Data, Planning and Results

Cutting tons of pollution from power plants, penalizing environmental criminals, stopping illegal imports from China, and making bankrupt companies pay for pollution are a few of the notable accomplishments highlighted in EPA’s Fiscal Year (FY) 2008 enforcement and compliance accomplishments report.

Data Source: Integrated Compliance
Information System (ICIS), Oct. 11, 2008;
data source for previous fiscal years: ICIS

Last year, regulated entities agreed to spend an estimated $11.8 billion on pollution controls, clean up and projects, an agency record, to keep an estimated 3.9 billion pounds of pollutants out of the environment.  This is approximately equal to four times the level of pollutant reductions achieved in FY 2007.

Highlights

Specific EPA successes include:

• In the largest settlement with a stationary source in EPA history, American Electric Power, a coal-fired electric utility company, agreed to install pollution controls and take other measures that will reduce a record 1.6 billion pounds of air pollution. The company also agreed to pay a $15 million penalty, the largest ever paid by an electric utility for New Source Review violations of the Clean Air Act.
  

• Massey Energy Company, Inc., Central Appalachia’s largest coal producer, agreed to pay a $20 million penalty, the largest of its kind, for discharging pollution into local waterways.  Massey also agreed to take measures at all of its facilities that will prevent an estimated 380 million pounds of sediment and other pollutants from entering the nation’s waters each year.

• EPA’s criminal program achieved several precedent-setting convictions.  In the largest fine ever for a criminal misdemeanor of the Clean Water Act, CITGO was ordered to pay a $13 million criminal fine.  British Petroleum Exploration (Alaska), Inc., pled guilty and was ordered to pay a $12 million criminal fine and $4 million in restitution to the State of Alaska for two pipeline leaks, one of which was the largest spill ever on the state’s North Slope.  Earlier this year, EPA announced the first criminal conviction resulting from a citizen tip to EPA’s Report a Violation Web site.

• EPA reached a record $250 million settlement with W.R. Grace for asbestos contamination in Libby, Montana. This is largest cash payment ever made by a company to reimburse the federal government for the costs of investigating and cleaning up a Superfund site.

• EPA helped 2.5 million entities understand and meet their environmental obligations through Web sites, guidance, and other means.