Hazardous Waste in Our Environment: What You Need to Know

By: Nichole Fandino

Hazardous waste regulation plays a major role in how chemicals enter our environment. It also dictates how governments respond when dangerous contamination occurs. Today, many hazardous substances are found deeply embedded in soil, air, and water across the United States.

Understanding how hazardous waste regulation works helps explain why chemicals like PFAS and PCE became such widespread environmental problems. In this article, we examine how the United States regulates hazardous chemicals, how that approach compares to Europe’s system, and why these differences matter for businesses, property owners, and communities.

The U.S. Approach to Hazardous Waste Regulation

When discussing how certain chemicals have become so common in our soil, air, and water, corporate manufacturers and everyday consumers often ask, “How did things get this bad?” One major reason involves how hazardous waste regulation and chemical oversight differ between countries.

In the United States, chemical regulation often follows a reactive model under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA). Under this system, many chemicals are allowed on the commercial market with limited initial testing. Only after evidence of harm emerges do regulators begin to restrict or regulate their use.

As a result, businesses face fewer barriers to bringing chemicals to market in the short term. However, this approach can create long-term environmental and financial consequences when hazardous substances later require investigation, litigation, and massive cleanup efforts.

The High Cost of Reactive Hazardous Waste Regulation

The costs of reactive hazardous waste regulation can be absolutely enormous. For example, cleaning up PCE—a chemical widely used in dry cleaning and industrial operations—can be extremely expensive for property owners and municipalities.

Cleanup costs can range between $100,000 and $1 million per contaminated site. This does not even include the legal disputes over responsibility for remediation. Consequently, businesses, municipalities, and property owners often become involved in lengthy environmental litigation.

More recently, regulators declared two types of PFAS—often referred to as “forever chemicals”—as hazardous substances under federal law. Because PFAS compounds are used in many consumer products and industrial processes, their contamination is incredibly widespread.

Therefore, the cost of removing PFAS from drinking water alone could reach billions of dollars. These costs affect both corporate entities and taxpayers, while thousands of lawsuits against PFAS manufacturers continue to aggressively move through the courts.

Related: America’s Clean Water Crisis: Addressing Inequality

The European Alternative to Hazardous Waste Regulation

In contrast, Europe uses a much more precautionary approach to hazardous waste regulation. European chemical policy, particularly the REACH regulation (Registration, Evaluation, Authorization, and Restriction of Chemicals), requires companies to demonstrate a chemical’s safety before it ever enters the market.

Because manufacturers must provide scientific evidence that a substance is safe, regulators can prevent many hazardous chemicals from becoming widespread in the first place. As a result, fewer chemicals later require bans, restrictions, or costly cleanup programs.

Could the U.S. Shift Its Hazardous Waste Regulation?

This comparison raises an important question for the future of hazardous waste regulation in the United States. If companies had been required to demonstrate that PFAS chemicals were safe before they were widely used in consumer goods, the environmental damage and cleanup costs might have been significantly lower.

Instead, regulators now face widespread contamination, expensive remediation projects, and extensive litigation across multiple industries. So, is it too late for the United States to adopt a more precautionary regulatory model?

Or will the country continue a cycle of allowing chemical usage, discovering environmental harm later, restricting the chemicals, and then paying for cleanup decades afterward? While stricter regulation could create short-term barriers for industry, it might also prevent the massive environmental and financial costs associated with hazardous contamination.

Related: California’s New Water Regulations: Will They Pass This Time?

Watch: What’s Wrong with Dry Cleaners?

Want to learn more? Watch this related video below:

About Us

The Law Office of Jennifer F. Novak Environmental Law represents property owners and businesses in environmental litigation and regulatory matters. Our practice focuses on soil and groundwater remediation, Clean Water Act citizen suits, compliance with Water Board orders (including under Sections 13304 and 13267), and other environmental legal challenges. We provide strategic counsel to clients navigating complex environmental regulations while ensuring fairness in enforcement and compliance.

For dedicated legal representation in environmental litigation and compliance, contact The Law Office of Jennifer F. Novak Environmental Law.