LOS ANGELES, June 12 (UPI) -- The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has proposed spending at least $36 million to clean up the pesticide DDT off California's Palos Verdes Peninsula.
The site, 200 feet underwater off the peninsula, holds the world's largest deposit of the banned pesticide, the Los Angeles Times reported Friday. The chemical is from Montrose Chemical Corp., which released 110 tons of DDT into the sewers from 1947 through 1971, the newspaper said.
The EPA declared the deposit a Superfund site in 1996.
The pollution has been blamed for the disappearance of some species of coastal birds and marine life.
Chemical companies, including the now-defunct Montrose, agreed in 2000 to pay a total of $73 million to help restore the area.
DDT has been banned in the United States since 1972. It was widely used until revelations that the chemical accumulated in fish and animals and humans who eat them.
