Washington News

Staff at the Environmental Protection Agency have recommended tightening air quality standards for lead.

Today the Office of Air Quality Planning at the Environmental Protection Agency released a final staff paper, Human Exposure and Health Risk Assessment (see it here), and in it they recommend EPA tighten lead standards. The staff basically says that the evidence of lead's health effects, particularly on children, "clearly calls into question the adequacy of the current standard."

The lead standard was developed in 1978. That standard helped get the lead out of gasoline, a major step forward in environmental health policy. The use of lead as a gasoline additive started in the 1920s, and went into hyperdrive in the 1940s. In spite of the 1978 standard, lead wasn't completely removed from gas until 1996. But in the 18-year period in which it was being phased out, the Centers for Disease Control reported a 90% reduction in kids' blood-lead levels. That's good news—a 90% reduction—but it isn't zero, and when it comes to lead, that's the only safe number. As the EPA staff says, "Current health-effects evidence does not indicate a level of lead exposure below which adverse health effects may not occur." They also say, according to a large and fast-growing body scientific studies, that "adverse effects in young children occur at much lower blood-lead levels than was understood when the current standard was set in 1978."

What does the lead do? Well for one thing, lead has been shown in several studies published in the last couple of years to significantly reduce IQ, depending on the dose and the timing of the exposure (high maternal lead exposures in the first trimester of pregnancy, for example, tend to have greater impact than later in pregnancy, and exposures earlier in childhood have greater affect.) It is clearly associated with other mental health problems and behavioral disorders: lead is implicated in ADHD, for example. It is also associated with infertility problems, birth defects, high blood pressure, and renal failure to name just a few of the long list of health disorders and diseases.

The EPA staff paper recommends "appreciably lowering the level of the current primary standard for lead (the current standard is 1.5 micrograms per cubic meter (μg/m3)." A staff recommendation does not mean that the standard will be changed, but it should fuel a dialog that really needs to happen.

From a Utah Coal Mine, To Your Plate, Coal Is Dangerous Stuff

With the trapping of six miners in the collapse of Murray Energy’s Utah coal mine, we are again hearing about the hazards of mining for mine workers. My sympathies extend to the families of the trapped miners, but this incident highlights for me the need for us to move away from coal-fired energy production and into safer—and cleaner—alternatives.

Coal is not only hazardous to those working in the industry, but is also hazardous to all of us. For most of us, coal is unseen, and unthought about, yet in 2005, coal production in the United States peaked at over a billion tons, with almost 92% of it going to use in electrical generation plants. In fact, 1,522 coal-fired plants around the country supply almost half of the US demand for electricity. Some are small local operations, but most are monster facilities that eat pulverized coal dust like candy.

Mercury

Although each ton of coal the monster eats has but a trace of mercury in it, the total impact adds up: globally, burning coal for power and heat accounts for the greatest addition to the global mercury pool each year, and in the US, approximately a third of our annual contribution comes from our coal-fired power industry. When coal is burned in power plants, traces of mercury, which were captured millions of years ago when the coal was formed,are vaporized and released to the atmosphere.

The mercury released by coal burning, as well as mercury released in industrial processes, mining, and the burning of waste, joins the global mercury pool, making it available to the mercury cycle. And one in the mercury pool, it rains down on land and water, to be taken up by microorganisms, and then by higher organisms, including the fish we eat.

Dioxin

Then there’s also the problem of dioxin produced by burning coal. The term dioxin is actually a catch phrase used to denote several hundred chemicals that have similar chemical structure. Most dioxins fall into three main families—the CDDs, the CDFs, and the PCBs. The ‘C’ in all three acronyms stands for chlorine.

“Everybody in toxicology knows that if you add chlorine to something, you make it toxic,” says Suzanne Wuerthele, a career toxicologist with the Environmental Protection Agency in Denver.

CDDs and CDFs are mainly accidental chemical creations that come from (again) the burning of coal, the burning of municipal and medical waste, and certain industrial processes, while PCBs were manufactured and widely used in industrial transformers until they were banned in 1979. All three families of dioxins are found throughout the natural world, and in all individuals who have been tested by the CDC in quantities that are “at or near the level where effects of dioxin and related compounds, such as enzyme induction, changes in hormone levels, and indicators of altered cellular function, have been observed in laboratory animals and humans.” And, according to EPA’s analysis, potentially adverse effects are associated with exposure to dioxin in human populations at or near the background levels we now see in the environment. Like mercury, dioxin family members accumulate in fat, and work their way up the food chain.

Other Contaminants

Coal-fired plants also spew 59% of total U.S. sulfur dioxide pollution and 18% of total nitrous oxides every year, and release about 50% of our particulate pollution, as well as other toxics, such as arsenic and cadmium. Oh, yeah: They also release about 40% of total U.S. carbon dioxide emissions, a prime contributor to global warming.

When the nitrous oxides that they emit react with volatile organic compounds and sunlight, they form smog, or ground level ozone. Of the six major criteria air pollutants regulated by the EPA, nitrous oxide emissions have historically been the hardest to control, in part because emissions from dirty coal plants in one region can easily pollute areas hundreds of miles downwind. The American Lung Association estimates that almost half of Americans live in areas with unhealthy levels of smog. Just last week, the State of Delaware confirmed in cancer cluster near the Indian River Power Plant that regulators believe is connected to the plant.

Protecting yourself

So what can you do to protect yourself: First, you can reduce exposures by watching what you eat. Several fish species are known for having high levels of dioxins (particularly of the PCB family) as well as mercury. Meat and dairy products also contain elevated levels of dioins, so the best way to reduce you personal dioxin exposure is to reduce the amount of animal fats in your diet: drink low-fat or reduced-fat milk and eat leaner cuts when you select meat.

Also, encourage your state and federal elected officials to close loopholes that allow coal-burning plants to continue spewing noxious and dangerous emissions into our air. To learn more, go to Clear The Air. Check out their power plant locater to learn about dirty plants where you live.