EPA Eyes 'Cumulative' Criminal Enforcement Metric To Address Equity Fears

摘要

EPA's criminal enforcement division is developing a "cumulative impact" metric to help the agency target groups of facilities, including smaller facilities, that may be cumulatively and intentionally causing significant harm to vulnerable communities, as part of EPA's new enforcement focus on environmental justice.rnFred Burnside, the agency's top criminal enforcement official, said in an interview with Inside EPA that once EPA has identified facilities that cause cumulative harms, the agency could then target enforcement against them, which could result in criminal prosecutions against a single facility or multiple facilities, as well as their owners. "You can see cumulative impacts on water and air from smaller facilities that together create an important impact on the environment. We're trying to affect positively any area we can where communities are impacted," he said.