailment contaminated waste removal

Hi buddy, thanks for coming. Just before taking questions. I want to share *** few thoughts from my visit. Um as you know, the initial stages of the response to this incident are giving way to the longer term investigation and the safety policy work that we do. I'm here to work and was able to spend time with our personnel here at the derailment site including our Federal Rail administration and the pipeline safety administration who are engaging the NTSB just to be very clear about this F. R. ***. And are part of the U. S. Department. NTSB is not their independent for very good reason. We respect their independence, but we also work with them to make sure that we're responding to finding and supporting their fact finding work. Was also able to spend time with *** number of federal personnel including E. P. ***. Fema and others who have been doing phenomenal work from day one in order to make sure that this community is important. That includes again not just the presence that our department had from the early hours of this situation, but the presence of public health personnel, environmental personnel and fire and emergency response. It's that time with not just federal folks, but state leaders including Ohio emergency management and local workers in the county council members. And the mayor had *** good conversation with the mayor who was clearly very focused on supporting this community in public uh as well as other village staff including village manager waterworks leader and the fires. And I just have to say that resilience resolve pieces of this year. I would say he's gone this disastrous immediate athletics and the swirl of national and international and political attention has come my way. Their decency results been inspired also also want to make sure to acknowledge something that happened yesterday. *** plane craft the lives of five people working for the C. T. Th that is *** firm that is involved in history. I met with some of their personnel earlier today mourning the loss of their friends and colleagues. Uh Some of them were involved in this response as they were on their way to another. Uh NTSB is involved in uh response to that craft and my heart goes out to people who are already very stressful situation here and are now this added basically inspiring. I also spoke today with the chair of the NTSB. They released their initial factual report. Their final work on this will take *** while to come out. But having factual findings is an important step towards being able to move on to the phase of policy. While we will of course wait for their analysis and explanations at the end of the full process to make certain we will not wait for that process to run its course to continue doing everything we can to raise the bar on rail safety and old people talent. That's the other part of my visit here is about to make sure that we can assess how we tried the best safety improvements across our national transportation system to any national political figure who just decided to get involved. I like to use Palisson Alex. I have *** simple message which is I need your help because if you're serious about it, there is more than we could do to prevent. We've laid out *** set of actions, the D. O. T. S. T. Some of which were already underway, which we're adding the agenda, *** set of things that the railroad industry needs to do, including better informing communities when Cashman is coming to them. Something I've talked to the governor about, strongly agree with and including steps to take care of their workers in their system, things that we need Congressman and again, anyone in Congress who cares about these issues, they are welcome to come to the table and work with us to get things done. So anybody who is interested in that, I'm gonna hold on to that, but we're also holding ourselves to the highest standards in terms of the work that we're doing and the work that we continue to do to respond to this incident and to make sure that we make rails safer for everyone who lives in *** community that is close to rail lines and anybody who is involved, all of that. So there's *** lot of trauma in this, there's *** lot of trauma in this community, *** lot of emotion and as you know, there's *** lot of politics too. Now that you've seen the records and spoken to the people wasn't *** mistake not to come here sooner. What I tried to do was balance two things. My desire to be involved and engaged and on the ground, which is how I am generally wired to act and my desire to follow the norm transportation secondary, allowing NTSB to really leave the initial stages of the public facing work. I'm just thinking about whether I got that balance right. But I think the most important thing is first of all, making sure that the residents here have what they need, something that from our piece of the puzzle bot we were working on from day one and making sure we can do something for the kitchen, we can talk about process and that's fairly, that's, that's perfectly fair. But I don't want people pointing the process as *** way to get away from the fund now that you have been here on the ground. Have you had an opportunity to speak to residents here since you've been on the ground and just to follow up since you have had some time to think about it in retrospect. Should you have come *** little sooner. So yeah, in terms of the timing of the visit, trying to strike the right balance, allowing NTSB all of the major sure work here in that show. But in terms of the residents, which is what this is really about really striking thing to me is how they're here for each other. I think this is not *** community with infinite resources. Uh, speaking with the mayor, hearing about what has been through and remembering the experience of being the mayor. Yes, with how they've been able to support and they're not here for the public. They're here to make sure this community can move forward. But other than the mayor spoke with community. Uh, two members of the council spoken *** lot of residents who were involved in their capacities, responding and all of them, just really, first of all, I want them to know they're not alone that before, during and after the national they're going to have support. They're gonna have support from us when it comes to holding North and southern County. They're gonna have support from the, when it comes to making sure they get accurate information about the safety of their air water. And so I think they can have support. They ought to have support from just to make sure that they're taking regulation. I think that is something that, that we need to look at. Look at this. This let me be clear about uh, these trains were regulated as having this material, but they were not in that higher category called. That's *** category that was created mainly with crude oil. And it was largely *** response to the 47 people in Canada part of the last. I understand why that there's something particularly dangerous about certain kinds of like I just had *** common sense like if you ask yourself if there's *** category called has planned and this trend will lead to that toxic cloud. That community wasn't in it, what's going on? And so it's one of many things that we're looking at with the authorities we have but also want to work with congressman and, and, and also You know that 2015 room is getting *** lot of attention around. Uh, simply breaks. I wouldn't have applied to *** non high hazard planet. You gotta ask what other trains should that have applied to in the first place and can Congress untie our hands in terms of the hoops, we've got to go to to try to raise the just like the, I mean when you see the twisted metal there, you realize the difference between *** fortified bank card and some of the tank cars that don't have that target for getting that done. Changing some of the tank cars was 2025. We got pushed out water down 2029. Again, I am being careful not to weigh in on what car fortifications network. And I'm just saying in general as materials could be going to stronger. Let's speed that up calling on the railroad. Uh, and the companies that they were like that require that. But also Congress can help before you send your first tweet expressing concern for the residents of *** week and *** half after the accident happened in hindsight? Was that waiting to to express anything Hours after you had addressed the makeup work crews on highway construction project against that very day? Answer your question is yes. I felt strongly about this and I could have expressed that seat again. I was taking pains to respect the role that I have and all that. I don't have but that should not have stopped me About how I felt about what was happening 253° before critical failure was alerted, the crew knew what they were supposed to do once the equipment that was used by the right equipment for this job. And I mean more importantly, could this have been prevented? Right. So part of that I really have to let NTSB speak to. And by the way, I think they have an availability at one o'clock where they'll go into what I will say is those hot box detectors represent an example of this? Is safety equipment right now is not required by regulation and so their differences. Railroad railroad company company in terms of how they're used. I think that's another example of something that needs to be looked at to try to prevent things like this. Common sense steps the other day this morning, I heard you talking with the officials down at the left side and they mentioned that the placard that said hi, hazardous materials, plastic burned right away for future responses to things like this. And first responders acting quickly. They don't know what's in those train cars earlier. What moves forward and what did you learn that you could implement going going forward? That's right. That's one of the reasons. I'm glad I was able to. The moment. You see the uh, you understand how *** placard indicating the hazardous material on board will not survive for more than *** second in the kind of thing that this, uh, this site created because one of the reasons why we called for railroad companies to proactively share more information on the hazardous materials on their trains. Moving through to do that goes through *** piece of software called I think raise the bar on what's expected and what's required. But I think the railroad industry should be doing more out of the gate. Let me mention one other thing. We fund first responders *** matter of fact through some of our program is about 4001st responders in Ohio alone have been through the training on hazardous materials. I think another thing we can do is completely to increase access so that we know they had access to that app and the funding they need training mania as well as pushing the railroad using proactiv what federal resources can the residents of Palestine in this area. I know this has had seven of them. So first of all, my colleague Michael Regan has made it very clear that Norfolk Southern will pay for this remediation and the federal administration will be here to hold them accountable for that and make sure that they are making this community hold other federal resources include the presence of emergency management personnel, public health personnel. Let me mention one other thing that I saw state public health personnel doing in concert with the county and local leaders, which is making sure that they address the mental as well as the physical. Oh, that's it. Even as as the air clears, even if the soil and water and there are continuing to be tested and shown to clean, that's still going to affect their health differently. And I thought he was paying attention when, when it comes to having the open Southern. The challenge is, you know, obviously you mentioned there's the immediate, uh, but as problems you talk about the present, I wanted to make, Well, that's just why we need to, it's *** great example of why we need to make sure we have the strongest possible when it comes to dealing with these railroads. And to me, it's both specific to this location, which is that as long as Norfolk Southern is running trains on this track. And as long as anybody is feeling the impact of this disaster or the Southern has to be not just this year and I'm just going all the press are here, but every single, but also Norfolk Southern and the other great rail companies need to stop fighting us every time we try to do *** regulation in order to hold them accountable and their other Millwork company account their safety and what we see in this industry goes to And they get their way, they got their way on the people, they got their way on *** Christmas tree of regulatory changes in the last administration made on his way out the door in December 20, I think they're getting their way on the fines being too low, sorry, but it is the biggest charge of violation. That's an egregious violation. It's not enough for multi. So what do you do about all that sir? What were acting on it with the authorities we have and calling on members of Congress to act on it again today and the railroads have to wait on us to require to do the right thing on there. Well, I will say this. You know, if you talk to uh, the unions representing workers and railings, number one thing they talk about when I'm, when I'm with them before they even get to wages and benefits is safety. And they have weighed in on safety matter of fact. Again, if you look at the record and comb through the fine print on the December 2020 rulemaking under the last administration, there's *** whole bunch of comments from labor on why they were concerned from *** safety perspective and then all of the rationale for, for why their, their concerns were overruled. Uh, we know that for example, and this is one of the biggest things we're working on. Uh, we know that one safety issue is how many people are on the train. Uh, this one had three people on *** training and uh, and two others according to the NTSB report. Uh, and that's actually more than you sometimes get on *** mile long train. Railroad companies want to be able to take it down to one one thing that workers have told us unions have told us and we feel strongly about because there needs to be an actual regulation on this. It was in the works the last administration frozen from the moment we got here. We've been resuming the work on advancing that regulation because it's an example of something that work has been asking about that bears unsafe. Again, I will state of the NTSB business on whether improving and staffing, how that might have related to this case too early to for me to go around making judgments on that. But we know that if you've got *** train that's *** mile long and something goes wrong halfway down. And you got one guy out there that's gonna be *** problem industry. And are you concerned about? So this is where we've got to make sure that we have enough teeth in our regulations. Some of the things with the hot box detectors are not prescribed in the letter of the law. They're up to the railroad to decide. And I think we need to look at two things. One did the railroad make the right decisions. That's part of the safety investigator. And then to, should we lay out *** little more clearly what those decisions should be. So it's not up. And that's the regulatory book about trust, mistrust considered. I just wish that, God secondly, what if your past to seek political emissions, how they made it? There was public look again, I'm here for the work and not for the politics. You can sense when you talk to local leaders and local residents that they're getting pretty sick of the politics too. And this national, uh, ideological player that's been added into all of this when they're just trying to figure out if they're gonna be safe. And there's no question that there have been enormous amounts of both information and misinformation injected into this situation, none of which is to the benefit of the community when it comes to that misinformation in normal. So I think so I lost my train of thought. Um, that's what I had to say about that. I guess one I'm sorry, one other thing, if the same people who want to come here and play political games are the same people who sided with industry again and again and again and watered down rail regulations again and again and again. I want to see where they've had an actual change of heart or not. And if they had *** change of heart, I'll take them at their word and we can get, we'll have the town back the way it was. That's exactly why we're here. That's why we've been here from the first hours of the incident as an administration. And it's why our interests both in what happened here in East Palestine and in keeping our railroads safe, doesn't go away. When some other hot news story comes into the headlines, we're gonna be here day in day out, year in year out, making our railroads safer and making sure Norfolk Southern meets its responsibilities. That is *** promise. And when I take very, very seriously. So you can see how hard people are working to clean up this site. Again, I met with some of the folks involved in that on everything, testing to the remediation and they are doing good work. They need to be supported, uh, if at any moment we see any evidence that Norfolk Southern is backsliding on their commitments or that anybody is not doing this by the book. And then some we're gonna be there with any authorities that we have on the matter and this whole administration because this is too important to make sure that people haven't asked for. Well, one thing he could do is express support for reversing the deregulation that happened on his watch. I heard him say he had nothing to do with it, even though it's in his administration, so if he had nothing to do with it and they did it in his administration against his will, uh, maybe he could come out and say that, uh, he supports us moving in *** different direction. We're not afraid to own our policies when it comes to raising the bar on regulations. And I've got to think that, uh, him indicating that this is something that everybody, no matter how much you disagree on politics and presidential campaigns can get behind higher fines, tougher regulations on safety Congress, untying our hands on breaking rules. All the other things that go with that. Um, that would be *** nice thing for him to do. The couple is from southern California, that's hard share number of persons. Yeah, that's right like this. There could be like, that's right, go through it and turn to respect training. How do you get comfy up stopping cutting like large? But the reality is this is their entire business model in the last few years, they've gone into *** business model that is about cutting and cutting and cutting and cutting. And what has happened is it's *** concern from *** safety perspective, it has not made them more effective in delivering freight. We know that from our supply chain, it has made them wildly profitable, so profitable. That in my view, they could meet *** much higher safety standards and still be profitable and that's what really needs to happen next. So, uh, you know, the reality is if their business model is telling them to cut whether it's cutting corners and cutting people. The only real wall we can put up against that is regulation. I know the word regulation is not popular or something, but we need enforcement, we need accountability and that starts with making sure we have enough teeth in our regulations to actually see to it. That that happens translate shortly in response to the thing that about what was seen in the department to make sure this cleanup is done properly with the pocket. Yeah. Look, I'm I'm here focused on east Palestine, but there have been *** number of, of incidents derailment and crash is that they need attention. And uh, and it gives you, if you look at the statistics, you get *** sense of what we're up against. And specifically with Norfolk Summit, uh they need to think, I think uh, lead the way and going above and beyond, especially after what happened here. They should have been doing it anyway. And some of their remediation responsibilities, obviously more on the E. P. *** side and not have to look to them in terms of what they can require. But what we're going to require is that they meet the highest standards on safety. Yeah. One of the things that that I've seen that the environmental folks on the ground here, both the state and Ep are very focused on is not just getting through the next day or two days, but, but what happens as water moves through the soil? What happens is soil moves through the area and what happens to the soil is being removed. I don't have all the details on that, but folks are right to be concerned. Yeah, You can talk about regulation regulatory changes, buying changes and some things that are political to take, um, in months to take place and to change anytime these trains are going from others in other states, all over the countries or anything. The federal government can do. E. And the emergency. One thing I've ordered F. R. ***. To do is step up inspection program. What we call focused inspections on any of the routes that are of particular concern either because of the nature of the cargo that's traveling there or because of some other community risk. They do *** good job to begin with. But what we can do immediately is *** level of elevated focused inspection based on what we've learned from this situation. Because you're exactly right. These regulatory processes can take forever something that railroad companies have taken advantage of, by the way, sometimes waiting out one administration to see if *** more industry friendly administration will come in and kill them. Uh, we're gonna work as fast as we can on the regulatory side. We're not waiting for that. We're not waiting for an act of Congress. We're not waiting for *** lot of change to do the things that we can do with the powers that we do have to worry about. What happens five years from now, 10 years from now coming down here. So they're right to be concerned with some of these issues, health issues, environmental issues, they can last for years last for decades. And there's really just two things I can say. First of all, we will never forget the people of these Palestinians. We will support them with everything we've got. But second, the best way to deal with an equal logical disaster is to stop it from happening in the first place. And that's *** big part of where my department comes in and we take that very seriously. That's why we've laid out all those sets of things things we're doing things, we want Congress to do things we expect the railroads to do about, probably better to direct from the details on that. But what I will say is my understanding is what you have here is what was needed in order to restore the supply chain and get things moving. But it's not the long term solution in terms of that. Obviously the contamination of the soil, the better cars to transport hazardous materials. And even talking about some of these days down to the southern, they own these cars. Could they have had better transport vehicles to carry the Well, certainly I would urge Norfolk southern and any other railroad to radically accelerate the adoption of these tankers. Uh, it is *** little complex. Often the tank cars are owned not by the railroad by the chemical company, but the railroad can require that the chemical company and we're looking into what we can require the chemical company sooner now that Congress kind of watered down the adoption, uh, date. So, I guess what I'm saying is that both and right. I think the railroad ought to require this right now, but we're gonna make sure we required on the legal side to wait on that until the NTSB has done their work. I think there's, there's, there's more analysis to be done. You've been in office from the fine that might have, well, the top priority we've had on the regulatory side has been this staffing. We can't do everything all at once and realized that we would have to sequence the kinds of regulatory actions we take. And the one we were hearing the most about, especially from workers in the railroad industry is this, this two person crew will The other thing that makes it hard on the CP rules that Congress remember, it didn't just get killed with *** clean shot, so to speak. Uh, Congress, uh, basically moved the goalposts on the, on the benefit cost analysis to make it very difficult to keep this rule on books. The last administration went ahead and took it down. So I am asking my staff to conduct *** stepped up analysis on anything. We may have missed any angle that we weren't looking at for anything that for example, in the benefit cost analysis might actually change now that we have the data, some of the data from this incident that would empower us. But look, the cleaner way to do that would be for Congress to entire hands so that we didn't have to go through all those three crew members on the train, including *** trainee, crew members on the train including *** trainee. Is there any way back to be safe? So again, NTSB should speak to some of what happened in particular in terms of folks on board. But this is why I'm so frustrated that it's taken, it's taken so much of our energy and political capital just to hold the line on there being two. I mean the railroad industry wants to be able to have one person on trains could be *** mile longer long one and there was movement to do something about that last administration frozen. We are before this incident and now we're still doing trying to bring that back. So how big *** problem is this true? I think it's *** real issue. And again, especially given the overall business model we've seen from the railroads, which is to cut and cut and cut, including cutting safety jobs, cutting maintenance jobs, the jobs on board *** little more tightly regulated. But if they could, I'm worried that they would, I want to get to somebody who hasn't asked the question yet. Back to the green covering that one, right right along. So this is *** community that first of all, it's *** community full of good people who did nothing wrong. No one in this community asked to be in this situation. And they deserve not just the full force of the federal administration and the state government being there for them, not just Norfolk southern doing the right thing and paying for the cleanup. They deserve *** different level of support. *** human level of support the country should be wrapping their arms around the people of east Palestine. Not as *** political football. How does an ideological flat flashpoint? Not as *** gotcha moment, but as thousands of human beings whose lives got upended through knowing who through no fault of their own. Uh, and I think that includes visits, not just big official visits from the government, but just people who've seen the news and whose hearts go out to the community here and can come here, come here on *** day like this when the sun is shining or on *** rainy day shopping those shops to visit those businesses. Um, it is safe to visit here as all of us can attest. Even while we're still making sure that it stays safe to live here. People President 19 I know they've got *** lot of lawyers. I wouldn't speculate on their legal strategy. What I would say is they need to go way, way beyond the legal minimum here and they need to lead the railroad industry shifting its posture to stop fighting us tooth and nail every time we try to use the tools that we have as an administration to make freight rail safety. Secretary of the department transportation is expected to have *** ruling in March on LNG transport by rail that the decision's been made yet. You worry that that transported LNG by rail cars could lead to an even bigger distraction. So I'm not ready to get ahead of *** finalized ruler announcement there. What I will say is that, you know, this situation calls on us to reexamine everything that's been underway related those issues now. Uh, what we found is we first looked at that LNG rule was that that uh class of rail movement was unlikely, at least in the short term to happen anyway. Nobody was seeking to use those kinds of cars. But we're setting policy for the long run, we gotta make sure we get it back. Alright. Thanks everybody

EPA orders 'pause' of derailment contaminated waste removal

Updated: 5:16 AM EST Feb 26, 2023

Federal environmental authorities have ordered a temporary halt in the shipment of contaminated waste from the site of a fiery train derailment earlier this month in eastern Ohio near the Pennsylvania state line.Region 5 administrator Debra Shore of the Environmental Protection Agency said Saturday the agency ordered Norfolk Southern to "pause" shipments from the site of the Feb. 3 derailment in East Palestine but vowed that removal of the material would resume "very soon.""Everyone wants this contamination gone from the community. They don't want the worry, and they don't want the smell, and we owe it to the people of East Palestine to move it out of the community as quickly as possible," Shore said. Until Friday, Shore said, the rail company had been solely responsible for the disposal of the waste and supplied Ohio environmental officials with a list of selected and utilized disposal sites. Going forward, disposal plans including locations and transportation routes for contaminated waste will be subject to EPA review and approval, she said."EPA will ensure that all waste is disposed of in a safe and lawful manner at EPA-certified facilities to prevent further release of hazardous substances and impacts to communities," Shore said. She said officials had heard concerns from residents and others in a number of states and were reviewing "the transport of some of this waste over long distances and finding the appropriate permitted and certified sites to take the waste."No one was injured when 38 Norfolk Southern cars derailed in a fiery, mangled mess on the outskirts of town, but as fears grew about a potential explosion due to hazardous chemicals in five of the rail cars, officials evacuated the area. They later opted to release and burn toxic vinyl chloride from the tanker cars, sending flames and black smoke billowing into the sky again. Shore said the EPA was not involved in the decision to do the controlled burn, but she called it a "well-founded" decision by local and state officials based on the information they had at the time "to deal with a highly explosive toxic chemical."Federal and state officials have repeatedly said it's safe for evacuated residents to return to the area and that air testing in the town and inside hundreds of homes hasn't detected any concerning levels of contaminants from the fires or burned chemicals. The state says the local municipal drinking water system is safe, and bottled water is available while testing is conducted for those with private wells.Video: EPA administrator visits East Palestine train derailment siteDespite those assurances and a bevy of news conferences and visits from politicians, many residents still express a sense of mistrust or have lingering questions about what they have been exposed to and how it will impact the future of their families and their communities.

EAST PALESTINE, Ohio —

Federal environmental authorities have ordered a temporary halt in the shipment of contaminated waste from the site of a fiery train derailment earlier this month in eastern Ohio near the Pennsylvania state line.

Region 5 administrator Debra Shore of the Environmental Protection Agency said Saturday the agency ordered Norfolk Southern to "pause" shipments from the site of the Feb. 3 derailment in East Palestine but vowed that removal of the material would resume "very soon."

"Everyone wants this contamination gone from the community. They don't want the worry, and they don't want the smell, and we owe it to the people of East Palestine to move it out of the community as quickly as possible," Shore said.

Until Friday, Shore said, the rail company had been solely responsible for the disposal of the waste and supplied Ohio environmental officials with a list of selected and utilized disposal sites. Going forward, disposal plans including locations and transportation routes for contaminated waste will be subject to EPA review and approval, she said.

"EPA will ensure that all waste is disposed of in a safe and lawful manner at EPA-certified facilities to prevent further release of hazardous substances and impacts to communities," Shore said. She said officials had heard concerns from residents and others in a number of states and were reviewing "the transport of some of this waste over long distances and finding the appropriate permitted and certified sites to take the waste."

No one was injured when 38 Norfolk Southern cars derailed in a fiery, mangled mess on the outskirts of town, but as fears grew about a potential explosion due to hazardous chemicals in five of the rail cars, officials evacuated the area. They later opted to release and burn toxic vinyl chloride from the tanker cars, sending flames and black smoke billowing into the sky again.

Shore said the EPA was not involved in the decision to do the controlled burn, but she called it a "well-founded" decision by local and state officials based on the information they had at the time "to deal with a highly explosive toxic chemical."

Federal and state officials have repeatedly said it's safe for evacuated residents to return to the area and that air testing in the town and inside hundreds of homes hasn't detected any concerning levels of contaminants from the fires or burned chemicals. The state says the local municipal drinking water system is safe, and bottled water is available while testing is conducted for those with private wells.

Video: EPA administrator visits East Palestine train derailment site

Despite those assurances and a bevy of news conferences and visits from politicians, many residents still express a sense of mistrust or have lingering questions about what they have been exposed to and how it will impact the future of their families and their communities.