From the U.S. Government Accountability Office, www.gao.gov Transcript for: Priority Recommendations for the Environmental Protection Agency Description: Every year, GAO sends letters to federal agencies, highlighting some of our recommendations that we think should be prioritized because they would have an immediate, high impact and the most pressing challenges facing their agencies and programs. Today, we'll find out more about our priority recommendations for the Environmental Protection Agency from GAO's Alfredo Gomez. Related GAO Work: GAO-21-557PR, Priority Open Recommendations: Environmental Protection Agency Released: July 2021 [Intro Music] [Alfredo Gomez:] EPA is making progress in implementing many of the priority recommendations, but EPA needs to do more. [Holly Hobbs:] Hi and welcome to GAO's Watchdog Report. Your source for news and information from the US Government Accountability Office--celebrating 100 years of fact based, nonpartisan government oversight. I'm Holly Hobbs. Every year, GAO sends letters to federal agencies, highlighting some of our recommendations that we think should be prioritized because they would have an immediate, high impact and the most pressing challenges facing their agencies and programs. For the Environmental Protection Agency, or EPA, these priority recommendations include actions related to climate change, air quality, toxic chemicals, and the agency cybersecurity. Today we'll find out more about our recommendations from Alfredo Gomez, an expert in Environmental Protection policy and a director in our natural resources and environment team. Thank you for joining us Alfredo. [Alfredo Gomez:] Thank you for having me. [Holly Hobbs:] So Alfredo, let's dig into some these recommendations, starting with those on the risks climate change poses to Superfund sites, which are managed by EPA and are some of the nation's most contaminated hazardous-waste sites. Can you tell us about those? [Alfredo Gomez:] Sure, we know that climate change may increase the frequency and intensity of certain natural disasters, and in turn these natural disasters may damage the Superfund sites. In our work, we found that 60% of the Superfund sites, or about 950, are in areas that may be impacted by these climate change effects, such as wildfires and different types of flooding. And as a result, toxic contaminants that are at these sites can be released into the environment. So, for example, when Hurricane Harvey hit Texas in 2017, an unprecedented amount of rainfall damaged several Superfund sites. At one of these sites, the San Jacinto River site, the floodwaters eroded the temporary structure that was in place, releasing dioxins, which are highly toxic into the environment. [Holly Hobbs:] And what were our priority recommendations for addressing those risks? [Alfredo Gomez:] We made several recommendations to EPA, and, for example, we recommended that EPA provide direction on how agency officials should integrate climate change information into decision making at the Superfund sites to ensure that, for example, the remedies that are at these sites, would be protective given the potential impacts from the climate. [Holly Hobbs:] Monitoring and protecting the nation's air quality was another area where we highlighted actions at EPA could take. What can you tell us about those? [Alfredo Gomez:] Our nation's air quality monitoring system is critical for enforcing our air quality laws and for protecting public health. We have found that the system was in disrepair and had challenges meeting the information needs of users, such as information on air toxics or pollution hotspots and environmental justice communities. So we recommend it that EPA work with state and local air monitoring agencies to help target resources to priorities for sustaining the monitoring system. And then, second, we recommend it that EPA again working with state and local monitoring agencies to develop a plan for modernizing the system that allows us to better provide information that's needed to protect public health. EPA agreed with these recommendations and has begun working with state and local and tribal organizations to implement them. [Holly Hobbs:] And our letter to EPA also talks about toxic chemical management. What's EPA's role in managing chemicals, and what were are recommendations there? [Alfredo Gomez:] So the agency assesses and reports on the risks that toxic chemicals pose to what are known as chemical assessments. In our letter, we made several recommendations and some of these address longstanding issues with, for example, timeliness and the transparency of these chemical assessments. For example, we have recommendations for EPA to assess the resources that are needed for conducting these assessments, to establish criteria for how they are prioritizing them, and then also to provide more information publicly on the status of these assessments. [Holly Hobbs:] So we've also highlighted cybersecurity concerns facing the nation's drinking water and wastewater infrastructure. And this seems particularly important after the Colonial Pipeline attack. What's EPA's role in safeguarding water and wastewater systems? And what are priority recommendations for addressing those risks? [Alfredo Gomez:] So like pipelines, water and wastewater systems are among the nation's critical infrastructure that provides essential services to us all. And as you've indicated, cybersecurity threats to infrastructure represent a significant national security challenge. EPA is responsible for helping to secure water and wastewater infrastructure against cyberthreats. For example, one of EPA's responsibilities is to help the water and wastewater sectors implement a framework of cybersecurity standards and procedures. We recommend it that EPA developed methods for determining how these sectors have adopted this framework. We believe that having this information can help the sectors focus their resources to mitigate cyber risks. [Music] [Holly Hobbs:] So it sounds like there are a number of critical environmental and public safety issues that could negatively affect our climate as well as individual's health and safety. And that while these challenges are significant, we've identified a number of actions that EPA should prioritize that would have an immediate positive effect on these issues. Alfredo, since we send this letter to EPA every year, can you tell us how many recommendations are open from last year? And did we make any new ones? [Alfredo Gomez:] Yes, EPA implemented six of our recommendations from last year's letter. For example, in response to one of them, EPA updated water quality measures and collected data on state projects that protect certain water bodies. This is going to help EPA better measure the health of these water bodies and understand states abilities to protect them. Now, for this year's letter, we have added seven priority recommendations, as we have been discussing. These new recommendations along with 15 that remain open from last year, bring the total number of priority recommendations for EPA to 22. [Holly Hobbs:] And Alfredo last question, what's the bottom line? Why is it so important that we keep sending these letters? [Alfredo Gomez:] The bottom line is that EPA is making progress and implementing many of the priority recommendations we have identified in our letters, but EPA needs to do more. Fully implementing the recommendations could significantly improve agency operations. For these reasons, we believe that it is important to keep sending these letters. We're asking for EPA's continued commitment to these important issues. [Holly Hobbs:] That was Alfredo Gomez talking about GAO's priority recommendations for the EPA. Thank you for your time, Alfredo. [Alfredo Gomez:] Thank you. [Holly Hobbs:] And thank you for listening to the Watchdog Report. To hear more podcasts, subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Google Podcasts and more, and make sure you leave a rating and review to let others know about the work we're doing. For more from the congressional watchdog, the U.S. Government Accountability Office, visit us at GAO.gov.