For years, Diane Wilson has tried to get Formosa Plastics Corp. to stop discharging plastic pellets from its sprawling petrochemical complex on the Central Texas coast. This week, she’s getting her day in court. Read more ...
Tag: polluters
Harris County has sued Intercontinental Terminals Co. for failing to prevent a massive chemical fire that burned for more than 60 hours last week and spewed an unknown volume of hazardous chemicals into the air and nearby waterways. Read more …
A massive fire at a fuels storage company along the Houston Ship Channel may burn for two more days, an official said on Monday as the blaze spread a plume of black smoke across the city, shutting schools in two nearby communities. Read more
State and federal officials have known about the shipments from the Netherlands to Fayetteville for at least a year but never told the public. Read more here
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State Stops Plan to Burn PFAS Waste
The state of Vermont changed its mind about sending about 2,500 gallons of the hazardous fire depressant known as PFOA and PFOS to a hazardous waste incinerator, when it discovered that the operator of the plant had been cited for numerous clean air violations. The Heritage Thermal Services incinerator in East Liverpool, OH has consistently and repeatedly been in violation of federal and state environmental laws and has been a Significant and Habitual Non-Complier of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act and High Priority Violator of the Clean Air Act continuously for years. For the past three years running, for the 12 consecutive quarters from October 2014 to today, Heritage Thermal Services has been and continues to be a High Priority Violator of the Clean Air Act due to the release of excessive amounts of hazardous air pollutants and hydrocarbons. That’s 100% of the time. This is an increase over the three (3) year period from 2010 to 2012 when Heritage Thermal Services was a High Priority Violator 67% of the time.
What’s odd about the decision to burn this waste is that the very reason this family of chemicals are used by fire fighters is that it suppresses flames and is difficult to burn. It’s very likely that the much of the PFAS waste that would be burned in an incinerator would end up going out the smokestack creating air pollution problems.
The state changed its mind once it learned about Heritage’s track record. There was also public pressure from local citizens groups in Vermont who raised significant concerns about burning foam at a hazardous waste incinerator. Alonzo Spencer of the local groups Save Our County in East Liverpool credited the Conservation Law Foundation which has an office in Vermont with stopping the delivery of the waste. “I would like to personally thank Jen Duggen [fusion_builder_container hundred_percent=”yes” overflow=”visible”][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” center_content=”no” min_height=”none”][Vermont director of CLF]. Heritage was on the verge of accepting waste from Vermont that Heritage couldn’t handle correctly. It was Duggan’s Foundation that opposed that. That waste would have been on its way now if she hadn’t intervened,” Spencer told a local paper.
The ingredients of these fire-fighting foams have been found to be toxic. PFOS and PFOA belong to a class of compounds called PFAS chemicals that have been linked to cancer, thyroid disease, developmental problems in children and immune system problems. They were banned for use by fire departments in the early 2000s and have become an emerging drinking water contaminant across the country. An estimated 110 million Americans have PFAS in their water according to a report by the Environmental Working Group. There are 32 military sites and 17 private sites contaminated with PFAS that are on the federal Superfund list. For more, <read here>.
Alonzo Spencer told his local paper, “The city has been spared a ‘disaster.’”[/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]
The USEPA Region 4 Administrator, a 2017 Trump appointee, has been indicted by a Jefferson County, Alabama, grand jury for ethics violations, along with his former business partner, former Alabama Environmental Management Commissioner Scott Phillips. <Read more…>
When it comes to environmental reform, the conversation starts around the kitchen table. And while they don’t get the credit or recognition they deserve, women over the years heavily influenced environmental reform.
Dr. Terrianne K. Schulte narrowed it down to four reformers across the 20th century to represent the work done. She spoke Friday during a talk titled, “We Have to Create a National Debate, Community by Community: Women Trailblazers in Environmental Reform.” She spoke of Helen Dortch Longstreet, Rachel Carson, Betty Klaric and Lois Gibbs.
The talk was sponsored by the Daughters of the American Revolution as part of the Orleans County Heritage Festival.
“They often time don’t get the credit — what’s really ironic about the individuals I chose, three out of the four were closely aligned with media,” Schulte said. “So they did receive attention where they were, but when you look across the broad scope of the 20th century, you don’t really see the work a lot of women did.”
Women did most of their work as part of organizations. In this area especially, Housewives to End Pollution was very effective to clean up Lake Erie when it was labeled “dead” after there was a 1,400 mile dead zone due to the eutrophication and detergent phosphates.
The League of Women Voters were also extremely important, not only locally, but nationally, in terms of conservation and environmentalism. Women Strike for Peace during the Kennedy era was important in protesting the nuclear tests. Read more.
Innocent families live around the 327 Superfund sites at risk of storms and rising seas. Over 2 million moms, dads, children live close enough to one of these toxic sites that likely will be impacted by climate cha
nge and sea level rise. Most families are of modest or low income and don’t have the ability to move. They are the most vulnerable among us.
What is Scott Pruitt, Administrator at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) or Bill Brock, Administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) doing about it? EPA and FEMA are denying climate change, as Trump demanded. Today, denying climate change is like denying your pregnant as your belly swells and the baby kicks. Denial does not negate the problem.
How many innocent people are going to die? How many children will end up getting sick because of exposure to toxic chemical or lack of water and health care. How in the riches country in the world can we as people know this fact and simply ignore the inevitable?
Pruitt said that Superfund sites are his and the agency’s priority. It therefore would make logical sense that these 327 sites be the first place that he takes action. He doesn’t need to say because of climate change he could say they are vulnerable to flooding. If a site is flooded than the toxins spread costing more to clean up and increasing the human health risks significantly.
Instead, Pruitt is prioritizing Superfund sites that either have redevelopment potential or an identified responsible corporation, still in business that can pay for the cleanups. Â So, what does that mean?
We saw through news reports what happened in Puerto after hurricane Maria. By some counts over 1,000 innocent people died. Not from drowning or flying debris but from the lack of infrastructure, water and power or critical medical treatments for people who need dialysis or respirators.
News sources published pictures and reported that families were lined up at toxic waste sites to fill containers with water for their infants who were dehydrating. Depending on what was in that toxic water more deaths are surely in the forecast.
Who is the responsible party for the devastation in Puerto, Houston, New York, New Jersey, Louisiana’s Super Storms? Mother Nature and she has no money.
Where do American families fit into decisions to cleanup sites or create programs that will adequately respond to a natural disaster and especially ones that include toxic chemical waste exposures? Countries and government leaders are measured by how well they protected their people. America is failing in so many ways.
The majority of American families living near these site two million people are working poor, low-income and communities of color. They are the most vulnerable among us. Most live on little surviving day to day but have exactly the same dreams for their children and families as wealthy people. Parents want their children to succeed, go to college and break out of the cycle of poverty and poisonous environments.
From the standpoint of prevention and preparedness, I think understanding the conditions behind the destruction and deaths that occur are extremely important if we are to adequately prepare for the next disaster.
However, instead of prioritizing and preparing for the next super-storm to protect the most vulnerable communities, EPA’s priority Superfund site list is preparing for new development that helps corporations succeed. Â They are ignoring Superfund sites in vulnerable areas, with fragile populations that do not lend themselves to redevelopment.
I have been working in the field of toxic chemicals and impacts on human health for 40 years under both republican and democratic leadership. In that time I have never seen such disregard for human health and American people as this administration. I cried when I saw a father filing his jug with water from a toxic waste site for his infant and when I heard about the eight year old boy who died, suffocated, because he couldn’t get medication for his asthma.
I’m angry. Instead of retiring which was my plan last year, I am working overtime to organize people to stand up, speak out, vote and bring back the America we can all be proud of.
Bobby Griffin found the clusters of shiny silver mercury globules scattered across his San Jacinto riverfront property on Tuesday, a few hundred yards from the San Jacinto Waste Pits, a Superfund site that was inundated during last week’s storm.
Public health officials are investigating a case of dangerous liquid mercury that appears to have washed or blown ashore here, east of Houston, in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey. Read more.
Don’t drink the water. That’s something you’d expect to hear when you travel to a developing country. But that’s what people are saying in Wilmington, a historic beach, tourist and retiree destination and the eighth-largest city in this state. It also happens to be one of my favorite places to go when I need a reprieve from the heat and humidity of central North Carolina. With its charming historic riverfront, shops, delicious restaurants, parks, water sports and beautiful beaches, it’s a great place to relax and unwind. The last thing one should have to worry about is the safety of the local drinking water.
Over the past couple of months, Wilmington residents have learned that DuPont and its spinoff company Chemours have been dumping unregulated chemicals into the Cape Fear River for decades and only recently stopped at the request of the governor. The result: Disturbing levels of chemicals like 1,4-dioxane, GenX and PFOA have been found in the drinking water of residents in Wilmington, Brunswick and the surrounding area.
These types of of chemicals, called fluorinated compounds, have been linked to cancer, thyroid disease and obesity. GenX and other fluorinated compounds are used in the making of Teflon, Scotchgard and other stain-resistant and water-repellant products. They are designed so that they are water- and oil-repellant, which means that they are extremely difficult to treat in water-treatment plants before they hit our taps.
While GenX has received a lot of the attention, the chemical 1,4-dioxane – which is much more well-studied – has been found in some places to be in excess of 35 parts per billion, a level at which, when consumed regularly over the course of a lifetime, cancer risk becomes two orders of magnitude higher than that at generally acceptable levels. Many Wilmington residents have been drinking this water their whole lives. Now they must worry about the risks to their and their children’s health.
Wilmington has asked the EPA to start looking into GenX and investigating the safety of its water. But with asbestos denier Scott Pruitt and chemical industry representative Nancy Beck overseeing EPA’s program in charge of regulating these chemicals, I don’t have much faith in their investigation. Now, the Trump Administration has nominated Michael Dourson to lead the entire toxics program at the EPA. Will Mr. Dourson provide hope for Wilmington?
A look at his background also leaves me skeptical. In 2002, DuPont hand-picked Dourson’s firm Toxicology Excellence for Risk Assessment (TERA) to advise West Virginia’s Department of Environmental Quality on setting health levels for PFOA, one of the same chemicals now found in Wilmington’s water. His firm came up with a level that was thousands of times less protective than a later EPA assessment. 1,4-dioxane is currently under review by the very office that Mr. Dourson has been nominated to lead. Yet he also published research on that chemical paid for entirely by PPG, a company responsible for discharging this chemical and contaminating Ohio’s waterways.
Saturday, I went to a Rally for Clean Water in Wilmington to talk with residents about their concerns. They want what we all want – to know that when they open up the tap, they can drink the water without worrying about toxic chemicals. And they deserve better: corporate polluters that are held accountable for egregious pollution and government officials who will protect their health and safety at the local and the national level.
By Ansje Miller resides in Hillsborough and is the director of policy and partnerships for the Center for Environmental Health.