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EAST PALESTINE -- When sitting down for a one-on-one interview in East Palestine last week, Region 5 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Debra Shore made two things clear. First, she both sympathizes and empathizes with those impacted by last year's Norfolk Southern train derailment, and, second, she trusts the science.
Shore and the agency's on-scene response coordinator, Mark Durno, reflected on the response, remediation, opposition face and criticism received one year after the derailment.
"We at the EPA, rely on science and on facts. And yet when we speak about this in the language of science and facts, it doesn't get at people's feelings and their fears. Those are things passing each other in the night, " Shore said. "We need to let the science speak but we also need to learn to be more empathetic as much as we can be in communities. This was our first experience in this social media environment and post-pandemic when people were less trusting of both medical professionals, science and the government and that's been a challenge. We acknowledge those fears and concerns, but we trust the science."
That science, Shore said, from the beginning of the derailment, has directed the response and the decisions made, including what to test for and what to not test for. Shore explained the rationale behind the agency's stance on both dioxin testing and additional indoor air sampling.
In the month following the derailment, the EPA reported no plans to conduct dioxin testing because it maintained that no elevated levels of hydrochloride and phosgene was detected by air monitoring equipment. Shore explained both are needed to form dioxin.
"Before the vent and burn, during the vent and burn and after the vent and burn, we had this array of air monitoring equipment and got lots of data and we were looking for the building blocks of dioxins, the primary combustion ingredients, hydrochloride and phosgene. We found them in levels that were so low that we knew we couldn't get to the secondary," Shore said. "You can't build water if you don't have hydrogen and oxygen and, in this case, we just didn't see the building blocks for dioxin. Even the subsequent testing we did to respond to public concerns didn't show anything above background levels except along a few road sides which is expected from exhaust."
In Marcn. to help quell concerns, the EPA sampled and tested soil at 148 residential, recreational, commercial, and agricultural locations -- 89 from Ohio and 59 from Pennsylvania. Each location was sampled for both shallow and deep samples, meaning one at the surface and one below the surface. Seven of those locations were inside the East Palestine City Park. The median results in East Palestine were 4.8 parts per trillion (ppt) far below the threshold of 1,000 parts per trillion (ppt) that the EPA considers safe for residential areas.
Durno said the soil sampling data confirmed what the EPA already knew due to low concentration of the primary byproducts needed to create dioxin detected in the village air. However, the low levels of dioxins found in the soil at the derailment, fortified their findings.
"The third and most important evidence was the waste samples itself. The highest concentration we see anywhere is going to be in that waste. We collected samples of waste and we saw dioxins and we saw elevated levels which you would expect in a burn arena," Durno said. " The waste came back elevated but not crazy high."
Durno also said that other states' refusal to take the contaminated soil, which was a public relation nightmare at first, turned into a blessing. Eventually, the EPA ordered licensed facilities to take the waste under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (commonly known as CERCLA or Superfund), but some states insisted on their own testing before complying with the order.
"Because it turned into a national story and nobody wanted to take our waste, the Governor of Indiana said 'prove to me that waste is not a dioxin pit' and he had his environmental agency collect samples from the waste that showed up on his state's doorstep and their waste samples came back at the same concentration as our's did."
Durno also clarified the dioxin that was detected in the waste was octachlorodibenzodioxin (OCDD) and not the more noxious tetrachlorodibenzodioxin (TCDD). It was TCDD, which is 3,000 times more toxic than OCDD, that was found at Times Beach in Missouri and led to the EPA in essence condemning the entire town, making any comparison between Times Beach and East Palestine moot.
When addressing the agency's refusal to do more air testing despite cries from some residents to do so, Shore was blunt. Again, she pointed to the science, but she also pointed to the stubbornness of some to accept any evidence the EPA presented and the ubiquitousness of volatile organic compounds (VOC) in the environment -- in other words, VOC's are always found indoors.
"I am not persuaded (more air testing) would have put people at ease because I think it's been shown, if one answer does not satisfy them, they will ask another way or ask for something else. And we know that if we go into homes, we will find volatile organic compounds because they are in everyday cleaning products. They are in perfume, they are in paint, adhesives and a whole host of things we have in and around our homes," She said. "And we also know that because the sophisticated, redundant, and extensive array of air monitoring and air sampling equipment throughout the community and especially around the site of excavation hasn't found elevated levels of the contaminants of concern, of these chemicals," Shore said. "If we don't see them outside, we are not going to see them inside. There is no pathway, and we don't see them outside because these are volatile organic compounds. Volatile means they turn to gas and dissipate. If it's not outside, it's not going to get inside."
Durno built off Shore's statement.
"By collecting those additional samples, we might not see in acrylates but we would see other things. And people would ask 'what about this benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, and xylene' -- which probably came from fuel or 'what about this perchloroethylene' -- which probably came from your dry cleaning. I have a feeling it would create more problems than it would create," he added.
The EPA did conduct initial air screenings in the days after the evacuation was lifted and just days after the vent and burn. Durno said it was to specifically look for vinyl chloride.
"If there was even a little uptick on the meters, we collected a vinyl chloride test sample. Over 100 homes were sampled with zero detection. We also did hydrochloride testing in every home, with these multi-gas meters and had no detections," he said. "The vinyl chloride was burned up for the most part. We did see some residual vinyl chloride in the creeks and we definitely saw it in the soil at the derailment site where it didn't burn as hot and some vinyl chloride remained, but because we were actually able to detect at the lower levels with the instrumentation we had, we are very confident that vinyl chloride was no an issue inside homes."
Both Shore and Durno said they encouraged any third party to present to them evidence that could refute the EPA findings, but none did.
"I think of it as a bank account. If I got a statement from my bank saying $2,000 in my account and I know I have $4,000, I am going to get my proof and go to the bank and say 'your statement does not comport with the facts' and we got to sit down and compare the evidence and figure out what went on and, at some point, someone going to find out, I have the proof. That is a scientific method and I can back it up," Shore said. "When we have asked and offered to anyone who has said 'well I don't believe you' to bring your evidence, bring science, show us methods, show us your protocols, show us your data and let's sit down and look at it together, it didn't produce a joint meeting. The other folks who are making assertions about what they are finding haven't been willing to share their methods, their equipment, their protocols and sit down scientist-to-scientist to say 'here's what we are finding and it does not comport with what you've found.'"
Durno said that even the data that he has seen shared, not with the EPA, but with others, ultimately agree with the agency's results.
"All the third-party data that's out there, even though I question that data based on my review of it, the results are almost identical," he said.
Shore said that even in a response as enormous as the East Palestine derailment, the EPA did not lose sight of its most fundamental canon - to protect people from the impacts.
"It's been a massive undertaking with 115 million data points of air monitoring and sampling information and we have done our utmost to make sure the people of East Palestine and surrounding communities were protected from the contamination. That's the what EPA does. Its job is to protect health and environment by removing the source of the contamination," she said. "And we did that and I am really proud of the partnership we had and collaborative work with our partners in the village, county and state and other members of the federal government."
Shore also expressed appreciation for the local crews who were first on the scene. Their actions helped mitigate an already ugly disaster.
"I have enormous gratitude to the first responders from the village, county and state. Without their concerted efforts, it could have been much worse," Shore said. "I mean think about it. There were no deaths from the derailment. There were no residential homes destroyed. There were no increases to visits in emergency rooms nearby in the weeks following."
As far as Norfolk Southern's part in the cleanup, the EPA has had few complaints.
"They have been cooperative. When we've asked them to revise or come back with more detailed or thorough work plans, they've done so. And they have so far been paying for it," Shore said.
Durno agreed.
"Norfolk Southern, so far, has met all of our operational deadlines and that's the most important thing. We've had ups and downs like we do in any business relationship. In our case, it's a regulator and regulated entity," Durno said. "We need to make sure the work plans meet our requirements. And to date, through a lot of elbow grease, those work plans are where we want them and where they need to be."
Durno also said the railroad should be commended for its surprisingly strong safety record throughout the response and remediation.
"Operationally, I think Norfolk Southern has done a good job of carrying out the operation in a safe manner," he said. " We have over a million hours of person hours with no serious injury. That's something that Norfolk Southern and the EPA should be proud of."
Despite the progress made, Shore said there is more work to be done and the EPA will be there every step of the way.
"Our goal is to protect the health and safety of people of East Palestine and surrounding communities and environment, and we will be there as long as we are needed," she said. "We are here for the long term. And I have seen a strong resilience community and look forward to coming back and seeing even more progress made."
And when the work is done in East Palestine, Shore said the agency will be better for what it learned in the village.
" One of the most important things we will be undertaking in this calendar year will be an after action report, a sort of a lessons learned. We are still in the midst of remediation and restoration, but there will be a time for reflections and lessons learned and I know there will be some."