(TV static hisses) - There's a dirty secret buried in some of America's poorest towns: (chimes twinkle) (metal thumps) Toxic waste.

(concerning music) Think toxicants like asbestos or arsenic and manmade forever chemicals like Teflon.

Chemicals that are most likely in your bloodstream right now.

If you live in states like New York or Wisconsin, it's probably not ending up in your backyard.

That's because as part of their socially responsible cleanup plans, states with more stringent environmental regulations offload a portion of their hazardous waste onto states willing to accept it.

States like Texas, Louisiana, and Alabama.

Studies show that residents across the US living near hazardous waste are suffering from respiratory diseases and higher rates of cancer.

And these sacrifice zones are overwhelmingly made up of people of color.

Emelle, Alabama, is predominantly Black, and home to one of the largest hazardous waste landfills in the country.

This nearly 2,700-acre zone takes in massive amounts of nearly every type of regulated toxic substance imaginable from all over the US.

But what is the human cost of placing so much of a country's toxic waste problem on vulnerable communities?

And how did Alabama, of all places, become America's dumping ground?

(somber concerning music) (tape distorts and reels) Big picture: the US generates more trash than any other nation in the world, and that number doesn't even include the roughly 38 million tons of hazardous waste created annually.

A lot of hazardous waste is recycled, incinerated, or injected into deep wells, but millions of tons end up in landfills.

The US waste management business is a $140 billion industry today.

So many states are happy to take another state's waste in exchange for millions of dollars.

You've heard of hazardous materials like lead and asbestos being regulated.

Today the cycle of contamination continues in the form of manmade chemicals called PFAS, a group of substances that have been mass produced since the 1950s.

Two of these chemicals were classified as hazardous substances in 2024.

PFAS have been entering our water supply for years through consumer products, industry, and you guessed it, landfills.

Because Emelle is regulated by the state under federal law, Emelle's landfill is one of only eight in the US that still knowingly accepts them.

Alabama has a long history of being the nation's trash can because of lax environmental regulations, lower land value, economic disparities, and systemic racism.

So, how did we get here?

The very first Earth Day was observed in 1970, when being environmentally conscious was still a relatively new concept.

By that December, President Nixon created the Environmental Protection Agency to protect human health and the environment.

In the early 1970s, the EPA identified Emelle and the surrounding area as a possible location for hazardous waste site due to its geological characteristics.

Emelle sits above 700 feet of Selma Chalk, a generally-impermeable type of limestone bed, (tape whirs) that is going to be important later.

And like so many toxic waste sites, the town is below the poverty line and overwhelmingly Black.

Due to the legacy of Jim Crow segregation, redlining, and other anti-Black policies, Black Americans are 75% more likely to live near waste-producing sites.

- [Reporter] The United Church of Christ leaders say the location of the landfill at Emelle about six years ago was racially motivated.

- What else except callous indifference could explain the existence of the nation's largest toxic waste landfill in one of the country's poorest counties?

- At the time, there were no state laws stating people had to be aware of toxic waste landfills, so the residents living near what could become the nation's largest hazardous waste landfill were not made fully aware until years later.

- I didn't know anybody was coming here.

That's why people were so upset, because they didn't know at the beginning.

Oh, I was concerned too, because it's a Black belt community, you know?

So I went to meetings, hun, and I was against it all the way.

I'm telling you I was at first, you know.

- But this is where things get complicated.

The landfill employed 380 workers, for a poor county this was huge.

Much of Emelle became subsidized by the landfill.

Roads were created, new businesses opened, creating economic dependence as the county's largest employer.

- I was supervisor manager in record and reporting.

I worked with the peoples from the lab.

I worked all over the site because I had to get paperwork.

I know they make every effort to try, you know, to process it right.

- [Harini] For example, waste sent to this facility is first tested before WM agrees to handle it.

Once it arrives, it's tested again to ensure it's the correct material before disposal.

At its peak, the landfill took in 800,000 tons of hazardous waste a year, generating millions in revenue for the owner, Waste Management, or WM, and the state.

But not long after the landfill was established, multiple environmental groups organized against it, and local residents became aware of what was really happening in their town.

- Many of us in the county are concerned about the possible effects now and in the future.

- I'm concerned about what I don't know.

- Local residents, mainly white women who lived near Emelle, created A.C.E, Alabamians for a Clean Environment, in 1983.

Their goal was to raise awareness about the potential harm the landfill posed to Emelle and shut it down.

- We were super naive.

We thought as soon as everybody understood what was happening, namely waste was coming from all over the United States.

It was coming here without people knowing or understanding.

- But due to a lack of buy-in from locals, A.C.E struggled to reach its goal.

The group didn't believe the dump was necessary for Sumter County, putting them at odds with the needs of the employees for which they advocated.

- That was the closest place where you can get a good job.

And I think a lot of people were still a little concerned, you crazy or something wrong with you if you ain't concerned.

But after they got down there, a lot of 'em were working directly on the site, and they weren't concerned as they was before they went.

- Anytime you're dealing with chemicals, you, you know, need to be concerned.

But those concerns can be met.

We feel like that we're doing it in a professional manner, and therefore we're protecting the public.

- While many landfill employees were hesitant to stand against the landfill, walkouts and demonstrations protesting the unsafe working conditions had been happening since its establishment.

Slowly, Black workers also began to publicly share concerns about the health of the community, occupational hazards, and environmental violations.

After several years of advocating for town support, A.C.E.

had a breakthrough when a local Black leader named Wendell H. Paris helped align the white and Black organizations' missions.

- Wendell Paris was very much involved in those days because workers would come to Wendell and they would say, "My shoes are melting, my kids are sick.

It's a good job, but there's something that is not right."

- The workers there were washing the clothes that they worked in within the family laundry.

We got an entity out of Huntsville, Alabama, to do some testing, and we were able to test 25 people, me being one of 'em.

I was the only one that was not showing over 300 times the concentration of these chemicals in their body, and that's because I lived in Livingston, which was 20 miles in the opposite direction.

- Together, the two organizations, with the support of two other environmental networks, organize a march called "The Toxic Trail of Tears."

- We wanna do a motorcade from Montgomery to the site in Emelle, and to bring up the level of awareness of what is happening here.

Because not only that we had the site in there at Emelle, but the state of Alabama was getting ready to approve some other sites.

- [Harini] While A.C.E.

didn't manage to achieve its goal of shutting down the landfill, this was one of the first times an environmental campaign was successful in garnering national attention.

- We realized this was bigger than just Sumter County, and we had to reach out.

We had to work with whoever would work with us, even though the state legislature finally got on board because we made it such an issue.

We hoped to close the dump.

But that was so naive, because that dump will never close.

That dump will never, ever close.

We did, however, stop the incinerator from being built, and the incinerator would've burned all kinds of things you do not wanna breed.

- While the grassroots fight struggled to close the landfill, another battle was taking place in the courts.

(gavel bangs) After WM scheduled a large amount of toxic PCBs to be shipped to the landfill without telling the Alabama legislature, lawmakers tried to tax the landfill out of existence.

Waste disposal dropped dramatically from 788,000 tons in 1989, to 290,000 tons in 1990.

According to the Associated Press, the landfill was in danger of closing.

In response, WM filed a lawsuit to stop the tax.

After making it all the way to the Supreme Court, WM won in 1992.

The landfill remains open today, spanning about 2,700 acres, and accepting thousands of tons of hazardous waste and cancer-causing chemicals few landfills across the country would take.

WM describes it as one of the most secure treatment and disposal facilities in the world.

The facility has several monitoring systems and special liners to help prevent groundwater contamination and chalk penetration.

But even if the landfill shuts its doors, the required 30 years of monitoring and maintenance mandated by the EPA won't be enough to protect Alabamians.

This landfill will need to be maintained forever.

- When they close the dumps in Wisconsin, and in Texas, and here and there, people don't know.

They don't know to ask, "Hey, where's this going?

Where is this waste going?"

It's not going to outer space, it's coming to Alabama.

You know, you hear about environmental justice.

Where's the environmental justice?

Where has it always been for the people that live around that dump?

- I feel more comfortable with it because I feel like it...

They processing it right.

But you still, you still got that little edge.

What if something happened?

(train roars by) - Burying our trash and hazardous waste in landfills is not a long-term solution.

According to Environment Washington, seven states are projected to run out of landfill space in the next five years, and the US will run out of current landfill space in the next 60.

Waste is not only one of the biggest environmental issues we need to tackle, is also one of the biggest environmental injustice issues.

According to the EPA, almost a quarter of Americans live within three miles of a toxic waste cleanup site.

Some studies have shown that living near a landfill increases your risk of disease and birth defects, from respiratory illnesses to invisible cancer-causing chemicals leaching into the water supply.

The harm seems undeniable.

And for Emelle, the stakes are even higher than they appear.

That impenetrable chalk that made Emelle a prime location has also made it a ticking time bomb.

700 feet below this hazardous landfill is the Eutaw aquifer that provides drinking water to most of west and central Alabama.

The EPA says the aquifer is not likely to be penetrated within 300 years, while WM says 10,000, but earthquakes and fault cracks could speed up the leaching process.

- It is not totally impermeable and eventually its going to leak.

- This kind of environmental injustice experienced in Emelle isn't new.

There are dozens of similar cases around the state and the country, but the EPA has denied civil rights complaints in the past.

The Trump administration recently rolled back environmental regulations on pollutants like PFAS, making it easier for businesses and industries to dispose of harmful waste without limits.

The future is uncertain for Emelle.

Its low-income population is smaller than ever, and the landfill is still in operation.

But there is some good news.

After more than 70 years of public exposure to PFAS, the EPA took action in 2024, creating the first drinking water standard to protect communities from PFAS exposure and prevent thousands of deaths and illnesses.

Scientists are also working on PFAS alternatives right now.

Two of the top countries in waste recovery are also top waste producers.

The US could look to these nations for innovative solutions in waste recovery, but until we find ways to reduce, reuse, and recycle the waste we're creating, the health and environmental impacts will continue.

"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."

What affects some of us will eventually affect all of us.

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