Heavy Metal Holdup

[Guest guest]

http://www.truthout.org/issues_05/090805HA.shtml

 

Heavy Metal Holdup

By Frank O'Donnell

TomPaine.com

 

Thursday 08 September 2005

 

In Katrina's catastrophic shadow, it's easy to ignore other

threats to public health and the environment that involve government

malfeasance.

 

But one such issue is on the US Senate calendar right now. The

issue is toxic mercury pollution, which - for legal reasons aimed at

protecting big polluters - the Bush administration pretends is not toxic.

 

As soon as this afternoon, the Senate has the rare opportunity to

go on record against this duplicitous public health rollback. The

Senate will be voting on a bipartisan resolution (sponsored by Sens.

Patrick Leahy, D-VT, Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Olympia Snowe,

R-Maine) to disapprove the Bush mercury rules under the Congressional

Review Act.

 

In all likelihood, this will be the biggest vote on clean air in

this Congress.

 

Even though the more industry-dominated House is unlikely to

follow suit, this is an opportunity for the Senate to strike a blow

for public health, common sense and good government - all in one vote.

At the same time, it's a chance to send a message that the Senate will

not rewrite the Clean Air Act along the lines sought by the nation's

biggest polluters. (That would be the ill-named " clear skies "

initiative, which power industry lobbyists and their administration

friends are still huckstering behind the scenes.)

 

The mercury issues are deceptively simple: As many will recall

from watching local newscasts of mercury spills forcing public schools

to evacuate, mercury is a powerful poison. It harms babies' brains,

causing everything from reduced IQ to mental retardation. Government

scientists estimate that 630,000 infants are born each year exposed to

unhealthful mercury levels from their mothers' bodies.

 

Mercury also poses a threat to adults. As the group Physicians for

Social Responsibility notes, adults exposed to mercury may experience

" effects such as personality changes, tremors, vision problems, poor

muscle coordination, and memory loss. "

 

Most of the mercury gets into our systems when we eat contaminated

fish. Literally 44 states have issued advisories warning against

eating fish tainted with mercury. Last year, the EPA and FDA warned

that women of childbearing age and children should eat no more than

two meals per week of canned light tuna and should avoid certain fish

altogether.

 

Of course, the poison didn't get into the fish by magic;

coal-burning electric power plants are the largest source of US

mercury emissions, responsible for more than 40 percent of the total.

Mercury spews out the smokestacks, lands in the water and then moves

up the aquatic food chain.

 

That's why the Clinton administration - after cleaning up other

big mercury sources such as medical and municipal incinerators - set

in motion a plan to require all coal-burning power plants to control

mercury pollution by 2008.

 

But the power industry lobby went to work, led by Tom Kuhn, head

of the Edison Electric Institute and a former college classmate of

President Bush (as well as a Bush " Ranger " fundraiser). Kuhn's

connections and cash worked.

 

In March, EPA announced it was rescinding the Clinton plan, and

substituting an industry-supplied alternative. The polluter plan

permits power companies to buy the right to spew out mercury from

other companies - a feature that could lead to toxic " hot spots " in

areas near power plants that buy such pollution " credits. " The Bush

plan, written by a former power company lobbyist, also would give

power companies up to 20 more years to clean up compared to the

Clinton approach. As the Congressional Research Service reported in

April, the net effect of the rule appears to " postpone until the 2020s

direct regulation of mercury. "

 

The Bush administration advanced two phony arguments to support

its industry-friendly approach: 1) that mercury isn't really toxic;

and 2) there's no " commercially available " technology available to

clean it up.

 

The first argument, of course, is sheer nonsense. Organizations

ranging from the National Academy of Sciences to the American Medical

Association describe mercury as " toxic. " What the Bush administration

really has done is legal legerdemain: by law, a source of toxic

pollution must be cleaned up quickly. EPA has falsely labeled mercury

as non-toxic simply to justify weaker and slower cleanup.

 

The second argument is also ridiculous. In many cases, most of the

mercury can be cleaned up simply by using long-established

technologies such as scrubbers. And last month, a Colorado-based

company eliminated the last vestige of the Bush argument by announcing

it had received a commercial contract to provide newer technology to

clean up mercury from a power plant in the Midwest obligated to meet a

state standard.

 

As the Senate takes up the Leahy-Collins-Snowe resolution, its

members really only need to remember one thing: Mercury is indeed

toxic. Lying to the public doesn't make it any less so.

 

Frank O'Donnell is president of Clean Air Watch, a 501 © 3

non-partisan, non-profit organization aimed at educating the public

about clean air and the need for an effective Clean Air Act.

 

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