NATION : EPA Chief Warns of Cleanup Costs

The head of the Environmental Protection Agency said today that the American public has expected too much from the government toxic waste cleanup program, considering the money available and the size of the task.

And EPA Administrator William K. Reilly said cleaning up the nation’s hundreds of toxic waste dumps will take tens of billions of dollars and go well into the next century.

Reilly outlined for a Senate Environment and Public Works subcommittee the changes he plans for his agency’s toxic cleanup program, including giving more emphasis on increased enforcement to force polluters--and not the government--to clean the waste dumps. Reilly noted that Congress so far has provided nearly $10 billion for the Superfund cleanup program but that only a handful of the nearly 1,200 sites targeted have actually been cleaned. The total cost could exceed $60 billion, according to EPA estimates.