The U.S. Government Accountability Office recently issued a report that questioned the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (both of Washington) level of enforcement regarding the exporting of hazardous materials, most notably used and obsolete consumer electronics. Calling the EPA's enforcement "lacking," GAO officials stated that "U.S. regulatory controls do little to stem the export of potentially hazardous used electronics." In preparing the report, GAO investigators reviewed waste management surveys in developing countries, monitored e-commerce Web sites and posed as foreign buyers of broken cathode ray tubes (CRTs). Once completed, the investigation revealed that 43 U.S. companies were willing to ignore the EPA's CRT rule - including those that "publicly tout their exemplary environmental practices," -and illegally export non-working CRT monitors overseas.
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