United States Government Publishing Office publisher pbl distributor dst United States Government Accountability Office National Security and International Affairs Division author aut Government Organization text government publication eng GAOREPORTS Legislative Agency Publications gao legislative 2010-08-12 U.S. Government Printing Office 1997-06-27 monographic deposited born digital 55 p. GA 1.13:NSIAD-97-98 https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-NSIAD-97-98 P0b002ee1803a15c9 f:ns97098 DGPO 2010-08-12 2011-03-28 GAOREPORTS-NSIAD-97-98 machine generated eng fdlp REPORT GAOREPORTS-NSIAD-97-98 NSIAD-97-98 Hazardous substances Environmental policies Environmental law Pollution control Cost analysis Research and development facilities Health hazards Future budget projections Environmental monitoring Waste disposal NASA Environmental Protection Program EPA National Priorities List Letter Report NSIAD

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) environmental cleanup costs, focusing on NASA's: (1) determination of the extent of contamination it may be responsible for cleaning up and progress in its cleanup program; (2) cost estimates for accomplishing cleanup; and (3) efforts to determine whether "potentially responsible parties" should share in cleanup costs.<p/>GAO noted that: (1) although NASA began identifying sites nearly 10 years ago, it did not complete a comprehensive hazardous site inventory database until 1993; (2) NASA officials said that they now consider their inventory of 913 potentially contaminated sites to be about complete; (3) NASA is also in the early stages of determining what it will cost to clean up those sites that require remediation; (4) however, NASA needs better data before it can reliably estimate its cleanup cost; (5) NASA headquarters had estimated its total cleanup costs would be $2 billion to cleanup all its potentially contaminated sites over a 20-year period; (6) it later lowered the estimate to $1.5 billion by eliminating sites where it believed no further action was needed; (7) this estimate assumed that all sites of the same type would cost the same, regardless of variances in the extent of contamination; (8) at GAO's request, NASA field facilities developed estimates of remediation costs totalling $636 million based on actual costs, local quotes, and input from other federal facilities; (9) however, the field facilities' estimates excluded some of the 383 sites that had not been studied; (10) neither the headquarters nor the field estimates included long-term operation and maintenance costs or considered NASA's potential costs for remediation at its contractor facilities; (11) furthermore, neither estimate considered the potential effect of infrastructure changes that could increase remediation cost; (12) although NASA's overall budget is projected to decline over the next few years, NASA headquarters is projecting that environment funding will remain about level in fiscal year 1998, then increase somewhat over the following 4 years; (13) the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) allows federal agencies and other entities that carry out cleanup activities to seek cost sharing or cost recovery from the potentially responsible parties whom the law would hold liable, such as past owners, operators, and contractors; (14) CERCLA cost recovery can also be available to a party conducting a cleanup under RCRA corrective action requirements; (15) despite the availability of a cost recovery mechanism, NASA headquarters has not had a policy for determining whether to seek contributions from other parties; (16) NASA is paying the remediation costs for virtually all of its field facilities; and (1* https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-NSIAD-97-98/html/GAOREPORTS-NSIAD-97-98.htm https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-NSIAD-97-98/pdf/GAOREPORTS-NSIAD-97-98.pdf GAO/NSIAD-97-98 https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-NSIAD-97-98 Letter Report GAO/NSIAD-97-98; Environmental Cleanup Costs: NASA Is Making Progress in Identifying Contamination, but More Effort Is Needed; Hazardous substances Environmental policies Environmental law Pollution control Cost analysis Research and development facilities Health hazards Future budget projections Environmental monitoring Waste disposal NASA Environmental Protection Program EPA National Priorities List Title 42 Section 9607(a)(4)(A) 42 U.S.C. 9607(a)(4)(A)