New Jersey is defending its cleanup levels for cancer-causing, ubiquitous chemicals with new data in response to regulated companies’ claims that the state was too strict.
Companies with contaminated sites have argued that New Jersey’s soil standards for chemicals such as benzo(a)pyrene, were unreasonably low, triggering cleanups that may have predated their operations. But the state found no consistent, preexisting amount of the chemicals in the environment, New Jersey’s Department of Environmental Protection said in a report released Monday.
Regulated companies said benzo(a)pyrene concentrations found at their sites, which 2017 state regulations require them to clean up, were actually ...