Alaska will get 6.7 million dollars from the Environmental Protection Agency, or EPA, to clean up contaminated sites on land owned by Alaska Native corporations and villages. The sites were already contaminated when they were transferred to Alaska Native corporations and villages under ANCSA, the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, in 1971.
That was more than fifty years ago, and Stephanie Buss, who manages the contaminated sites program for the state Department of Environmental Conservation, said it’s “past time” to clean-up them up.
“We're just thankful for the work that we're able to do with the federal and tribal partners to get these sites addressed and really address the human health and environmental risks that they pose,” she said.
Sen. Lisa Murkowski has called the failure of the federal government to clean up most contamination on ANCSA lands a “shocking environmental injustice.” She wrote for the American Bar Association that the state has estimated that contamination could impact about 40 percent of ANCSA land. Murkowski created the EPA’s Contaminated ANCSA Lands Assistance Program in 2023.
In 2022, Alaska sued the federal government for failing to clean up ANCSA sites from contamination, but a federal judge dismissed the lawsuit.
Buss said the EPA grants target three sites. The Native Village of Unalakleet will get help cleaning up contaminated sludge and soil near the Unalakleet River. She said the Ukpeaġvik Iñupiat Corporation will get help cleaning up asbestos from the Naval Arctic Research Laboratory, which houses Iḷisaġvik College and the North Slope Borough Department of Wildlife Management. And she said the EPA will fund cleanup of buried barrels of tar on land owned by Kawerak, Inc. in Shishmaref.
The Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium will also get three million dollars in EPA funding to support the program and help communities apply for funding.
This is the second year of the ANCSA grant program. Buss said the federal government and state are identifying more sites eligible for EPA grants.
“We are aware that there are hundreds of them that were conveyed contaminated that need to be addressed,” she said.
Past state estimates have identified over a thousand contaminated sites. According to the EPA, contamination on ANCSA lands includes arsenic, asbestos, lead, mercury, pesticides, PCBs, and petroleum products. Communities interested in applying for EPA grant funding can go to the EPA’s ANCSA program website.
