Kevork Djansezian / Getty Images A playground at the Carson-Gore
Academy of Environmental Sciences in Los Angeles. The
$75.5-million elementary school, which was named after former
Vice President Al Gore and pioneering environmentalist Rachel
Carson, was built atop an environmentally contaminated piece of
real estate. Construction crews replaced the toxic soil, which
was poisoned by more than a dozen underground storage tanks,
with clean fill. A landmark Environmental Protection Agency
report concluding that children exposed to toxic substances can
develop learning disabilities, asthma and other health problems
has been sidetracked indefinitely amid fierce opposition from
the chemical industry. America’s Children and the Environment,
Third Edition, is a sobering analysis of the way in which
pollutants build up in children’s developing bodies and the
damage they can inflict. The report is unpublished, but was
posted on EPA’s website in draft form in March 2011, marked “Do
not Quote or Cite.” The report, which