Pollution & Cleanup
If you're buying or renting a home, it's worth knowing whether the EPA has flagged contaminated land nearby. These are called Superfund sites, and there are more than 1,300 of the most serious ones on the federal National Priorities List (NPL)— plus thousands of additional sites in earlier stages. Here's what Superfund means, how to find sites near an address, and how worried (or not) you should be.
Check Superfund sites near a specific address →
VetMyAddress maps nearby EPA Superfund/NPL sites and grades the address A–F alongside its water, PFAS, flood, and air data.
Superfund is the federal program (officially CERCLA, 1980) that funds the cleanup of land contaminated with hazardous substances — old industrial sites, landfills, mining areas, manufacturing plants, and similar. The EPA tracks these sites and ranks the worst on the National Priorities List, which prioritizes them for long-term cleanup.
A site can be in several stages:
Note that “Superfund” is broader than the NPL: depending on the EPA dataset, it can also include proposed, deleted, and non-NPL removal or assessment-stage sites. So “a Superfund site is near this address” does not automatically mean danger — many are remediated or in early assessment. What matters is the stage, the type of contamination, and the distance.
Proximity is a starting point, not a verdict. To understand real-world impact, look at:
If a serious, active site is close, that's a cue to ask questions before you buy: request the EPA site fact sheet, ask about the home's water source and any vapor intrusion testing, and factor it into your offer.
Environmental risks cluster. A neighborhood near an old industrial Superfund site may also have PFAS detections in its water system or sit in a flood zone that can spread contamination. Checking them together gives a truer picture than any single map — which is the whole point of a combined A–F address report.
Vet the full environmental profile of an address
Superfund sites, drinking water, PFAS, flood zone, and air quality in one plain-English report.
Run a report — $19.99 →Browse the statewide list of EPA National Priorities List (NPL) sites with confirmed PFAS contamination, then check Superfund proximity for a specific address.
Search by address using the EPA's Superfund site search or ECHO database (free, official at echo.epa.gov), or use VetMyAddress to see nearby Superfund/NPL sites bundled with the home's water, PFAS, flood, and air data in a single plain-English grade.
The NPL is the EPA's list of the most serious contaminated sites in the country — the ones prioritized for long-term Superfund cleanup. There are over 1,300 sites on it.
Not necessarily. Many sites are cleaned up or fully remediated, and 'construction complete' means EPA finished the physical remedy — though monitoring or land-use controls may continue. Actual risk depends on the distance, the type of contamination, the exposure pathway, and the cleanup stage — not just the presence of a site on the map.
It can, especially if the site is active or well-known. It's worth knowing before you buy so you can ask the right questions and price the home accordingly.