Trump’s swift demolition of East Wing may have launched asbestos plumes

There is no confirmation that the Trump admin. followed abatement processes.

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[Snark218]

Not just toxics - there was no EA, so they're not compliant with NEPA at all, so there was no assessment of alternatives or any potential impacts related to noise, air quality, stormwater management, social/economic effects, soils and geology, they're not disposing of the asbestos-contaminated waste properly, blah blah blah.

The WH is exempt from Section 106 requirements, so they didn't conduct consultation for adverse effects to a NRHP-listed property, but it's still subject to the National Capitol Planning Act of 1952, and they're not compliant with that either. And the footprint of the new ballroom hasn't been assessed for potential impacts to other listed historic resources like the viewshed and design/layout of the national mall or other character-defining features of historic properties, buried subsurface archaeology, whatever.

 

[Snark218]

well, that never stopped Trump.

As for asbestos being safe: yeah, if you never maintain the building, nor tear it down, but also don't let it fall down, then asbestos is safe. "Safe until disturbed" means it's not safe, because buildings get disturbed.

And not to put too fine a point on it, they disturbed the fuck out of the East Wing.

But yes; if it is fully encapsulated, non-friable, not damaged, and not exposed to the open air, sure, asbestos is a contained risk.

 

[Snark218]

So if it had asbestos in it then it needed to be renovated.

Tell me you know nothing, have read nothing, and can contribute nothing to this discussion, without telling me.

 

[Snark218]

This is the guy who wants to resume nuclear testing, remember.

DOE and DOD giving each other nervous glances like uhhhh who gonna tell him

 

[Snark218]

One of the buildings I used to work in was "fully remediated" before we moved in, but they missed some pockets. So part of the building was cleaned out again. But this time, they dug out some areas and "encapsulated" the stuff instead of hauling it away.

Big government buildings of the 1920s-40s have just s*** loads of the stuff lying around. It's everywhere.

Hell, past the 40s, it wasn't much less popular. The middle of the 20th century was a fucking wild time. It was like we realized we had all this cool shit like rockets, radioactive elements, PCBs, fission, fusion, asbestos, perchlorates, plastics, CFCs, DDT, you name it, and it was like a race to find as many uses for each of them as imaginable so we could cram them into every possible aspect of modern life before anyone realized they were capable of killing us all, either individually or all at once, often in combination. The friendly atom! Better living through chemistry! Wait, shit, oops

 

[Snark218]

One question is, who exactly is responsible for ensuring asbestos compliance? Is the demolition contractor not responsible? Locally I know of an old (> 100 years) house that was demolished, and prior to demolition the contractor visited and ripped up bits of floor tile, window frames, checked plumbing, etc. to verify that there was no asbestos. What could the penalties to ACECO be?

[Ninja'd by DarthSlack]

It is ultimately the responsibility of the project proponent and, in this case, the contracting officer. The contractor is responsible only for fulfilling the terms of their SOW/PWS and would not be required to presumptively test or mitigate for asbestos if those contracting documents did not specify them as part of the scope.

 

[Snark218]

I'm not so sure that the contractor has that easy an out. I mean, yeah, the SOW should specify what they do, but they don't have to just blindly accept an SOW without changes. If they suspect a problem with something like asbestos, they do have a duty to their own employees to work with it in a safe manner. Just pointing to the SOW sounds a bit too close to "just following orders".

I don't disagree, but I was speaking to where the buck stopped, not exonerating the contractor. There's plenty of blame on that side too, and the contractor should have done testing and mitigation proactively once potential ACM was encountered - but ultimately, contract oversight is the responsibility of the CO. If the government didn't specify that in the SOW/PWS, it will take on the majority of the liability.

 

[Snark218]

Why you cant build sh*t in America, on budget and time, anymore in a nutshell.
50% valid things, 50% wishy washy subjective HOA crap that only generates piles of papers and years lost.

If NEPA slows a project down, blame the project manager.

 

[Snark218]

The Hanford Site reports are one hell of a read. They're just page after page of "So, the 1960s nuclear weapons engineers went to the 1960s chemical engineers and asked for a tanker car each of their 20 nastiest most aggressive solvents, then they tried dissolving the radioactive plutonium in each of them, and this one worked but the other 19 didn't, so they dumped them in underground tanks 24 through 43 beside the river and buried it and moved on. Now we're spending $4bn to clean that experiment up." Repeated like 20 times over until they've spent the GDP of a midsize island nation on "toxic radioactive hazmat leaking into the river" abatement.

Yeah, Hanford may be the apex of mid-century no fucks given.