Nonhazardous Waste: State Management of Municipal Landfills and Landfill Expansions

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information about municipal landfills in the 50 states, focusing on the number of: (1) landfills included on the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) National Priorities List (NPL) of hazardous waste sites posing serious health and environmental threats and the number of NPL landfills that sought state approval to expand operations; (2) landfills not on NPL but identified by states as requiring cleanup and the number of those that sought expansion approval; and (3) operating landfills not on NPL or identified by states as requiring cleanup and those that have sought expansion approval. GAO also examined the extent to which states considered citizens' views and owners' and operators' past records as part of the approval process.