Very briefly, to assist the honorable Senator from Northern Ireland who has kindly sponsored this important bill, I'd like to point out a few things. This bill was previously introduced a few years ago, but was then called the Super Duper Fund Act. This new title is a bit more descriptive and transparent.
Section II pertains to what is commonly known as the Superfund Act. Very briefly, under Superfund, if certain hazardous substances (aka harmful and persistent chemicals and such) are found in the ground, the hazardous substances are required to be cleaned up. Liability for cleanup starts with the actual polluters (if known or still around), then a convoluted order of present owners, past owners, waste generators, transporters, etc. It is strict liability so saying you didnt know and didnt do it yourself is not an excuse. If there is not enough money to pay for cleanup, a federal pot of money known as the "superfund" pays to clean up the rest.
So under the current federal law, the past or present owner of land contaminated by a hazardous substance has to contribute to the cleanup. The process, timeframes, and other aspects of the cleanup are left up to the States (or regions in our game) for the most part. EXCEPT, the federal government which is one of the biggest polluters under superfund from gasoline, to military ordinance, to general office building chemicals, is exempt from having to comply with State (aka regional) regs that are stricter than what the fed law requires. So the Regions can have stricter rules for private owners, it can have stricter rules for itself, but Uncle Sam gets to be excused from this. In other words, under current federal law the federal government does not have to clean up contaminated polluted land to the same degree as everyone else. I think the federal government should set a good example and help eliminate pollution instead of foisting its responsibilities on everyone else. The effect of this bill will be to have the federal government meet the stricter regional standards when cleaning up pollution.
Don't believe me? Check the law I reference above yourself:
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/42/9620Its a short section. You can read it.
Section III also deals with superfund. Specifically, it clarifies that animal poop aka manure is not a hazardous substance that imposes crazy expensive cleanup costs under Superfund. The whole goal of Superfund was to clean up like nuclear waste and gasoline and VOCs/POPs and heavy metals and stuff that poisons the dirt for hundreds or thousands of years. Poop is just poop. And no, we are not talking about fake chemical heavy fertilizer here. We are talking about poop. You can check the definition. The South, Fremont, and Lincoln all have lots of farmers and farmland. This bill will ensure they dont get bankrupted over poop. Especially when manure is a natural organic alternative to chemical fertilizers made by DuPont and Monsanto. We should be encouraging better decision making by our farmers, and we can do that by making sure they wont be ruined for using good old fashioned natural manure. This is good for farmers, good for the regions, and good for the environment.
Section IV repeals a few obscure and dumb regulations specifically about horsecox. I really dont know why the federal government thinks its smart or efficient to have horsecox police to investigate if your horse was erect when you bathed it, or the reason for why someone examined a show horse, or whether it was studded out to other horses between shows. This cleans up federal law by removing some dumb, unnecessary, bloated regulations.
So in conclusion, this super important bill:
1. Keeps the federal government from avoiding responsibility for cleaning up hazardous pollutants.
2. Exempts farmers who use organic manure from costly and unnecessary superfund liability for using such organic manure.
3. Repeals 3 dumb and unnecessary federal regulations pertaining to equine genitalia.
