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States with the Most Superfund Sites

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All states ranked by number of EPA National Priorities List hazardous waste sites requiring federal cleanup.

What This Ranking Tells Us

Superfund sites are the nation's worst contaminated locations, listed on the EPA's National Priorities List for federal cleanup. States with more Superfund sites often have legacy industrial contamination from manufacturing, military operations, or mining. New Jersey consistently leads the nation, reflecting its dense industrial history along the I-95 corridor. The presence of Superfund sites can affect property values, health outcomes, and community development in surrounding areas.

This page ranks all 50 U.S. states and territories on a single indicator - sites - drawn directly from the EPA Superfund National Priorities List (NPL). The ranking draws on 51 state records in the current dataset, ordered descending (highest count at the top) by the underlying federal count.

The top of the table is led by New Jersey with a reported value of 153, followed by Pennsylvania (127) and New York (122). The bottom of the ranking ends with North Dakota at 2, illustrating the spread across the federal record.

A state's position depends on underlying geography, industrial history, population, and the density of reporting entities, not on a simple "cleaner" or "dirtier" label. Use the links in the table to open each state's full environmental profile and view county-level breakdowns, individual facility records, and violation history. Data source: EPA Superfund National Priorities List (NPL). All figures are as-filed and not weighted for toxicity or exposure.

States with the Most Superfund Sites: top 15

Ranked by sites - full table below

sites

What this shows Rankings reflect reported federal totals, shaped by each state's geography, industrial history and population, not a direct measure of health risk or water safety.

Source EPA Superfund National Priorities List (NPL) As of current NPL list
#1 New Jersey 153 sites #2 Pennsylvania 127 sites #3 New York 122 sites
# State Sites
1 New Jersey NJ 153
2 Pennsylvania PA 127
3 New York NY 122
4 California CA 116
5 Michigan MI 90
6 Florida FL 81
7 Texas TX 70
8 Washington WA 69
9 Illinois IL 56
10 Indiana IN 53
11 Ohio OH 50
12 Minnesota MN 49
13 Wisconsin WI 46
14 North Carolina NC 42
15 Massachusetts MA 41
16 Missouri MO 39
17 Virginia VA 35
18 South Carolina SC 34
19 Louisiana LA 29
20 Delaware DE 26
21 Maryland MD 26
22 Tennessee TN 26
23 Puerto Rico PR 26
24 Iowa IA 25
25 Colorado CO 24
26 Utah UT 24
27 Georgia GA 23
28 New Hampshire NH 22
29 New Mexico NM 21
30 Oregon OR 21
31 Kansas KS 20
32 Kentucky KY 20
33 Montana MT 19
34 Nebraska NE 19
35 Oklahoma OK 18
36 Arkansas AR 17
37 Connecticut CT 17
38 Alabama AL 16
39 Maine ME 16
40 Mississippi MS 14
41 Vermont VT 14
42 West Virginia WV 14
43 Arizona AZ 13
44 Rhode Island RI 13
45 Idaho ID 12
46 Alaska AK 9
47 Hawaii HI 4
48 South Dakota SD 4
49 Wyoming WY 3
50 Nevada NV 2
51 North Dakota ND 2

Source: EPA Superfund National Priorities List (NPL).

Frequently Asked Questions

What is a Superfund site?

A Superfund site is a contaminated location that the EPA has placed on the National Priorities List (NPL) due to the severity of contamination. The Superfund program was created by CERCLA in 1980 to clean up the most hazardous waste sites in the country. Sites are scored using the Hazard Ranking System based on contamination type, exposure pathways, and affected populations.

How long does Superfund cleanup take?

Superfund cleanup is notoriously slow. The average site takes 12-15 years from listing to completion, though some complex sites have been under cleanup for 30+ years. As of 2024, about 450 sites have been fully cleaned and deleted from the NPL, while over 1,300 remain active.

Who pays for Superfund cleanup?

The "polluter pays" principle governs Superfund. The EPA identifies Potentially Responsible Parties (PRPs) - companies or individuals who contributed to contamination, and compels them to fund cleanup. When no viable PRP exists, the EPA uses the Superfund Trust (funded by taxes on chemical and petroleum industries) for remediation.

Explore More Rankings

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What to do with this ranking

Use the leaders here as a starting point, then check your own state's full record.

  • New Jersey tops this list at 153 sites - see its full environmental profile, not just this one metric. View New Jersey
  • This single indicator doesn't capture the full picture. Compare against most tri facilities for a different angle. Most TRI Facilities
  • Look up any state directly to see its complete facility, water, and Superfund record in one place. Browse all states

Rankings reflect reported federal data for a single indicator; a high or low rank does not by itself measure overall environmental quality or health risk.

Read our methodology - how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.

According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, this ranking is drawn from PlainEnviro's database of more than 25,000 EPA-tracked facilities and thousands of Safe Drinking Water Information System and Superfund National Priorities List records compiled since federal reporting began under the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act in October 1986; see our methodology for the full data-source citations and refresh cadence.

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Data sourced from U.S. EPA environmental datasets. See our methodology for details. Retrieved and formatted by PlainEnviro Editorial

Every figure on PlainEnviro is rendered directly from EPA environmental compliance data, no number is typed in by an editor. Rankings are computed directly from EPA data. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error.