TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTERS Introduction 4 A Dirty World 7 Cleaning Up America 17 Working Together for Earth 27 A Greener Future 37 AGENCY INSIDERS Three Mile Island 12 William Doyle Ruckelshaus 22 Superfund 32 Gaylord Nelson 42 AROUND THE WORLD Chernobyl 15 Cuyahoga Fires 25 British Antarctic Survey 35 National Environmental Justice Advisory Council 45 Glossary 46 Selected Bibliography 47 Websites 47 Index 48
It may be hard to believe but before 1970 a factory could spew black clouds of toxic chemicals into the air filling the city air with haze or dump hazardous waste into lakes and rivers coating them with sludge And it was all perfectly legal Companies were rarely convicted and ordered to stop such behaviors There was no agency or law in place to prevent people from endangering the environ ment and there were no punishments either In December 1970 the United States Senate confirmed president Richard Nixon's choice of an administrator for a new federal agency to tackle envi ronmental issues In the words of the U S Environmental Protec tion Agency EPA its purpose is to ensure that all Americans are protected from significant risks to human health and the environ ment where they live learn and work The EPA coordinates and supports research and antipollution activities conducted by state and local governments private and public groups individuals and educational institutions Without the EPA there would be no legal way to limit or eliminate pollution to air water and land and all life on Earth could be in
In the late 1800s pollution from factories in industrial cities such as Pittsburgh Pennsylvania filled the
