The Mercury Scandal

[Guest guest]

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/06/opinion/06KRUG.html?th

 

April 6, 2004OP-ED COLUMNIST The Mercury ScandalBy PAUL KRUGMAN

 

If you want a single example that captures why so many people no longer believe

in the good intentions of the Bush administration, look at the case of mercury

pollution.

 

Mercury can damage the nervous system, especially in fetuses and infants — which

is why the Food and Drug Administration warns pregnant women and nursing mothers

against consuming types of fish, like albacore tuna, that often contain high

mercury levels. About 8 percent of American women have more mercury in their

bloodstreams than the Environmental Protection Agency considers safe.

 

During the 1990's, government regulation greatly reduced mercury emissions from

medical and municipal waste incineration, leaving power plants as the main

problem. In 2000, the E.P.A. determined that mercury is a hazardous substance as

defined by the Clean Air Act, which requires that such substances be strictly

controlled. E.P.A. staff estimated that enforcing this requirement would lead to

a 90 percent reduction in power-plant mercury emissions by 2008.

 

A few months ago, however, the Bush administration reversed this determination

and proposed a " cap and trade " system for mercury that it claimed would lead to

a 70 percent reduction by 2018. Other estimates suggest that the reduction would

be smaller, and take longer.

 

For some pollutants, setting a cap on total emissions, while letting polluters

buy and sell emission rights, is a cost-efficient way to reduce pollution. The

cap-and-trade system for sulfur dioxide, which causes acid rain, has been a big

success. But the science clearly shows that cap-and-trade is inappropriate for

mercury.

 

Sulfur dioxide is light, and travels long distances: power plants in the Midwest

can cause acid rain in Maine. So a cap on total national emissions makes sense.

Mercury is heavy: much of it precipitates to the ground near the source. As a

result, coal-fired power plants in states like Pennsylvania and Michigan create

" hot spots " — chemical Chernobyls — where the risks of mercury poisoning are

severe. Under a cap-and-trade system, these plants are likely to purchase

pollution rights rather than cut emissions. In other words, the administration

proposal would perpetuate mercury pollution where it does the most harm. That

probably means thousands of children born with preventable neurological

problems.

 

So how did the original plan get replaced with a plan so obviously wrong on the

science?

 

The answer is that the foxes have been put in charge of the henhouse. The head

of the E.P.A.'s Office of Air and Radiation, like most key environmental

appointees in the Bush administration, previously made his living representing

polluting industries (which, in case you haven't guessed, are huge Republican

donors). On mercury, the administration didn't just take industry views into

account, it literally let the polluters write the regulations: much of the

language of the administration's proposal came directly from lobbyists' memos.

 

E.P.A. experts normally study regulations before they are issued, but they were

bypassed. According to The Los Angeles Times: " E.P.A. staffers say they were

told not to undertake the normal scientific and economic studies called for

under a standing executive order. . . . E.P.A. veterans say they cannot recall

another instance where the agency's technical experts were cut out of developing

a major regulatory proposal. "

 

Mercury is just a particularly vivid example of what's going on in environmental

protection, and public policy in general. As a devastating article in Sunday's

New York Times Magazine documented, the administration's rollback of the Clean

Air Act has gone beyond the polluters' wildest dreams.

 

And the corruption of the policy process — in which political appointees come in

with a predetermined agenda, and technical experts who might present information

their superiors don't want to hear are muzzled — has infected every area I know

anything about, from tax cuts to matters of war and peace.

 

A Yawngate update: CNN called me to insist that despite what it first said, the

administration really, truly wasn't responsible for the network's claim that

David Letterman's embarrassing video of a Bush speech was a fake. I still don't

understand why the network didn't deny White House involvement until it

retracted the charge. But the main point of Friday's column was to highlight the

way CNN facilitated crude administration smears of Richard Clarke.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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