Superfund Sites

According to the Environmental Protection Agency, "thousands of contaminated sites [known as Superfund sites] exist nationally due to hazardous waste being dumped, left out in the open, or otherwise improperly managed. These sites include manufacturing facilities, processing plants, landfills and mining sites." There are over 35 Superfund Sites in the state of Massachusetts, including sites in the Merrimack watershed communities of Lowell, Sudbury, Devens, Haverhill, Tyngsborough, Tewksbury, Acton, Concord, and Billerica.  

Urban Heat Islands

Heat islands are areas in cities where the temperatures are higher than in suburban or rural areas.  Buildings and roads absorb and reflect the sun’s heat more than natural landscapes such as forests and water bodies. Cities, where there are a lot of roads and buildings and less trees and grass, become “islands” of higher temperatures. Urban heat islands most often correspond with locations that have higher concentrations of poverty, people of color, and non-English speaking residents.

The orange areas on the map (left) mark places with less tree cover and show the overlap with environmental justice indicators, like poverty and people of color, and unemployment. The darker the orange the less tree cover and the higher concentration of environmental justice indicators.  For example, downtown Lowell (black dot) has only 15% tree cover and the population is 70% people of color and 65% people in poverty.  Whereas, Belvidere (blue dot) has 51% tree cover, 23% people of color and 11% people in poverty.