Blunt rejects key sections of Midwestern energy accord
December 20, 2007
The Kansas City Star
By Karen Dillon
Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt has dismissed major parts of the Midwestern Governors Association's energy pact that would establish greenhouse gas reduction goals and require greater reliance on renewable electricity sources.
Blunt was the only governor who did not sign any part of the pact at the 12-state association's energy summit last month. He had also refused to take part in the months-long development of the pact.
On Wednesday, after having reviewed the pact, he said that he would sign certain components, such as helping establish a regional fuels corridor and joining a discussion of new bio-energy projects.
But he refused to sign the main parts of the pact that included specific goals such as producing 30 percent of electricity from renewable sources by 2030 and requiring coal-fired power plants to capture and store emissions by 2020.
Blunt said some of the accord's goals would have to be addressed on a national level, not a regional one, and he said he was concerned that the goals could hurt Missouri consumers.
Blunt noted that 70 percent of the power produced in Missouri comes from coal-fired plants.
"My primary concern is the impact of any agreement on Missouri energy consumers, Missouri jobs and Missouri's environment," Blunt said.
Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius signed the accord, including the major portions. The only other states that did not sign on to the specific goals that make up the majority of the pact were Nebraska and North Dakota.
Recent reports cite Missouri as the 12th-dirtiest state in terms of carbon dioxide emissions and No. 46 in energy conservation. Unlike many other cities and states, Missouri has yet to develop a climate-protection plan.
And Missouri is continuing to build coal-fired power plants even as other states' power companies are stopping construction. Kansas in October refused to issue a permit to allow a utility to build two plants in the western part of the state.
Two coal plants are under construction in western Missouri, one just north of Kansas City and the other in Springfield. Construction on a third coal plant in Norborne, 30 miles east of Excelsior Springs, should begin next year.
With the Norborne plant, CO{-2} emissions will increase by about 15 million tons annually, according to state government estimates. CO{-2}, a greenhouse gas, is a major contributor to the Earth's warming, which in the Midwest may result in more droughts, severe weather and food and water shortages, scientists say.
Erin Noble of the Missouri Coalition for the Environment was critical of Blunt, saying he supported only the parts of the accord that did not require action.
"Blunt isn't committing to any action, and he is acting more as an observer," Noble said. "He is basically signing on to pieces that don't require any commitment or actions."
A statement released by the Sierra Club applauded Blunt's signing and said it was a "good first step" and would "commit the state to slash energy use."
Later, Melissa Hope, the Sierra Club's development director, who issued the statement, said: "Certainly our preference would be that Governor Blunt signs that pact and we start working toward those goals. Right now we are behind, and we need to catch up."
Her statement was criticized by Ken Midkiff, a fellow Sierra Club member in Columbia. Midkiff told The Associated Press that although Blunt was taking a first step, he "is not committing the state to slash energy use."
Builder vows to fix Belleau Creek
December 12, 2007
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
By Tim Bryant
O'FALLON, MO. — A developer has been cited by a state environmental agency for allowing sediment to pollute the creek that runs through the project.
The Missouri Department of Natural Resources cited developer Todd Dwyer over the treatment of Belleau Creek near Mexico Road at Highway K but says he is working to correct the problem.
Dwyer wants to build stores, restaurants and condominiums at the busy intersection's northeast corner. The creek divides what is to be a 13-acre commercial area from 240 condos at the planned Bramblett Crossing project.
He said Tuesday that he was taking steps to correct the problems with Belleau Creek that the state agency found in an inspection last month. He said he would remove a temporary dam and build more silt fences to prevent soil from washing into the creek.
A neighbor, Lisa Markham, and the Missouri Coalition for the Environment remain critical. Markham said Dwyer began removing hundreds of creekside trees this fall and clearing land on both sides of the small stream. As a result dirt eroded into the creek.
"We used to see fish down there," she said.
Markham is especially critical of a small rock dam installed this fall. Dwyer said city officials had suggested the dam as a way to block sediment from washing downstream. He said the dam would be removed because it was blocking
fish movement.
The developer added that although he would take care of problems a DNR inspector found, dirt must be moved and trees would have to go as part of the Bramblett Crossing project.
"When you develop a site, at some point some trees have got to come down," he said.
The Army Corps of Engineers, which granted a permit for work along the creek, also is looking into complaints about the stream's treatment, an agency spokeswoman said.
Kim Knowles, staff attorney for the Missouri Coalition for the Environment, said Dwyer knew the development permit requirements and chose to ignore them.
"These trees are gone for good," she said. "Trees protect streams. They also happen to provide habitat for birds and other wildlife."
Dwyer said new plantings would replace some of the trees removed this fall. He added that a recreational trail would be built along the creek.
"It's going to be pretty neat when it's done," he said.
Mike Struckhoff, DNR's regional director in St. Louis, said the agency's inspection had found two violations at the site. Both involved sediment in Belleau Creek, a tributary of Dardenne Creek. He described the violations as serious but complimented Dwyer for responding promptly to the complaints.
"If we can work with people and get these things remediated as quickly as possible, that's the best for the environment," Struckhoff said.
Dwyer initially proposed a shopping center on the 35-acre site and planned to run 2,200 feet of Belleau Creek through an underground pipe. Opposition from Markham and others helped lead to an amended plan to allow the creek to continue to meander through the site. Dwyer said he planned to put up educational wildlife trail markers at "habitat stations."
Under the current plan, Bramblett Crossing's stores and restaurants will face heavily traveled Mexico Road. The condos, in 20 three-story buildings, will be across Belleau Creek on higher ground to the north. Dwyer said he hoped to build a condo display office in the spring.
"We're still proceeding forward," he said.
Outside, Looking in
November 20th, 2007
St. Louis Post Dispatch Editorial
Members of the Midwestern Governors Association, including Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, approved a pair of landmark agreements last week to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and encourage renewable power sources.
The move attracted considerable attention. California's Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger lauded the agreement, which he said could help pave the way for a national policy to reduce emissions. Western and Northeastern states have endorsed regional pacts.
Of the 12 Midwestern states in the group, only one didn't even bother to send a representative to take part in the discussions: Missouri. That's as shortsighted as it is disappointing. Our failure to anticipate evolving challenges in energy use and production could harm the state's economy — to say nothing of the longer term damage it could inflict on the environment.
Curbing the release of heat-trapping carbon dioxide and ramping up the development of alternative fuels are vital to the region's future. The Midwestern governors' agreements encourage states to offset growing energy demand by increasing efficiency; to expand use of renewable power sources such as solar or wind; and to establish a regional cap-and-trade system to trade emission credits.
No state could benefit more from those policies than Missouri. A report released last week showed that our state led the Midwest in the rate of increase of greenhouse gas emissions. Between 1990 and 2003, releases of heat-trapping gas here grew twice as fast as the state's population.
Coal-fired power plants, many of which are decades old, account for the biggest share of greenhouse gas emissions in Missouri. With mounting evidence of the harm caused by greenhouse gas emissions, the federal government eventually will enact emissions caps, if not next year then after the 2008 elections.
A bill already introduced in the U.S. Senate would impose a cap-and-trade system similar to that contained in the Midwestern governors' agreement. If it passes, it would have a significant impact on states, including Missouri, that have not yet acted to rein-in emissions and encourage alternatives.
A spokeswoman for Gov. Matt Blunt said he is "actively studying and reviewing" the agreements but expressed concern that "it could have serious implications on the state's energy supply and the cost of electricity."
So will the attempt to coast on the status quo, which is unsustainable. The Midwestern Governors Association collectively decided that the benefits of early action outweigh the risks, and clearly they do.
"Our strong manufacturing base and rich agricultural industries, along with the wealth of resources in our vast northern forests and our world-leading research universities, position the Midwest to become the Saudi Arabia of renewable energy," explained Gov. Jim Doyle of Wisconsin.
It's important — economically as well as environmentally — that Missouri share in that future instead of standing on the sidelines and watching the rest of the Midwest pass it by.
Effort to keep CAFO from Arrow Rock mirrors fight to protect parks
November 17th, 2007
The Joplin Globe
By Wally Kennedy
ARROW ROCK, Mo. — The 4,800 hogs will be confined in two buildings. The urine and feces will fall through slatted floors into concrete pits where it will be held for up to a year before it is spread on nearby farmland.
The hogs will produce up to 2 million gallons of manure annually.
The industrial hog farm planned for a site two miles west of Arrow Rock has not been built. If local opponents have their way, it never will.
At stake, they say, is the future of one of the most important historic sites in Missouri. Arrow Rock, population 79, has been referred to as the Williamsburg of the Midwest.
"This is a historic site for the state and nation. Arrow Rock is part of everyone's backyard," said Kathy Borgman, head of the Friends of Arrow Rock. "This is a spot where history was made. You can't move it. Who would want to come here if the air stinks so bad you cannot breathe it?"
Her concern mirrors what is happening elsewhere in Missouri, where large concentrated animal feeding operations going in near state parks is sparking resistance from neighbors and park supporters, who want them protected from odor, runoff and other impacts.
Borgman operates a bed and breakfast in Arrow Rock. On a recent Sunday, she served breakfast to John and Virgie Irvin, of Chillicothe. The Irvins, both in their mid-90s, have been longtime supporters of Arrow Rock and its Lyceum Theatre, Missouri's oldest regional theater.
"It's a wake-up call for the Legislature. It's up to the state to protect these public places," said John Irvin. "But working up a law for the whole state in terms of buffer zones may not be easy. As an example, five miles on either side of the KATY Trail would be a lot of territory."
Said Borgman: "If we get setbacks for state parks, then people would want setbacks for hospitals and schools. But if we don't do something, we could have them (CAFOs) a lot closer than they are now and a whole bunch more.
"We as a community might be able to do something to stop this CAFO. We have resources. But for a citizen, it's like getting run over by a truck. An ordinary person has no defense."
Dennis Gessling, of Marshall, did not return multiple telephone calls made over the course of a week to discuss his plans for the CAFO or his side of the operation. He has said publicly, however, that he would never do anything to harm Arrow Rock. Other hog CAFOs exist in the Arrow Rock area, but the one that Gessling wants to build would be the closest to the village. It also would be within a half-mile of eight historic landmarks west of Arrow Rock.
‘Dangerous'
A new group has formed to lobby for legislation to protect state parks and historic sites from CAFOs.
Citizens to Protect State Parks and Historic Sites incorporated two weeks ago as a non-profit organization. It has retained a Jefferson City law firm for its lobbying effort. The group is planning to raise $30,000.
The group has formed alliances with opponents of a chicken CAFO near Roaring River State Park at Cassville and the opponents of a hog CAFO near the Battle of Athens State Park in northeast Missouri.
The group also has retained a public relations consultant, John Robinson, who is the former director of tourism in Missouri. Robinson said his message will be simple: "CAFOs are dangerous to tourism in Missouri."
In addition, the Missouri Parks Association, the Village of Arrow Rock and the Friends of Arrow Rock have retained a Kansas City lawyer to file a lawsuit against the Missouri Department of Natural Resources and its director, Doyle Childers, to block the hog CAFO.
The DNR, which approved a permit to construct the hog operation, also oversees all Missouri parks and historic sites.
Childers has described the allegation that the hog manure could ruin the historic site as "ridiculous." He also said the lawsuit was "aimed more at political issues than at legal issues."
Gov. Matt Blunt, who appointed Childers, has said he has full confidence in the ability of Childers and the DNR to protect the state's parks and historic sites.
Whitney Kerr, a member of the Friends of Arrow Rock, said CAFOs devalue adjoining properties, have a negative impact on air quality and produce runoff that can damage surface waters.
"We are seeking a declaratory judgment that the DNR has not fulfilled it statutory obligation to protect state parks and historic sites," he said. "Childers is the state historic-preservation officer. He has not done what he is statutorily obligated to do." In addition, the Friends of Arrow Rock have requested a review of the hog CAFO by the U.S. Department of Interior since Arrow Rock is a national historic landmark.
Julie Fisher, a Columbia resident who owns property in Arrow Rock, said the review was triggered by Gessling's acceptance of $108,000 from the National Resources Conservation Service, a federal agency, for projects associated with the transfer and storage of manure, and a treescape to reduce odor from the CAFO.
The review will determine what steps, if any, must be taken to mitigate the impact of the CAFO on the historic site.
Nixon takes stand
In an Oct. 19 speech at Arrow Rock that marked the Missouri Parks Association's 25th anniversary, Missouri Attorney General Jay Nixon said he would not represent the DNR in the lawsuit and would instead hire an outside attorney for the state. Nixon said the DNR should have not issued the construction permit for the Gessling hog farm because of the threat it posed to Arrow Rock.
Nixon has launched a campaign to challenge Blunt for the governor's seat.
Julie Fisher said, "Nixon drew the line that night when he said he will not represent the DNR. He said all the things we advocated."
Ted Fisher, her husband, served on the board of directors of the Lyceum Theatre for 35 years. He also has served on the board of the Missouri Parks Association.
"The DNR is in charge of protecting state parks and permitting CAFOs. That's where the conflict is," he said. "The same agency cannot do both. The state parks should be separated from the DNR."
The Fishers said they have tried to get some form of county zoning in Saline County to protect Arrow Rock, but the effort has fallen on deaf ears. They also said they worked against Senate Bill 364 in the last legislative session, which would have stripped away a county's ability to pass health ordinances to regulate CAFOs.
Blunt said he supported the Senate bill because industrial agriculture, like any other industry in the state, should expect to deal with rules and regulations that are the same in each of the state's 114 counties.
A unique place
Arrow Rock is a National Historic Landmark. It was the birthplace of historic preservation in Missouri with the state's purchase of the Huston Tavern in 1923. It is where the Santa Fe Trail crossed the Missouri River. It also was home to famed Missouri River artist George Caleb Bingham — his home also is a National Historic Landmark — and of Dr. John Sappington, who created the quinine pill as a treatment for malarial fevers.
In 2006, Arrow Rock was chosen by the National Trust for Historic Preservation as one of its "Dozen Distinctive Destinations."
Having worked for decades to advance the preservation of Arrow Rock, Borgman said she is proud of the honors that have been bestowed on Arrow Rock and what has been achieved by the Friends of Arrow Rock.
"But all of these things are trumped by a CAFO. Is this really the only way you can raise hogs?" she asked. "I think greed is getting us into trouble."
What really grates on Borgman is the portrayal of CAFOs as family farms.
"They are just extensions of large agricultural corporations," she said. "These are not family farms. But the supporters of CAFOs call them that because there is this huge mystique around those two words — family farm.
"It reminds of that old television game show, ‘To Tell The Truth,' with Garry Moore. Will the real family farmer please stand up?"
Greek Revival
Whitney and Day Kerr, of Kansas City, have been active in historic preservation at Arrow Rock since 1980, when they purchased and restored the Sanders Townsend House, a Greek Revival cottage constructed in 1860.
"It was in terrible shape. We did a real number on it," said Day Kerr. "It never had indoor plumbing or central heating. No one had lived there for 13 years."
But the big project was still ahead for the Kerrs.
In 1991, they purchased Prairie Park, one of the finest surviving examples of 19th-century Greek Revival architecture in rural Missouri. The brick mansion was the home of William Sappington, a son of Dr. John Sappington.
"At one time, there were crates of chickens going up the spiral staircase," Kerr said. "It was in poor condition. The roof was leaking badly. The rain would pour down the center of the home.
"Even for us, this was a huge undertaking. There were times when we thought we were just crazy, but Whitney and I are both committed to historic preservation. We respect history."
The Kerrs installed a new roof and flashing. Drainage tiles and concrete floors were installed in the basement. Drainage tiles were placed around the foundation to protect the house from water. It was rewired and replumbed. A geothermal-heating system was installed.
Original pieces of furniture were found and returned to the house. Two Bingham portraits now hang in the house.
"Thousands of people have been through that house over the years. We even had tours during the restoration," she said.
The hog CAFO will be a half-mile north of the mansion's front door.
The Kerrs and their neighbor, Bob Stith, who owns a farm Bingham lived in as a boy, offered to buy the land from Gessling, which Gessling's family acquired in about 2000. The offer was declined.
"These CAFOs spend as little money as they have to get as much money as they can out of the animal," said Kerr. "In the process, they do not protect the environment and have no regard for how they impact their neighbors."
Huston Tavern
Built in 1834, the Huston Tavern in Arrow Rock is considered the oldest continuously operating restaurant west of the Mississippi River.
Unsafe at any level
November 8th, 2007
St. Louis Post dispatch
Editorial
The federal standard for how much lead is permitted in the air around smelters is nearly 30 years old and badly outdated. Regulators said last week it's too high for the public's good.
That's bad news for residents of Herculaneum, 35 miles southwest of St. Louis. The Doe Run Company's giant lead smelter there has struggled since 1981 to meet the standard that regulators now say doesn't protect public health. During most of that time, lead levels in air samples taken around the smelter have exceeded the standard.
In May, Doe Run signed an agreement with the Missouri Department of Natural Resources that, when fully implemented next year, would reduce levels of airborne lead around the plant to just below the current standard. But even at that level, federal regulators now say, there is risk of "IQ loss in children."
Scientists at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said last week that the existing standard should be cut by at least 86 percent, from 1.5 micrograms per cubic meter of air to between 0.1 and 0.2 micrograms per cubic meter. The recommendation won't necessarily be accepted by political appointees running the EPA, but it should be.
In March, a panel of independent scientists advising the EPA on airborne lead levels also concluded that the current standard is dangerously high. They also slapped down an industry-sponsored plan to remove lead from the list of contaminates that the EPA monitors.
In September 2005, a federal judge ordered the agency to set new standards as a result of a lawsuit filed by the Missouri Coalition for the Environment. The current standard, written in 1978, was supposed to be reviewed every five years and updated as new scientific evidence warranted. That never happened.
With the report released last week, the EPA is inching closer to a new, lower standard. But the process is agonizingly slow. As Post-Dispatch environmental writer Kim McGuire reported, the draft of a proposed new standard probably won't be available until March. The final rule may not be in place until May.
In the meantime, Herculaneum residents will continue to be exposed to levels of lead around the smelter that federal regulators now acknowledge are too high. Lead is a potent neurotoxin that has devastating effects on the developing brains of you children. It can significantly lower IQ, and has been associated with serious problems, including attention deficit disorder. There is no safe level of lead exposure in children.
Because of its agreement with the state, Doe Run technically is not in violation of the law. But given that the new report cites clear scientific evidence that airborne lead, at the level Doe Run is producing, is harmful to children, Missouri regulators must push the company to immediately reduce lead in the air around the smelter. The company may not yet have a legal obligation to comply, but it can no longer deny its moral obligation.
U.N. Warns of Rapid Decay of Environment
October 26th, 2007
New York Times
By James Kanter
PARIS, Oct. 25 — The human population is living far beyond its means and inflicting damage to the environment that could pass points of no return, according to a major report issued Thursday by the United Nations.
Climate change, the rate of extinction of species, and the challenge of feeding a growing population are putting humanity at risk, the United Nations Environment Program said in its fourth Global Environmental Outlook since 1997.
"The human population is now so large that the amount of resources needed to sustain it exceeds what is available at current consumption patterns," Achim Steiner, the executive director of the Environment Program, said in a telephone interview.
Many biologists and climate scientists have concluded that human activities have become a dominant influence on the Earth's climate and ecosystems. But there is still a range of views on whether the changes could have catastrophic impacts, as the human population heads toward nine billion by midcentury, or more manageable results.
Over the last two decades, the world population increased by almost 34 percent, to 6.7 billion, from 5 billion. But the land available to each person is shrinking, from 19.5 acres in 1900 to 5 acres by 2005, the report said.
Population growth combined with unsustainable consumption has resulted in an increasingly stressed planet where natural disasters and environmental degradation endanger people, plants and animal species.
Persistent problems include a rapid rise of "dead zones," where marine life no longer can be supported because pollutants like runoff fertilizers deplete oxygen.
But Mr. Steiner, of the Environment Program, did note that Western European governments had taken effective measures to reduce air pollutants and that Brazil had made efforts to roll back some deforestation. He said an international treaty to tackle the hole in the earth's ozone layer had led to the phasing out of 95 percent of ozone-damaging chemicals.
"Life would be easier if we didn't have the kind of population growth rates that we have at the moment," Mr. Steiner said. "But to force people to stop having children would be a simplistic answer. The more realistic, ethical and practical issue is to accelerate human well-being and make more rational use of the resources we have on this planet."
Mr. Steiner said parts of Africa could reach an environmental tipping point if changing rainfall patterns turned semi-arid zones into arid zones and made agriculture much harder. He said another tipping point could occur in India and China if Himalayan glaciers shrank so much that they no longer supplied adequate amounts of water.
He also warned of a global collapse of all species being fished by 2050, if fishing around the world continued at its current pace. The report said that two and a half times more fish were being caught than the oceans could produce in a sustainable manner, and that the level of fish stocks classed as collapsed had roughly doubled over the past 20 years, to 30 percent.
In the spirit of the United Nations report, President Nicolas Sarkozy of France outlined plans on Thursday to fight climate change.
He said he would make 1 billion euros, or $1.4 billion, available over four years to develop energy sources and maintain biodiversity. He said each euro spent on nuclear research would be matched by one spent on research into clean technologies and environmental protection.
Mississippi River 'an orphan,' review finds
October 17th, 2007
St. Louis Post dispatch
By Bill Lambrecht
Mark Twain once described the Mississippi River as worthless for anything except drinking, steamboating and baptizing.
But even Twain never called the Mississippi an "orphan," the word a panel of experts used Tuesday to describe what is happening to America's most famous river because of federal neglect.
In a 229-page report two years in the making, the National Research Council blamed the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for failure to coordinate state efforts to manage water quality, leaving a system of patchwork monitoring that makes it hard to assess the river's health.
David Dzombak, an environmental engineering professor at Carnegie Mellon University, headed the 13-member panel that studied the river's management. He said the government's limited attention to the Mississippi doesn't match the river's value to the nation in terms of economics, ecology or cultural importance.
"The EPA has not exercised its authority under the Clean Water Act to provide adequate coordination," Dzombak said, noting that no system exists to share research data about the river.
Added panel member Robin Craig, a law professor at Florida State University, "There are a lot of provisions in the act waiting to be awakened."
Benjamin Grumbles, the EPA's assistant administrator for water, responded by saying his agency "is committed to increasing efforts with all of our partners to improve the water quality and monitoring of the Mississippi River Basin."
The panel noted that this week marks the 35th anniversary of the signing of the Clean Water Act, the nation's first full-scale effort to stanch the flow of pollution into rivers and lakes. The law halted much of the industrial pollution that once poured into the river, the study says.
But the Mississippi has a significant new problem: farm fertilizer runoff that chokes the river and its tributaries with nitrate pollution on the way to feeding a New Jersey-size "dead zone" of oxygen-impaired water in the Gulf of Mexico.
The Clean Water Act "was designed for those things that the public perceived as the 800-pound gorilla," said panel member Otto Doering, a Purdue University agriculture economist. "Now we've got another 800-pound gorilla."
The panel recommended that the EPA hasten efforts to promote cooperation among states while pushing for limits on nutrient pollution.
But stemming farm pollution will be challenging, the report's authors conceded, considering that the Clean Water Act covers agriculture only indirectly. The study concludes that the Agriculture Department needs to play a much bigger role in the river's health with programs that "widely and aggressively" reward farmers for better environmental stewardship.
'NOT MY KID'
Under the Clean Water Act, the EPA and states share responsibility for water quality. States designate uses of rivers and pollution limits, and the EPA oversees regulations with the authority to step in when states fail.
The Missouri Coalition for the Environment, an advocacy group, sued the EPA in 2005, contending that Missouri was not living up to the Clean Water Act. In a settlement, the EPA agreed to force Missouri to implement tougher water quality standards.
Kathleen Logan Smith, the coalition's executive director, described the new report as "pretty close to right on. When they call it an orphan, they mean that. Everybody wants to say: It's not my kid."
The National Research Council is part of the National Academy of Sciences, set up by Congress as an independent group to advise the government on science.
The study was sponsored by the Minneapolis-based McKnight Foundation, which described the study as unprecedented in terms of its expert focus on the Mississippi. Said the foundation's Gretchen Bonfert, "It confirmed our fears."
blambrecht@post-dispatch.com
202-298-6880
Carol Stark: Neighbors may be only defense
October 20th, 2007
The Joplin Globe
Editorial
I keeping looking at the row of maple trees in my neighbor's yard, hoping for some signs of fall color.
Nothing but green — well, maybe a tinge of yellow. Nonetheless, the view from my porch is a nice one. I live in a rural neighborhood, surrounded by good neighbors. I count myself lucky.
But the view from my porch could easily change. Under different circumstances, I might have to stare at a junk yard, a crowded housing subdivision or a 24-hour convenience store.
Worse yet, to my thinking, a factory farm might move into the neighborhood.
It's come to the point where living outside the city limits has become quite the gamble. After all, neighbors come and go.
Country dwellers have always been risk-takers. The well might run dry. It takes longer for the fire department to get to the house. And, those septic tanks are expensive to replace. But the risks have always seemed worth the reward of being able to hear the crickets sing or to breathe in the smell of fresh-cut alfalfa. I also like the solitude.
But the more I learn about the way our state determines the standards needed to permit confined animal-feeding operations, the more I worry that in 10 years, my neighbors could be thousands and thousands of chickens.
And, under the current guidelines established by the state, and the lack of regulations in the county where I live, there's absolutely nothing I can do to prevent something like that from happening.
Gov. Matt Blunt made a quick stop at the Globe a few days ago. His meeting with our editorial board had more the feel of a press conference in which he discussed the last legislative session. With about 10 minutes left for questions, we attempted to prompt discussion on the state's decision to grant a permit to a chicken CAFO located near Roaring River State Park in Barry County.
Blunt defended the Department of Natural Resources and its director, Doyle Childers. The governor said that if the CAFO met the requirements, there was nothing the state could do but grant the permit. That, he said, was the case at Roaring River.
While Blunt said he would be in favor of strengthening those standards, he made it clear that he felt agribusiness should be regulated by set standards imposed by the state.
I didn't say it out loud — I didn't have time — but I thought to myself that those state standards aren't working out so well for us now. Check out a map of Southwest Missouri. We have become the dumping grounds for you know what. The little dots on the map signifying factory farms are quickly filling in the landscape.
So, what can we do?
I've noticed recently that there are a number of individuals who are stepping out with petitions. They write us, and they send copies of those letters to their legislators. The tone of those letters tells me they are tired of being patient.
More local controls — not fewer — would seem to be in line with what we're hearing from many of our readers.
That being said, I'll throw out the concept of county zoning. I know, I know. Zoning and planning have been rejected by voters several times in past years. And, as far as I know, there's no movement afoot to put it on the ballot.
But, in the coming months, we here at the Globe plan to provide you with information about how residents in other counties have fared under planning and zoning.
Does it protect state parks, historic sites and other landmarks important to our counties? Does having countywide planning and zoning assure family farmers that land will be protected for agriculture?
And, even if a county has planning and zoning, could CAFOs still move in?
Our editorial board will visit with commissioners and state legislators to see if there is an equitable solution.
I'm among those counting on answers. I have grandchildren who will want to fish and picnic at Roaring River State Park.
And, when they sit on my porch in the years to come, I want them to enjoy the colors of the fall leaves in the neighbor's yard.
It doesn't seem like too much to ask.
Carol Stark is editor of The Joplin Globe. Address correspondence to her, c/o The Joplin Globe, P.O. Box 7, Joplin, Mo. 64802 or e-mail cstark@joplinglobe.com.
Individuals voice opposition to CAFOs near state parks
October 19th, 2007
The Joplin Globe
By Wally Kennedy
CASSVILLE, Mo. — Sharon Riedel started to explain to the Missouri State Park Advisory Board why confined-animal-feeding operations pose a threat to Roaring River State Park, but she couldn't.
With tears welling up in her eyes, she had to stop to regain her composure. She said, "I am trying not to be emotional, but Roaring River is a God-given beauty that should not be taken away.''
Riedel told the board, which met Friday morning in the Roaring River Inn, that she had heard Emory Melton, of Cassville, give a fireside chat about the history of Roaring River the night before. She described Melton as a local statesman who understands the importance of the park and the river to Barry County.
"A hundred years from now when someone gives another fireside chat will they say that our legacy was letting Roaring River be surrounded by CAFOs?'' she asked.
Riedel was one of the more than 40 people who turned out Friday morning for the board's meeting to express concern about what they see as a threat posed by CAFOs near state parks and historic sites. They traveled to Roaring River from Joplin, Carthage, Neosho, Eagle Rock and Arrow Rock, a historic community in central Missouri that recently filed a lawsuit against the Missouri Department of Natural Resources and its director, Doyle Childers, to attempt to stop a hog CAFO there.
Speaker after speaker before the board decried the stench of corporate agriculture, and its influence on state politics through campaign contributions. Childers, in response to the criticism, has said the claims made by those opposed to CAFOs near state parks and historic sites are "ridiculous.'' He said their concerns are politically motivated.
Childers, while not at the meeting Friday, also has repeatedly stated publicly that the DNR can only do what it is authorized by state law to do, and that it is up to the General Assembly to make laws.
He has stated the DNR does not have authority to address issues of zoning, location, property values, tourism or others unrelated to water quality. He says as long as a permit application for a CAFO meets the state's requirements, the DNR has no authority not to issue a permit.
Kay Smith, a Pierce City resident who owns a cabin at Table Rock Lake, said, "The DNR tells us they were forced to issue the permit for the CAFO here at Roaring River. They said they had no choice. I don't believe that. The statutory mission of the DNR has been compromised to the mission of big business.''
Jean Blackwood, of Carthage, said she has never put a fishing line in Roaring River, but that she comes to the park to camp, hike and bird watch.
"Is nothing sacred?" she asked. "The DNR must think nothing is sacred. I know this is a radical idea but I think the parks should be removed from the DNR and made into a free-standing division because the DNR has become hopelessly compromised by politics.''
She said the agency is at cross-purposes with itself. She said it cannot protect CAFOs and state parks at the same time. The representation of so many people from across the state at Friday's meeting of the board, she said, suggests the issue has reached a "a tipping point. Don't let them tell you you are a boisterous minority. You are the bravest among us.''
Wes Nall, of Neosho, told the opponents of the chicken CAFO at Roaring River not to expect any help from the DNR. He said he and others who live near Crowder College at Neosho have been fighting a poultry CAFO operated by Moark and the odor associated with it for years.
wkennedy@joplinglobe.com
Power Plant Rejected Over Carbon Dioxide For First Time
October 19th, 2007
The Washington Post
Steven Mufson
The Kansas Department of Health and Environment yesterday became the first government agency in the United States to cite carbon dioxide emissions as the reason for rejecting an air permit for a proposed coal-fired electricity generating plant, saying that the greenhouse gas threatens public health and the environment.
The decision marks a victory for environmental groups that are fighting proposals for new coal-fired plants around the country. It may be the first of a series of similar state actions inspired by a Supreme Court decision in April that asserted that greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide should be considered pollutants under the Clean Air Act.
In the past, air permits, which are required before construction of combustion facilities, have been denied over emissions such as sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides and mercury. But Roderick L. Bremby, secretary of the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, said yesterday that "it would be irresponsible to ignore emerging information about the contribution of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to climate change and the potential harm to our environment and health if we do nothing."
The Kansas agency's decision caps a controversy over a proposal by Sunflower Electric Power, a rural electrical cooperative, to build a pair of big, 700-megawatt, coal-fired plants in Holcomb, a town in the western part of the state, at a cost of about $3.6 billion. One unit would have supplied power to parts of Kansas; the other, to be owned by another rural co-op, Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association, would have provided electricity to fast-growing eastern Colorado.
Together the plants would have produced 11 million tons of carbon dioxide annually, nearly as much as a group of eight Northeastern states hope to save by 2020 through a mandatory cap-and-trade program they plan to impose. The attorneys general from those states had written a letter opposing the permit.
The proposed Holcomb plants had become the center of a political dispute in Kansas, inflaming traditional tensions between the eastern and western parts of the state, dividing labor unions and posing a test for the energy policies of Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, who is head of the Democratic Governors Association and is believed to harbor aspirations for federal office.
Kansas, long a conservative Republican stronghold, is not generally considered to be on the leading edge of environmental causes. The GOP leadership in both the state Senate and House of Representatives endorsed the project. Although the regional United Steelworkers union opposed the plant, the state AFL-CIO supported it.
"Now the Sebelius administration rockets to the forefront of the states [working] to solve the global warming crisis," said Bruce Nilles, a Sierra Club lawyer.
Like many governors, Sebelius has been promoting the expanded use of renewable energy, especially wind. In her state of the state address this year, she said: "The question of where we get our energy is . . . no longer just an economic issue, nor solely an issue of national security. Quite simply, we have a moral obligation to be good stewards of this state."
But she said she was leaving the air permit decision on the Holcomb plants to Bremby, her close political ally.
Tri-State and Sunflower spokesmen sharply criticized the decision and said they were examining their legal options. Bremby's decision "has no basis in law or regulation," said Steve Miller, a Sunflower spokesman. "We still believe fiercely that this is the right project, that this is the right thing to do for customers and that the secretary has made a horrible error."
Miller said that Sebelius had pledged not to oppose the plants but that her position was clear after her "moral steward" remark. "That implies that we're not moral stewards of the land, which we don't appreciate one bit," he said.
Lee Boughey, a spokesman for Tri-State, said Bremby had disregarded his own staff, which had recommended issuing the permit.
The plants' powerful supporters included the speaker of the state House, Melvin Neufeld, who had earlier gathered the signatures of 46 GOP members, including key committee chairmen, for a letter to Bremby. The letter said, "Without your approval of the permit as proposed by Sunflower, our state and its citizens will lose access to the low-cost energy source and millions in economic development." Thirty-one Republican House members declined to sign the letter.
Neufeld said the plants would bring in new tax revenue, create hundreds of jobs, prompt the expansion of transmission lines that could also be used for wind power and keep energy costs low for Kansans by producing enough power to export to other states.
But the plants had aroused strong opposition, especially in the half-dozen eastern counties from Topeka to Kansas City, which have enough voters to carry statewide elections.
Bob Eye, a former state legislator, said of yesterday's decision: "Is it without precedent? Yes, as far as I know, in this state or any other." But he argued that "CO{-2} . . . is a pollutant, not just because the Sierra Club says it, but because the Supreme Court said it."
Holcomb's previous claim to fame had been the savage murders that Truman Capote described in his book "In Cold Blood." Holcomb was a place, Capote wrote, that stood "on the high wheat plains of western Kansas, a lonesome area that other Kansans call 'out there.'"
But Eye argued that wind projects were building a new constituency for renewable energy resources even "out there" among the people who were supposed to be the biggest backers of Sunflower's plans. FPL Group, a Florida power firm with a wind farm in Kansas, said it is making payments to about 30 landowners there.
Sunflower, which already has a smaller coal-fired plant in Holcomb, has portrayed the proposed plants as part of a "bio-energy center" that would include an ethanol plant and an $86 million facility that would use a still-experimental algae process to capture carbon dioxide emissions from the proposed generating units. But one investor in the center had pulled out before yesterday's decision.
Even without yesterday's permit denial, the Holcomb project faced economic challenges. A proposal to build a third new unit there was dropped earlier. Tri-State must also meet a renewable portfolio standard adopted recently by Colorado. (Tri-State supported the measure.) That requires utilities to use renewable energy sources to meet 10 percent of their sales. Because Tri-State's purchases of hydropower do not count, it uses less than 1 percent renewable resources. Two-thirds of its power comes from coal. It is negotiating to acquire some wind power.
KDHE Denies Sunflower Electric Air Quality Permit
October 18th, 2007
Kansas Department of Health and Environment News Release
Roderick L. Bremby, Secretary of the Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE), announced today that he has denied the air quality permit for the two proposed 700-megawatt generators at the Sunflower Electric Power Corporation plant near Holcomb.
"After careful consideration of my responsibility to protect the public health and environment from actual, threatened or potential harm from air pollution, I have decided to deny the Sunflower Electric Power Corporation application for an air quality permit," said Bremby.
In making his decision, Bremby cited the authority provided to the Secretary of KDHE in K.S.A. 65-3008 and K.S.A. 65-3008a, which grant him the authority to affirm, modify or reverse a decision on an air quality permit after the public comment period or hearing, and K.S.A. 65-3012, which authorizes him to deny or modify an air quality permit to protect the health of persons or the environment.
"I believe it would be irresponsible to ignore emerging information about the contribution of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to climate change and the potential harm to our environment and health if we do nothing," said Bremby.
The U.S. Supreme Court found in Massachusetts v. EPA that carbon dioxide meets the broad definition of an air pollutant under the Clean Air Act. The Kansas Air Quality Act similarly has a broad definition of what constitutes air pollution.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has recognized the need for public health agencies to take the lead on educating the public about the health impacts of climate change and has adopted priority health actions to prepare for, respond to and manage the associated health risks of climate change.
The decision constitutes a first step in emerging policy to address existing and future carbon dioxide emissions in Kansas. " KDHE will work to engage various industries and stakeholders to establish goals for reducing carbon dioxide emissions and strategies to achieve them. This is consistent with initiatives underway in states leading the effort to address climate change," said Bremby.
One such initiative currently being undertaken by eight northeastern states is the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), a mandatory regional cap-and-trade program aimed at reducing carbon dioxide emissions from power plants by 10 percent, or approximately 12 million tons annually, by 2020. The expanded Sunflower plant was projected to release an estimated 11 million tons of carbon dioxide annually.
"Denying the Sunflower air quality permit, combined with creating sound policy to reduce carbon dioxide emissions can facilitate the development of clean and renewable energy to protect the health and environment of Kansans," said Bremby.
# # #
Editor's note: More information about the Sunflower Electric Cooperative air quality permit decision, including a timeline, the summary response to comments and multimedia clips of the announcement can be found at http://www.kdheks.gov/press_room.htm.
As the state's environmental protection and public health agency, KDHE promotes responsible choices to protect the health and environment for all Kansans.
Through education, direct services and the assessment of data and trends, coupled with policy development and enforcement, KDHE will improve health and quality of life. We prevent illness, injuries and foster a safe and sustainable environment for the people of Kansas.
Contact:
Joe Blubaugh,
785-296-5795;
jblubaugh@kdhe.state.ks.us
EPA revisits lead in park where riders kick up dust
August 27th, 2007
St. Louis Post dispatch
By Ken Leiser
PARK HILLS, MO. — Kevin Ferguson watched his 6-year-old son, Taylor, as the boy drove a kid-size all-terrain vehicle off the sandy flats of St. Joe State Park.
"You got muddy already, huh?" Dad asked as the boy came to a stop on an overcast Saturday afternoon.
"Yeah."
"Did you do doughnuts?"
"I did," Taylor said. "One time."
The flats he rode on used to be part of an active lead mining and milling operation. But even though lead has proven to be especially harmful to young children, Ferguson, of Pacific, said it was not a major concern.
"I've never heard of anybody filing a claim on it," he said. "We all grew up with lead-based paint in our houses, our cribs and all that, and we're still here."
Thousands of people now ride, hike and camp on this former lead mining site, about 55 miles south of St. Louis. But nearly three decades after it was converted into a recreational park, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has raised new questions about letting the public play in the mine's gritty leftovers.
Last week, the EPA urged the Missouri Department of Natural Resources to move off-road vehicle riding away from the flats during the next several years and to better warn park visitors of the threat of lead mine waste, which makes up about 1,000 of the park's 8,200 acres.
"We see the continued use of the park for (off-road vehicle) riding and recreation in the mine tailings as inconsistent with EPA's approach to reducing lead exposure in St. Francois County," said Bruce Morrison, with the agency's Superfund Division in Kansas City.
Soil and dust sampling in 2002 found lead levels as high as 4,638 parts per million in the beach area where children play and swim, and up to 1,563 parts per million in the riding area, according to government reports.
Both are above levels that would trigger an EPA cleanup if they were found to be that high in a residential yard.
Lead-bearing sand can be tracked out of the park on tires, work its way into clothing or be ingested, federal health officials said. It also can be washed or blown out of the park into nearby communities.
A 1997 study by state and federal health agencies found 17 percent of the children living in this part of St. Francois County had lead poisoning, though the figure has dropped in recent years.
Federal regulators say they don't want to close the park, but Ferguson and other ATV enthusiasts aren't so sure.
The risks, they say, don't outweigh the benefits of keeping the popular sand flats open.
"They just want to shut down every place somebody can go ride," Ferguson said. "We pay to come down here. The kids can ride, have a good time. They're not on the streets doing something illegal or dangerous."
800,000 VISITORS
State parks officials want to keep the sand flats open to off-road vehicles, mostly ATVs and dirt bikes. Hundreds of riders descend on the park most nonwinter weekends to ride on the flats, or the forested upland trails.
The park drew more than 800,000 visitors last year. ATV and dirt bike riders have to pay for a $3 daily permit. In 2006, about 55,000 permits were sold.
Doyle Childers, director of the Department of Natural Resources, said that if lead exposure at the park is "minuscule" compared with what some children face in their homes, it may not make sense to curtail a popular activity.
"We are hopeful that as we look at it, we will find out that yes, there are common-sense efforts to make sure the park is safe," Childers said.
State and U.S. EPA officials are expected to meet in October. The EPA will have final say on how the mine waste is cleaned up.
State officials prefer to create a trail network in the riding area, seed and fertilize some of the areas, and cover other spots with graded rock.
But EPA officials said the plan lacks sufficient detail to evaluate how it would prevent exposure to mine waste and protect people.
The state and the Maryland Heights-based Doe Run Co., successor to St. Joe Lead Co., are considered potentially responsible in cleaning up the waste.
Mining in the region began during the 1700s and ultimately grew to become one of the most prolific sources of lead in the world. St. Joe Minerals Corp. donated the land to the state in the 1970s after closing its last mine.
The state converted the site into a park in the late 1970s.
STATE CHANGES
Missouri parks officials say they have taken some steps to deal with the lead issue at St. Joe. They have removed tailings from a section of the Pim Lake beach and replaced them with traditional sand. In April, the park opened a wash station to rinse mine tailings off ATVs and dirt bikes. And literature about the effects of lead is available inside park offices.
John Carter, manager of historic properties at Doe Run, said the company will work closely with the state in dealing with the mine waste at St. Joe Park.
Jim Yancey, an environmental specialist with the Division of State Parks, said a 2003 study at St. Joe Park found human health risks to be within "acceptable" limits for recreational users.
"At least the information we have right now, that we're acting on today, is that recreational exposure does not present undue risk to recreational users," Yancey said.
But federal regulators are worried not only about park users, but also about children living in the old mining districts who will visit St. Joe Park and increase their exposure to lead.
Morrison also said some of the measures to inform park visitors about lead exposure are "inadequate." For instance, signs declaring some of the riding surface and public beaches as "mine tailings areas" don't mention lead, he said.
Park visitors should be handed a brochure at the off-road vehicle check-in office and at the nearby mining museum, he said.
Tom Kruzen, a Sierra Club volunteer and longtime critic of the lead industry, said the old mine and mill should never have opened as a state park, and the questions being posed by the EPA are long overdue.
"It's toxic mining waste," Kruzen said.
Some park visitors appear to have weighed the risk.
At Monsanto Lake, Jerry and Carol Ladymon of Farmington kept a close eye on their granddaughters, ages 5 and 8, who were playing on the beach. They have told the two girls not to put anything in their mouths and to wash off their hands.
"Yeah, it's a concern," Carol Ladymon said. "The lead, once it gets in your system, it's there. It never leaves."
Melissa Schneider of Pacific agrees that more information should be offered to park visitors. But Schneider, who was at the park this past weekend with her husband, Darryl, and two sons, ages 5 and 10, said she doesn't harbor major concerns about lead levels at the park.
"I'm worried more about my toys nowadays," Schneider said. "This is at least Mother Earth. To me, it's probably the lead that came from the mines that came from the earth. And to me, that is different than lead that's in the paint that is being processed on my toys."
The ruling is posted
online
or can be found via a link on our website.
We hope that this will be the final act in the City's 10 year old
attempt to sell Buehler Park. We look forward to working with the City
and the Chamber to enhance and beautify the Park, replace the bathrooms
and playground equipment that have been removed during the course of
the controversy, and make Buehler Park into an attraction that the late
Dr. Henry Buehler would have been proud of.
Permit Issued for Chicken Farm Near State Park
August 23th, 2007
The Joplin Globe
by Wally Kennedy
The DNR said the permit application complies with state law and meets all requirements needed to protect state waters. The permit calls for a no-discharge waste system. Waste generated by the CAFO will be taken elsewhere for land application.
Although the Administrative Hearing Commission issued a ruling July 25 to stay construction, the DNR says continuing construction work at the site "did not involve manure storage or treatment."
Darrick Steen, who is overseeing the project for the DNR, said, "Our impression was that the CAFO was essentially complete when the stay was issued."
The DNR in March issued a construction permit to Michelle Ozbun that authorized construction of four chicken-confinement buildings. The DNR said the construction of "other storage buildings for purposes of other utility work, plumbing or installation of other equipment not related to manure storage or treatment did not require authorization from a construction permit and therefore were not affected by the Administrative Hearing Commission's stay order."
Michelle Ozbun said the construction permit was only for the four confinement buildings.
"Everything else we have done, the propane tanks, the feeders and stuff like that, has nothing to do with the DNR," she said. "The permit stuff was completed when we got the stay. We were done with the construction permit at that time.
"I had them (the contractor) do some work on a couple of sheds while they were here, but they don't have anything to do with the farm."
As for the Administrative Hearing Commission, she said: "They are not a court or a judge, or any of that. The people who are fighting us have made a big deal out of that. It's nothing. What they do is give their recommendation to the DNR and to the Clean Water Commission. After that, it's up to them."
The stay was issued when the Administrative Hearing Commission received testimony that the Ozbuns still needed to obtain permission from an adjoining landowner to operate the CAFO.
Steen said the operating permit was issued after the DNR, not the hearing commission, determined that the Ozbuns had obtained the landowner's signature to comply with the ruling of the commission. The commission has not lifted the stay, he said.
"We asked the Ozbuns to provide evidence to clear that up, which they did," he said. "We feel comfortable that the deficiency has been adequately addressed. It's the department's role to make sure the operating permit is in compliance with the regulations before we issue a permit. Both permits are appealable."
Steen said it is not necessary for the commission to lift a stay on a construction permit before an operating permit can be issued.
"The AHC did not state an operating permit could not be issued,"he said. "They did not prohibit that in their order."
Steen said there is no state law that prohibits the issuance of an operating permit when a stay is in effect on a construction permit.
Before an operating permit can be issued, the operator must certify in writing that the CAFO was built according to the approved plans or permit.
The Ozbuns obtained a professional engineer who certified that the CAFO was built according to the approved plan, Steen said.
One of three
The Ozbun CAFO, which will supply chickens for the George's processing plant at Butterfield, is one of three in Missouri that have been constructed or are proposed for construction near state parks or historic sites.
The others are at Arrow Rock State Historic Site in central Missouri and at Battle of Athens State Historic Site in the northeastern corner of the state.
The Missouri Parks Association and the Missouri Coalition for the Environment have encouraged their members to write to state legislators, the governor and the director of the Department of Natural Resources to seek stronger regulations of CAFOs.
The Pernicious Allure of Lead
August 21st 2007
The New York Times
By Natalie Angier
The human body needs a diet enriched with many ingredients from the periodic table that sound less like food than like machine parts or spare change. We must have iron to capture oxygen, copper and chromium to absorb energy, cobalt to sheathe our nerves and zinc to help finger our genes. Other creatures demand the occasional sprinkling of tin, nickel, platinum, tungsten and even strontium.
But when it comes to lead, the 82nd item on Mendeleev's menu of the elements, the universal minimum daily requirement is zero. As far as we know, neither we nor any known life form needs the slightest amount of lead to survive. And for humans, especially infants and young children, consumption of even moderate amounts of the metal can have serious consequences.
Developing brains seem to be extremely sensitive to the effects of the metal, which is why many scientists who study lead were distraught by the latest news of lead paint's being used on children's toys.
"I'm not normally a rabble rouser, but I'm disturbed by the potential enormity of this problem," said Jeremy R. Knowles, a professor of chemistry and biochemistry at Harvard. "We're talking about millions of toys, and the possibility of an entire generation of children being exposed to gratuitous constraints on their neurological development."
Yet even as Dr. Knowles and others urged that much more rigorous inspection procedures be adopted to guard against lead finding its way into children's mouths, the experts conceded that the toy recall fiasco felt like another case of Et tu, déjà vu? Humans have a long, tangled relationship with lead, now celebrating its pliant versatility, now fearing its orotund power, and who knows if we can ever put our saturnine genie back in the bottle we've been mining for at least 5,000 years.
As one of the 100-plus elements of which the Earth is built, lead is certainly "natural." But it is relatively uncommon, and only became a ubiquitous feature of our everyday human landscape because we pulled it up from the ground and put it there.
Like any element, lead is a substance that cannot be broken down by chemical means, an aggregate of large numbers of the same type of atom, in this case very heavy atoms. The dense core of a lead atom bulges with more than 200 nuclear particles, nearly four times the number in an iron nucleus.
Lead is considered the heaviest of the so-called stable elements, meaning atoms that are not radioactive and don't tend to spit out nuclear particles periodically the way uranium does. But stable does not mean inert, and lead interacts readily with other elements, particularly sulfur, an association that makes lead easy to find and mine, but also makes it a particularly inhospitable bully.
Lead was indeed one of the first metals mined, for it doesn't take much to convert raw lead ore into a usable commodity. Lead is easily purified away from the odiferous sulfur, and it has such a low melting point that a hunk of it can be softened in a campfire and shaped into a wondrous variety of objects — pots, pans and water pipes, all displaying lead's trademark resistance to corrosion and discoloration.
"Lead was a civilizing metal, there were so many things it could do," said John Emsley, a chemist and author of "The Elements of Murder: A History of Poison."
The ancient Romans mined lead on a huge scale, mostly from deposits in England and Spain, spinning it into vast subterranean waterworks, hammering it into pewter tableware, cheaply doping their silver coins, kohl-lining their eyes.
A bad harvest year? Boil the sour grapes in lead vessels, and the release of lead acetate would sweeten the wine. (In fact, the sweet flavor of some lead compounds is thought to aggravate the danger of lead-painted toys, adding the temptation of sweetness to young children already inclined to explore the world with their mouths.)
Time and again lead proved its versatile mettle. Paint pigment made from white lead was said to have an exceptional brightness and unequaled "covering power," and well into the 20th century, old-school housepainters insisted that nothing clung to wood as faithfully as lead paint.
The refractive index of lead made it the ideal element to stir moltenly with glass to form crystal, and the finest facets on the most luxurious chandeliers owe their diamond spangle to a recipe that may be 30 percent lead. With the advent of automobiles and inefficient engines that rattled and balked, engineers solved the problem by adding lead to gasoline, lowering the combustion point and silencing "knock."
Yet practically from the start there were signs of trouble. The Greek physician Hippocrates described circa 400 B.C. a severe case of "colic" in a lead miner, and the Roman engineer Vitruvius noted that men who worked in lead smelters had disturbingly wan complexions. Over the centuries, doctors described disorders like "wrist drop," in which housepainters using leaded paint would suddenly lose control of their wrist musculature, and "dry gripes," a complaint among early American colonists that was linked to the drinking of West Indian rum that, as a result of its processing, was brimming with lead.
Not until the 20th century were epidemiological studies carried out that showed the particular dangers that lead posed to children, evidence that helped usher in bans in many countries against lead paint, leaded gasoline, lead-glazed pottery and the like.
Titanium has replaced lead as the gold-standard white pigment in paint, and, apart from its superior safety profile, is considered more than a match for lead in brilliance and opacity, if not low price. With the introduction of cleaner additives in the 1970s, lead-laden fuels were phased out in the United States, though leaded gasoline is used in developing countries where people drive old knockabout cars.
Scientists, too, have made great strides in mapping lead's impact on the body. They have shown that after it infiltrates a cell, lead seeks out those regions of proteins where sulfur abounds and pushes aside smaller characters that stand in its way. But being bulkier than whatever it displaces, and chemically inappropriate besides, lead twists the entire protein into a sad, worthless shape. As it turns out, this distorting effect has a particularly severe effect on so-called transcription factors, proteins that control when genes flick on and flick off. In gestation, genetic timing is critical. This could help explain why even modest exposure to our old "civilizing" friend might corrupt the whole script of a developing brain.
In our view: Stronger standards.
August 20th, 2007
The Joplin Globe
Editorial
Missouri needs tougher standards on odors. Residents of Carthage, Joplin and other areas require better protection from foul smells emanating from plants that process animal wastes and from large concentrated animal feeding operations than they have been getting.
Blame the Missouri Department of Natural Resources, if you want, for not being aggressive enough in seeking authority from the Legislature to eliminate the smells that can damage the quality of life not only for rural residents, but for those in communities where agri-businesses operate with new technologies. You might choose to pin some blame on lawmakers for not getting tougher.
But trying to assess who is responsible at this juncture is counterproductive. The issue today is how to go about cleaning up these terrible, often sickening smells.
There appears a relatively simple solution: Set an odor dilution standard lower than the 7-to-1 measurement now in use by the DNR.
Simple, that is, in that it would accomplish what critics want and demand: cleaner, breathable air.
Not so simple, of course, for the business people who own plants that turn animal parts into oil or whatever and to owners of the large animal factories.
Is there a reasonable balance to be found? Only if those who seek the lower dilution ratio continue to press their case with the DNR, the Missouri Air Conservation Commission and the Legislature.
Two proposals have been forwarded by the DNR from an environmental study group and the Missouri attorney general's office that recommend reduced ratios. St. Louis, for instance, has a 4-to-1 ratio. If that is sufficient in that city, then perhaps it should be the rule in other populated areas around Missouri, including Carthage and Joplin. A 5-to-1 ratio might suffice for rural areas. Whatever the air commission decides, it should be stronger than what Missouri now has.
Ozbun Constructs CAFO Despite Stay Order
August 18th, 2007
The Joplin Independent
By Mariwinn
Several residents in the Barry County community near Roaring River State Park are confused over how construction can continue on four pullet houses by Michelle Ozbun after John J. Kopp, a hearing commissioner with the Administrative Hearing Commission State of Missouri had issued a stay of construction. His ruling was made on July 25, 2007, after he determined that neighbor Mark Stephenson's contention that a waiver on setbacks Ozbun had obtained from Phyllis J. Henke was invalid.
The residence of Phyllis J. and Walter L. Henke Jr. is within 1,000 feet, the necessary buffer zone needed before construction can begin without a waiver. While Walter Henke initially agreed to the waiver, his wife had been adamantly opposed. The situation was complicated by Phyllis Henke's allegedly having signed the waiver and then rescinded her agreement and then having confirmed to the Missouri Department of Natural Resources, the agency responsible for the permitting, that she really agreed. Stephenson contested the signature on the final document since it had not been notarized, and, therefore, could not be filed with the recorder of deeds, a necessary legal step.
While it was determined that Mr. Henke had power of attorney for his wife who allegedly is suffering from Alzheimer's disease, he has not executed it. And while his wife seems capable of determining for herself that "chickens themselves stink, not just the litter," her husband claims he "just wanted to be a good neighbor" when he signed the waiver. Word has it that he in part may have been influenced by his pastor who reportedly owns chicken houses.
Stephenson attempted to get a definition of "stay" from an attorney in the Office of the Missouri Attorney General, but the reply was, "We can't issue legal advice," as if the question actually asked for it. Presumably, the AG's office in response to an anonymous call by Ken Midkiff is investigating why the stay is not being enforced by the DNR. Of course, what is a paradox is that the attorney general's office also serves as legal counsel for the DNR.
Stephenson seeks assistance from local agency
"No zoning" is often cited as the reason for undesirable effects of county development, but Stephenson believes that lack of a county health ordinance better explains rampant CAFO development. His attempt to involve the Barry County Health Department in the CAFO matter got him the run around by Administrator Kathleen King who told him, oops, guess we forgot to tell you we postponed the meeting--they neglected to have a quorum for the first meeting he wanted to attend-- and by Board Chair, Barry County Commissioner John Starchman who somehow neglected to put Stephenson's name and that of 12 others on the next meeting's agenda, and so they couldn't speak.
It's "who's bought and paid for," Stephenson said after recalling how the health department meeting agenda was tabled last May after the department in response to what they labeled an "outburst from the audience," had phoned the police.
Stephenson also called attention to Ozbun's contract with George's Processing, Inc. And who do you think gives legal advice for George's? Why none other than Matt Blunt's brother's law firm, Stephenson replied.
What's coming?
According to an interim nutrient management system plan submitted by Michelle Ozbun and her husband Rodney, their system will manage the waste from four breeder pullet houses with a total capacity of 65,600 birds and that "annual production will be 2.1 flocks." With flock life estimated at "21 weeks and average weight estimated at 2.5 lb. per bird", they are calling for the "average daily litter production (manure and bedding) to be .41 cu. ft. per 1000 pounds of animal capacity or 386 tons. At 34 lb./cu. ft., the volume of manure and bedding will be about 20,710 cu. ft. annually," or waste "approximately equal to 6954 human equivalents," except, as Stephenson points out, the humans aren't defecating on a dirt floor with the clean-out of waste done yearly from inside the houses in order to be hauled away for land application.
Regarding the four tons of carcasses that are expected to die annually, they propose removal "daily or oftener" to a composter that will be maintained on the property. Carcass compost will be stored in the facility until spread.
Stephenson, who called the plan theoretical, admitted that Ozbun described her houses as having "state of the art construction." "She may have used those terms," he said, but "she lied about the open side walls." In spite of language in the plan, Stephenson said he also was told that the litter would be stored outdoors for two weeks. "The DNR may consider it a no discharge CAFO, but tell me how litter can be stored outdoors for two weeks without it doing something?" he asked.
Stephenson also doesn't like being described as the "Joplin realtor," suggesting that he was some sort of interloper. He said he and his family owned the 360-acre parcel near the Ozbuns for the past 35 years. "We use it for hunting, fishing and enjoying the Missouri Ozarks," he said.
AmerenUE gets OK to rebuild Taum Sauk
August 16th, 2007
St. Louis Post Dispatch
By Jeffrey Tomich
Almost two years after AmerenUE's mountaintop Taum Sauk reservoir collapsed and flooded a popular state park, federal regulators gave the utility approval to rebuild the giant man-made lake.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which oversees the reservoir and the hydroelectric plant it feeds, notified Ameren in a letter on Wednesday.
The approval is a milestone, to be sure. But the St. Louis-based utility says the project is in limbo while it works to resolve a lawsuit filed last year by Missouri Attorney General Jay Nixon, as well as liability claims by the Department of Natural Resources and Department of Conservation for damage to Johnson's Shut-Ins State Park and the Black River.
"(Rebuilding) is still contingent on resolving all of the issues with the state," Ameren spokeswoman Susan Gallagher said.
Nixon sued Ameren in December, accusing the utility of running the plant even though it knew the reservoir's water-level monitoring system wasn't working properly. The company denied knowingly putting the public at risk and said it has taken full responsibility for the incident.
Originally filed in St. Louis Circuit Court, the lawsuit since has been moved to Reynolds County Circuit Court in Lesterville, the tiny town 100 miles southwest of St. Louis that sits in the shadows of the reservoir atop Proffitt Mountain.
Nixon spokesman John Fougere declined to comment on the status of the lawsuit except to say it was "moving forward." But he said the attorney general believes Taum Sauk should be rebuilt.
That "has been one of the core principles that we have insisted on from the start to begin to compensate state and local interests for the harm caused by Ameren's conduct," Fougere said.
The Taum Sauk plant had operated for more than 40 years until Dec. 14, 2005, when a 650-foot section of the wall encircling the giant kidney-shaped upper reservoir collapsed, releasing more than a billion gallons of water that scoured the mountainside and Johnson's Shut-Ins State Park and injured the family of the park superintendent.
A federal investigation showed the collapse was triggered when water flowed over the top of the reservoir and eroded a rockfill dam. It also concluded that water-level sensors that were supposed to prevent the reservoir from overflowing had been moved high enough to render them ineffective.
Ameren paid $15 million under a settlement with FERC, which concluded its investigation almost a year ago.
The Missouri Public Service Commission, however, began its own investigation of the Taum Sauk failure last month. The commission doesn't regulate the plant, but wants to determine if the problems that led to the collapse might indicate problems elsewhere in AmerenUE's vast network of power plants, poles and wires.
The PSC is scheduled to wrap up a third week of hearings in the investigation today and Friday in Jefferson City.
The new reservoir would be the same size as the existing one, but made entirely of concrete, not bits and pieces of rock from the mountain that were used to build the original. The project also would include a spillway and a video monitoring system to ensure there isn't a repeat of the collapse.
Ameren hasn't disclosed the cost of the project, but the utility expects insurance to cover nearly all of it.
Construction is expected to take 21 months and the utility is pushing to get it rebuilt before its current 50-year operating license expires in 2010.
FERC conducted an environmental study before giving Ameren approval to rebuild, and is requiring the utility to take certain steps to minimize impact during construction.
Renewing the operating license will require a broader look at the need for the plant and its impact on the surrounding area, such as the effect on habitat and the quality and flow of water in the east fork of the Black River, a big regional tourist draw.
A Missouri environmental group says the more rigorous examination should be done before the reservoir is rebuilt, not afterward.
"That's essentially being circumvented," said Dan Sherburne, research director for the Missouri Coalition for the Environment. He said FERC's environmental study was too narrowly focused on the 200-acre site where the reservoir is to be rebuilt.
jtomich@post-dispatch.com | 314-340-8320
Hematite residents fume over cleanup
August 5th, 2007
St. Louis Post Dispatch
By Josh Swartzlander
HEMATITE — From a distance, the old Westinghouse plant is a nondescript complex of buildings, the kind of place that might make light bulbs or ceiling fans.
Drive a little closer and yellow signs come into view: "Caution: Nuclear Material."
A few years ago, officials with Westinghouse Electric Co. had predicted that the plant, which has been idle since 2001, would be razed in 2005 or last year. Now it appears the buildings won't be torn down and the site completely cleaned up until next year — at the earliest.
To some who live nearby, demolition can't come soon enough.
The plant has been linked to chemical contamination in nearby well water, prompting anxiety among residents and triggering lawsuits.
Mallinckrodt Chemical Co. opened the plant in 1956 in an undeveloped area of Jefferson County about six miles west of Festus. For decades the plant churned out nuclear fuel rods, primarily for the Navy and was also used for research of such projects as atomic-powered aircraft and spacecraft. From 1974 to 2001, the plant made nuclear fuel rods for commercial power plants. Last year Toshiba Corp., Japan's largest maker of nuclear power plant equipment, became the plant's latest owner when it bought Westinghouse.
But years before that, some residents knew something was wrong. "When I would shower, my eyes would burn," said Marcus Shepherd.
In 2002, Shepherd, his wife and four children moved into a home a few thousand feet from the plant. "We figured, it's a new house, it's on a well, we'll get it checked," he said.
Tests found chemical contaminants, used as cleaning agents at the plant in the 1950s and 1960s, in the Shepherds' well and in the wells of several nearby homes. The chemicals, trichloroethylene and tetrachloroethylene, have been linked to cancer and other health problems.
Most of the residents with contaminated well water have reached settlements — one for $20,000, others for $12,000 — with current and former plant owners. But new legal issues surfaced this year.
In March, the family whose well had the highest level of contaminants sued Westinghouse. The company has already bought that family's home.
And in May, another family, which had argued that Westinghouse should buy its house, advanced its legal battle in the Missouri Supreme Court.
The company is now working with the federal government and the Missouri Department of Natural Resources to develop a plan to clean up the site and tear down the plant's buildings, which have been cleaned of uranium and locked down, said Kevin Hayes, community relations manager with Westinghouse. Also at issue is what to do about the chemical contaminants and radiological material that was dumped into unlined pits on the site decades ago.
In July, the Department of Natural Resources approved a report by Westinghouse detailing the conditions of soil and water quality near the plant. A public meeting will be scheduled to discuss the results of that report, Hayes said.
Viktoria Mitlyng, spokeswoman for the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission, said it was impossible to estimate how long a cleanup would take. "There are no dates at this point," she said. "There are such major differences between every facility in terms of the materials used, whether there are burial pits with waste, the size of the facility."
Missouri has sued Westinghouse, seeking damages for the costs of monitoring the plant and for the contamination of state resources, and that suit hinges at least in part on the details of the plan to clean up and tear down the plant.
Meanwhile, Westinghouse has filed its own suit against previous owners and the U.S. government for the cost of tearing down and cleaning up the plant.
Dennis Diehl, director of the Jefferson County Health Department, said it was important to be patient with the process. "My understanding is there's been a lot of debate about how to determine what contamination could be there (in the pits). They're trying to do the right thing. If that's the case, maybe a little bit of a delay is not a bad thing."
But some residents have lost their patience with the process.
"Nothing has been resolved," said Clarissa Eaton, 38, who argued and won a decision for her family in front of the Missouri Supreme Court this year in a related case.
In 1998, Eaton and her husband, Jerry, bought a ranch-style home with a two-car garage on three acres in Hematite.
They did not know they were moving into a house within 3,000 feet of a nuclear fuel plant. When Clarissa Eaton saw an "ABB" sign on the property owned by the plant, she thought it stood for Anheuser-Busch brewery. In fact, it stood for ABB Combustion Engineering, which owned the plant then.
In 2002, the Eatons, who have three children, found out their well was contaminated. They hired an attorney, who negotiated a $26,000 settlement with companies that owned the plant. But the Eatons argued that they never approved such a settlement and that their attorney didn't have authority to accept it.
In circuit court, Judge Gary P. Kramer ruled to enforce the settlement. The Eatons appealed, arguing they should have been able to present their own evidence, including e-mails between family members and their attorney.
The appeal reached the Missouri Supreme Court, where Clarissa Eaton argued her case without a lawyer. She won a unanimous decision, and the case was sent back to circuit court.
While the Eatons remain in their house in Hematite, Bob and Gina McWilliams reached a settlement with Westinghouse and moved to Festus.
The McWilliamses, who used to live with their four children a few lots down the road from the Eatons, had the highest level of contamination in their well.
"I just wanted to get away and be done with worrying about my kids and what I'd brought them into," said Gina McWilliams, 44. Now, all six family members are listed as plaintiffs in a personal injury suit against Westinghouse.
Marcus Shepherd and his family reached a settlement years ago and decided to stay in Hematite. He said the family considered a personal injury suit, but any health concerns appeared to go away after they stopped using well water.
"I have quite a few acres. It's a good piece of property," he said. "I'm not going to find anywhere to go for a comparable price."
But the Eatons want out.
Said Clarissa Eaton: "The plant is just too close for comfort."
Water shortages a threat in western Kansas
August 23rd, 2007
The Kansas City Star
By Sudekum Fisher
WICHITA - Kansas has significant challenges ahead as it tackles water problems and shortages, said David Pope, former chief engineer at the Kansas Department of Agriculture's Division of Water Resources.
"The biggest challenge is in western Kansas, as far as long-term depletion of the Ogallala/High Plains aquifer and the effect of groundwater use on streams," Pope said Thursday after addressing the annual conference of the Kansas Water Congress.
Pope said irrigation in western Kansas would probably see more restrictions and regulations.
"The other uses will take care of themselves, because water for municipalities and industries is going to need to occur," he said. "... The system in place protects all water-rights holders, but if there is not enough water to go around, something has to give."
Pope, who was chief engineer of the Division of Water Resources for 24 years, retired from that position earlier this summer to become executive director of the Missouri River Association of States and Tribes.
As chief engineer, Pope helped define water policy and practice in the state, overseeing regulation during periods of record demand and drought. He was also involved in negotiations over interstate water disputes along the Republican and Arkansas rivers. Earlier in his career, Pope was instrumental in the development of the five groundwater districts systems in place in Kansas.
About 60 people attended the meeting of the Kansas Water Congress, a nonprofit organization started in 2003 to advance conservation and development of water resources in Kansas.
White House threatens veto of $20 billion water projects bill
August 2nd, 2007
The Associated Press
By John Heilprin
WASHINGTON — The House overwhelmingly passed a $20 billion water projects bill Wednesday night despite a promised veto by President George W. Bush, who complains the bill is laden with costly pet projects and shifts new costs onto the government.
The bill includes seven new locks on the upper Mississippi and Illinois rivers.
The measure was seven years in the making and finally passed the House on a 381-40 vote after it was agreed upon by House-Senate negotiators. The sponsor, Rep. James Oberstar, D-Minn., said he expected Congress would quickly override any veto by the president.
Earlier Wednesday, administration officials said Bush would veto the bill if it isn't pared down. "Indeed, it seems a $14 billion Senate bill went into a conference with the House's $15 billion bill and somehow a bill emerged costing approximately $20 billion," complained White House budget director Rob Portman and Assistant Army Secretary John Paul Woodley Jr.
This year's bill includes some $3.5 billion for Katrina-damaged Louisiana, plus more than $2 billion for projects in California and $2 billion for Florida, mostly for restoring the Everglades. Another $1.95 billion is included for the new locks and $1.7 billion for repairing the region's ecology.
The Senate also plans to act on the bill and get it to the president's desk before Congress begins its August vacation in a few days.
Powerful farmers negotiating water deal
August 1st, 2007
Kansas City Star
By Garance Burke (AP)
The U.S. government is considering turning over the rights to billions of gallons of water to a politically connected group of farmers in California, where most people are being asked to conserve.
Landowners in the Westlands Water District and other nearby districts would gain the rights to 1 million acre feet of water under a proposed settlement federal regulators are likely to discuss Wednesday. An acre foot translates to the amount needed to cover one acre with a foot of water.
That's 15 percent of the federally controlled water in California, which would make it the largest grant to irrigators since the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation was created in 1903, agency officials said.
The Westlands Water District, a coalition of giant agribusinesses in the fertile San Joaquin Valley, draws its water from the Central Valley Project, a vast irrigation system that also supplies drinking water to about 1 million households.
At public meetings earlier this month, concerns were voiced that the deal would prioritize farmers' needs over those of cities in the Bay area. Environmentalists, too, have expressed alarm that the deal would endanger the state's water supply for an estuary inhabited by an imperiled fish species.
"Can a proposal that appears to put a small group of farm operations ahead of the taxpayers and our fish and wildlife resources be justified because it may help one federal agency deal with a specific drainage problem?" said Hal Candee, a senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council who is participating in the negotiations.
Westlands declined to comment, saying Sen. Dianne Feinstein had asked participants to refrain from speaking about the negotiations in advance of Wednesday's meeting.
Feinstein said in a statement that the purpose of the meeting is "to examine whether the serious drainage issues facing the Valley can be resolved."
The proposed settlement, documents for which were obtained by The Associated Press, would give the Westlands farmers a stake in a massive reservoir, millions of dollars in pumps and pipes, and permanent rights to enough water to serve 8 million people.
A second, competing proposal would offer landowners a contract for less water but also could put them ahead of other water customers, including the densely populated Santa Clara and Contra Costa counties. The farmers wouldn't have to pay for much of the cost of building the Central Valley Project's pumps and canals, but they would still be responsible for cleaning up the polluted runoff - currently the sole responsibility of the federal government.
Westlands is the nation's largest water district, and its members include Harris Farms, one of California's biggest farming operations, and Tanimura & Antle, the nation's top lettuce grower.
More than a decade ago, the district sued the government after a botched federal project left thousands of acres of cropland tainted by salty, polluted runoff, and caused the death or deformation of thousands of birds. The proposed water-rights deal would settle that lawsuit.
Westlands recently hired two former Bush administration officials, one who is helping to negotiate the deal with the Bureau of Reclamation, a division of the U.S. Department of the Interior. Susan Ramos, a former assistant regional director at the Bureau of Reclamation, and Jason Peltier, former water policy adviser at the Interior Department, both took management posts at the district.
Either plan would need congressional approval. Bureau officials say the proposals would be cheaper than an official plan registered with the courts that would cost $2.6 billion to retire almost 200,000 acres of tainted Central Valley cropland and clean up salty runoff from surrounding areas.
Protest holds up permit for CAFO near Roaring River
August 1st, 2007
The Joplin Globe
By Wally Kennedy
EAGLE ROCK, Mo. — The construction permit for a poultry farm with 65,500 chickens within a mile or so of Roaring River State Park, near Eagle Rock, has been stayed by an administrative hearing judge for the state of Missouri.
But the developer of the concentrated animal feeding operation, Michelle Ozbun, said Tuesday that the stay is "a temporary hurdle" that will be overcome, and that the zero-emission CAFO will be in operation as scheduled in January.
She said the poultry farm has four main buildings, and that the construction of those buildings is complete. The stay bars any further action at the site pending more action by the administrative judge.
Ozbun plans to obtain pullets from George's Processing Inc., Butterfield, and grow them under contract for that company.
The Missouri Department of Natural Resources must issue an operating permit before the CAFO can obtain the pullets. That is not expected to take place until after an appeal of the request for an operating permit has been heard by the Administrative Hearing Commission on Jan. 7. The commission noted that "many people have appealed the issuance of the permit."
One of the appellants, Mark Stephenson, a Joplin resident who has an interest in a farm near the construction site, filed a motion to stay the effect of the construction permit on May 30. The hearing on the stay was conducted July 18.
Stephenson represented himself. Assistant Attorney General Timothy Duggan represented the DNR. Permit holder Ozbun testified as a witness for the DNR.
The commission, which issued its ruling late last week, granted the stay after Stephenson produced evidence that the developer had not obtained permission from two property owners who had to waive a setback or buffer requirement for operation of the CAFO.
Stephenson, a Realtor with Brookman Realty in Joplin, produced evidence that only Walter Henke Jr. had signed the waiver. His wife, Phyllis Henke, who also holds title to the property, initially signed the waiver but rescinded her approval after being approached by Stephenson.
The stay was issued after Stephenson produced a notarized signature, obtained by his wife, a notary public, that showed Phyllis Henke opposed the buffer-zone waiver.
When the DNR was alerted about the problem, it sent a document to Phyllis Henke asking her to clarify her position. She signed the document, expressing agreement with the waiver. The document was entered into evidence, but it was not notarized.
At issue is whether Phyllis Henke, who reportedly has Alzheimer's disease, can represent herself. Ozbun said Phyllis Henke, whom she has known for many years, "lives in the moment." Ozbun said Henke's husband recently obtained legal power of attorney with regard to his wife.
Stephenson, who acknowledged that Phyllis Henke apparently has "a memory problem," said he and his wife stopped by the Henke home near Eagle Rock and talked with the couple about purchasing the property to prevent the CAFO from being constructed. "She (Phyllis Henke) said to us that she had not given her permission, although the deed was in both their names," Stephenson said. "Only he had given his permission."
The DNR later notified Ozbun of the rescinded waiver and said the matter needed to be straightened out before an operating permit could be issued.
Ozbun said she provided the DNR with the documents it needed, including one with a notarized signature by Phyllis Henke showing she agreed to the setback waiver. But that notarized signature was not submitted into evidence.
"We had a notarized signature, but it was overlooked and not put into evidence," Ozbun said. "Somebody overlooked something. It's a fluke thing. Somebody messed up. As it stands now, we are not sure where we are with this."
She said she is obtaining counsel with a law firm in Jefferson City "to get the stay released and do whatever I need to get my permit. Going without legal counsel won't happen again."
Ozbun said she is not receiving any assistance from George's in her fight to get the permit.
"It's just me he (Stephenson) is fighting," she said. "I could go for 1,000 less chickens, and I would not need a permit over me. By getting a permit, the DNR has more authority over me. If I have fewer chickens, there would be no need for a permit. He (Stephenson) is shooting himself in the foot, in a way, by opposing this permit."
Ozbun, who said she borrowed $1 million to construct the chicken houses, vowed to "not lose a century farm because of what I decide to do for a living on my own property. I cannot afford to lose this, and I won't because I would lose this farm, and I won't lose this farm."
Derek Steen, who supervised the construction permit, said the DNR "will not issue an operating permit to the facility until the issue has been adequately resolved."
Steen noted that when the construction permit was issued, the agency "had received the required buffer waiver documents from both the husband and wife," but that a document that rescinded the earlier document from Phyllis Henke had been submitted by Stephenson.
Glen Balch, spokesman for George's Processing Inc., Springdale, Ark., could not be reached for comment Tuesday.
Tribunal
The Missouri Administrative Hearing Commission is a neutral, independent, administrative tribunal that has jurisdiction over 100 statutorily specified matters, including state taxes, professional licensing, Medicaid-provider issues and state permits.
In calendar year 2003, nearly 2,400 cases were filed with the commission. The commission makes decisions under a contested-case procedure, usually involving a trial-type hearing. All such decisions are subject to judicial review.
Creek Data Rile Critics
July 29th, 2007
St. Louis Post Dispatch
By Tim Bryant
The Missouri Department of Natural Resources is spending about $300,000 this year on private studies used to exempt some 220 small streams statewide from a key water-protection measure, an environmental group says.
The Missouri Coalition for the Environment wants the department to stop funding the studies, which determine whether the creeks could be used for swimming and therefore qualify for greater environmental protection. The studies fail to show accurately whether people use the streams for recreation, said Kim Knowles, the group's attorney.
Phil Schroeder, head of the department's water quality monitoring, said the affected streams, most of which are in rural areas, were small. He defended the department's decision to pay for the studies, which are designed to determine whether streams are one meter deep — a little over three feet — which is deemed a sufficient depth for swimming.
"The department feels it's appropriate the state takes on the burden to do this," he said.
Knowles said the federal Environmental Protection Agency, which oversees clean-water law, had in many cases rejected the state's findings. Despite the rejections, the state is using taxpayer funds to redo the same studies, she said.
"So, we're actually paying for them twice," she said. "DNR is grossly underfunded and lacks the staff and money to do the basic water quality monitoring and permit enforcement work it is mandated to do."
Schroeder said the $1,000 to $1,500 cost of a study was steep for mobile home parks, tiny rural communities and others seeking renewal of operating permits for their small sewage treatment facilities.
If part of the affected creek doubles as a swimming hole, federal clean-water law requires that treated sewage get disinfected to kill more bacteria. That can cost millions of dollars, he said.
The department is dedicated to enforcing clean-water regulations and is tightening rules for the studies to assure that small but swimmable streams are protected, he added.
"These are more what we call the headwater streams in rural areas of northern Missouri and western Missouri," Schroeder said. "When they're small and they dry up to a great extent in the summer months, they really don't contain the property to support that type of use. Basically, they aren't deep enough."
Not true, said Knowles, contending that Peruque Creek, a St. Charles County stream getting studied, is regularly used by swimmers. She also disputed Schroeder's claim that many of the affected streams run dry in the summer and are too shallow for kids to swim and play in.
Knowles said the department appeared more concerned with granting permits to wastewater treatment facilities than protecting Missouri's waterways.
The coalition said the state was in its third year of paying for the studies. In some cases, department employees conduct the studies at an additional, undetermined cost to taxpayers, the group said.
"These studies are payouts to polluters at taxpayer expense," said Kathleen Logan Smith, head of the St. Louis-based organization.
Among the St. Louis-area streams studied is Bigelow Creek in southwestern St. Charles County. It runs beneath the Katy Trail west of Augusta. The creek is on the department's study list because the operating permit for the Augusta wastewater treatment plant is up for renewal.
Elicia Abdolhosseini, an Augusta trustee, said that she was aware of the study but that it was being handled through Public Water Supply District No. 2, which bought the town's sewage treatment facility about six years ago. She said she doubted Bigelow met the one-meter rule for swimming.
"Wade, yes; swim, I don't think so," Abdolhosseini said.
Another Augusta trustee, Ellen Knoernschild, said Bigelow was "like two feet deep," adding that it flowed into the channel that carried Augusta's treated sewage.
"I really can't see where the town of Augusta has any impact on Bigelow Creek, since it runs into the drainage ditch that carries the treated sewage, not vice versa," Knoernschild said.
Knowles acknowledged that tightening the study rules to require creek-depth measurements at spots away from road crossings was an improvement. The problem lies in the depth requirement, she said.
"They've tightened the depth requirement and, as a result, fewer streams will be shown to support whole-body contact," Knowles said. "Our point is that this is ridiculous because people, in particular children, are drawn to water, and kids will play in water that is far less deep than a meter.
"And if we continue to allow bacteria to fester in these streams, kids who play in or lie down in streams can be infected through their eyes, ears, nose and through cuts they inevitably have."
tbryant@post-dispatch.com | 636-255-7212
WARNING: Do Not Play, Swim, Or Fish
With sewers overflowing into area creeks, MSD is now forced to post warning signs
July 27th, 2007
Kirkwood-Webster Times
By Dan Corrigan
Signs warning about sewage flow malfunctions are popping up in area neighborhoods. The signs are raising residents' concerns, as they advise against playing, swimming or fishing in creeks that often border backyards.
The sewage overflow signs are being posted by the Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District (MSD) at the behest of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
An MSD map of overflow locations reveals that many of the danger sites are along Deer Creek in the Webster Groves area and along Gravois Creek in Crestwood and Affton. Additional sites can be found along Manchester, Big Bend and Gravois roads.
"As a Webster Groves resident and mother, I would keep my kids out of these areas," said Kathleen Henry. "These problem areas are not going to be fixed anytime soon.
"If you look at the complaints that EPA has lodged against MSD, they describe the illnesses and diseases that can be caused by the pathogens getting into the water from the sewage," added Henry. "Many of these places being posted are attractive for kids, but this is not just a nuisance."
Henry, who is president of the Great Rivers Environmental Law Center in St. Louis, said the overflow of untreated sewage into storm water venues is nothing new for the St. Louis area. Nevertheless, she said the signs going up may by the first time it has come to the attention of many residents.
"This problem goes all the way back to the 1972 Clean Water Act," explained Henry. "The EPA made sewer overflows illegal in 1972. The EPA suggested that the MSD system should come into compliance by mid-1983. That never happened.
"This is a decades-old problem," added Henry. "You can only assume that it would have cost a lot less to fix the situation back in the 1970s, than it is going to cost now."
Many area residents received MSD notices in the mail that the sewage overflow warnings were going to be posted. The mailing noted that MSD has spent about $1.3 billion to eliminate 300 overflows in the system over the past two decades.
"If an overflow discharges or not is dependent upon a number of factors, including how much rain falls over a given period of time," the advisory stresses. "The result is that not all overflows discharge every time it rains – in fact, some overflows will go months or years without discharging."
Flap Over Overflows
Overflows can be found all over the St. Louis area. Some sewer pipes have flappers on them. If there is a significant rain, the sewage can back up and trip the flaps and then can flow directly into creeks and streams.
Critics of MSD argue that money from ratepayers has not been used efficiently. They also contend that MSD should have been refurbishing old pipe over the years, instead of putting money into buildings and expensive treatment plants.
"St. Louis has sewer problems, but so do a lot of other big cities that EPA is looking at," said Lance LeComb, a spokesperson for MSD. "But our system is unique, because we have the fourth largest system in the U.S. serving about 1.4 million people. We have a hodge-podge of old sewer districts cobbled into one system.
"Many people have been aware of the sewage overflow problems in St. Louis for years," added LeComb. "Everyone knows that raw sewage flows into the River Des Peres every time there's a rainy season. But we have been spending millions of dollars to address these problems."
LeComb said he is unsure why EPA insisted recently that MSD post the sewage overflow signs. However, he said the signs will help protect kids and also help sensitize the community to the size of the problem of an outdated sewer infrastructure.
"We have a big, costly problem with an inadequate and deteriorating system," said Le Comb. "To make things right, people are going to have to see some impact on their household budgets. Sewer rates are going to have to go up to put the system right, so that sewage is not mixing with storm water.
"Rates are going to have to go up," added LeComb. "Ours are in the $20s (average monthly bills) now, while rates in other communities are in the $50s and $60s. At some point, our rates are going to be heading in that direction to correct our sewer system and comply with the EPA mandates."
Environmentalist View
"We're really in a pretty primitive situation," said Kathleen Logan Smith, director of the Missouri Coalition for the Environment. "It's pretty 18th century to have sewage pouring into creeks and streams that run through parks and school yards.
"I think people believe this only happens in the industrialized parts of town. Not true," said Logan Smith. "Streams like Deer Creek and Gravois Creek become open sewers when we have heavy rains. Some area creeks get sewage overflows with less than an inch of rain."
Logan Smith said the Coalition agrees with MSD that fixing the system is a major undertaking. She said it's "like going to the moon," it will take years. However, she said the Coalition believes MSD has not acted wisely to address a chronic problem.
"The problem is not that MSD has not been spending money," said Logan Smith. "The problem is MSD has not been spending it judiciously. It has focused on buildings and treatment plants, instead of addressing its problem of using creeks and streams as a back-up system."
Logan Smith said erecting warning signs is a Band-Aid approach to a serious issue. However, she said if putting up signs helps protect kids and also informs residents about the sewage problem in the St. Louis area, then it's a step in the right direction.
"Our children should be able to play near creeks and streams without worries about pathogens in the water," said Logan Smith. "Shallow creek beds are where the kids like to play, and this is the water that can be carrying bacteria, viruses and parasites when there are sewage overflows.
"For an agency that presents itself as 'the clean water people,' it should have been working on this situation decades ago," added Logan Smith. "EPA seems to finally be telling MSD that this problem has to be solved. Creeks and streams are not an acceptable back-up system for our sewers."
With Missouri DNR CAFO location information
July 24th, 2007
The Joplin Globe
By Susan Redden (sredden@joplinglobe.com)
Missouri ranks in the top 10 states where hogs are raised in huge farming operations known as concentrated animal feeding operations, according to data released Tuesday by Food & Water Watch.
Despite the number of poultry operations in Southwest Missouri, the state as a whole did not rank among the top states in terms of chicken or egg production, based on national maps released by the organization.
"These factory farms are becoming the dominant method of meat production in the U.S.," said Patty Lovera, a spokeswoman for the group. "It's much different than what people think of as a family farm, and there are a lot of impacts on the environment and surrounding communities."
In Missouri, Newton County ranks first in CAFOs based on animal units measured by the Missouri Department of Natural Resources, while McDonald County ranks fourth. Moark Farms' egg operation in Newton County is the largest single CAFO in the state, and the company's egg operation in McDonald County is ninth.
Lovera said the organization produced the map because of the impact CAFOs are having "on farmers, the environment and on consumers."
The maps show that some regions have a comparatively large share of intensive animal operations — Iowa and North Carolina for hogs, California and Idaho for dairy cows, Texas and Kansas for feed lots, Georgia and Alabama for broiler chickens, and Iowa and Ohio for egg production.
Lovera said the group hopes to focus attention on the issue while a new farm bill is being debated in Congress.
"We think there should be a moratorium on any new CAFOs or expansions, and legislation should encourage a shift back to smaller operations," she said. "As industrial animal operations spread, they drive more family farmers out of business. Factory farming must end, and Congress and regulatory agencies need to make certain that food is produced in a sustainable way that does not harm people and the environment."
She said attempts by local governments to regulate the operations are being threatened by state lawmakers. The huge farms are threatening air and water quality at the same time some state legislatures are passing laws to strip away the authority for local regulation, she said.
"Local government should not be removed from this issue," she said. "They should be able to have control either through zoning or health rules, and that's where the biggest impact should be today."
Lovera said consumers are being affected by CAFOs, regardless of where they live, if they are eating food produced in operations that use hormones and antibiotics.
The national organization was formed by Public Citizen to raise concerns about the environmental and public-health consequences of corporate farming and feedlot operations.
Voices: No need for new regulations?
July 21st, 2007
The Joplin Globe
A Letter to the Editor by Mark Stephenson
Hooray for Missouri Attorney General Jay Nixon and the Sierra Club. It may be "truly disappointing" to you, Mr. Kruse (Charles Kruse, president of the Missouri Farm Bureau), but the majority of Missourians don't like living with the stink and air, land and water pollution of industrial farms. Haven't heard any complaints about the family farms and ranches, so why do you keep bringing them into the argument?
Trying to scare the family farmers and ranchers into thinking new regulations are directed towards them is hogwash. The industrial farms, ie. CAFOs with thousands of animals confined in buildings, that pay your way are the culprits, and we are sick and tired of them being shoved down our throats. If you don't think the majority of Missourians aren't, why do you think 20 Missouri counties have adopted their own health regulations regulating CAFOs? There is currently so little statewide regulation in place that the only setback requirements for the location of a CAFO are 100 feet from a perpetual stream or well and 1,000 feet from an existing residence. In theory, they could put chicken houses all along the banks of Roaring River, Shoal Creek, Spring River or any other creek, stream or lake or for that matter surrounding any municipality where there are no county health regulations in place, and there is nothing that can be done about it thanks to the current governor, Legislature, and the Missouri Farm Bureau that has bought and paid for them.
I, too, grew up on a family farm. We had chickens, beef and dairy cows, horses , etc. and a wonderful way of life. I was a little boy in heaven, and for the same reason, my children grew up in the same atmosphere. The Missouri Farm Bureau's misleading defense of industrialized farms is wrong for Missouri. In fact, I bet the majority of Missouri Farm Bureau members would drop their membership if they only knew. Mr. Kruse, you are not fooling everyone.
Mark Stephenson
Joplin
Racers to kayak, canoe across Missouri
July 20th, 2007
Kansas City Star
By Jonathon Kealing
The Web site is frank in its assessment: "This ain't no mama's boy float trip."
Indeed, the Missouri River 340 race from Kansas City to St. Charles "promises to test your mettle from the first stroke in Kansas City to the last gasp in St. Charles," the race's Web site, www.rivermiles.com, says.
"Just entering it will impress your friends. Finishing it will astound them … and winning it? Well, you always thought you were sort of a legend anyway, didn't you? It's time to prove it."
Ninety competitors — from ages 20 to 82 — are stepping up to that challenge on Tuesday, when they start paddling in the second-annual race from Kansas City to St. Charles.
Seventy-five canoes and kayaks, some with two paddlers, are entered in the 340-mile race, billed as the longest nonstop river race in North America. Only 15 boats entered last year; 10 finished the race.
Retired Chiefs guard Will Shields will sound the air horn for the 8 a.m. start at Kaw Point, where the Kansas and Missouri rivers meet.
There's no prize money — only medals and a trophy for the winner in each category — but the race has attracted some of the most competitive racers from around the country.
"The word has been getting around in the ultracompetitive paddling community," said race organizer Scott Mansker of Olathe. "They like the way the race is set up."
Boaters are allowed to approach the race however they like, as long as they complete it in the allotted 100 hours, or just more than four days. They can take time off to sleep or they can paddle straight through with brief breaks to resupply, as Hansen plans to do.
"Racers like that. They don't like forced stops," Mansker said.
All the participants from last year's race have returned for this year's challenge, Mansker said. He quit taking registrations in early June, when he reached his maximum of 75 boats.
Some are dedicated racers who practice every weekend, while others are more likely to race for the TV remote than sprint down a river.
The winner of last year's race is intent on shaving more than 10 hours off his 2006 time of 53 hours, 40 minutes.
"I won't sleep this year," said West Hansen of Austin, Texas. "Last year, I was really sloppy with my time."
Hansen last year pulled across the finish line nearly a day ahead of his nearest competition. He's hoping to be onshore in St. Charles in 40 to 42 hours this year, powered by sports drinks and granola bars.
Hansen, who's been racing for 15 years, said he took two naps of 30 minutes to an hour last year. He's not the fastest racer but focuses on going for as long as possible without extensive rest.
He said the Missouri River 340 is "a lot more pleasant than other races. There are no dams to portage, no swamps to navigate. No alligators."
Lacking Hansen's experience, but back for a second try at the race is University of Missouri-Columbia student Katie Pfefferkorn. The 22-year-old finished last year's race in 98 hours, 36 minutes — just under the maximum allowed time to be considered a finisher.
A triathlete, Pfefferkorn had never tried a race like this and came into it long on ambition and short on experience. She vows a different approach this year.
"It was a lot different than I thought," she said as she headed out to Shawnee Mission Lake this week for a practice run. "I've learned how to pack better and how to do these adventure paddle races."
Among the items that competitors are required to pack: a life vest, a cell phone, flashlight, special lights for night paddling, a knife and a first aid kit. Four safety boats will keep an eye on the boaters, who are required to stop at checkpoints so no one is left behind.
Pfefferkorn, from Chaffee, Mo., spent the past year practicing her paddling, between classes at MU and on weekends. She wants to trim her time by six hours by eliminating one night of sleeping.
She has a lot of support in her effort to best last year's time. Her brother, two sisters and her mother all will be helping with various parts of the race this year.
"It's become a little family affair," she said.
In fact, almost every racer will have a ground crew to meet them at various checkpoints along the river. Mansker said the ground crews have as much fun as the racers.
Erin Magee, a seven-time winner of the women's solo category of the Texas Water Safari, is participating in her first Missouri River 340.
"I race pretty much all year," said Magee of Martindale, Texas. "There's a race almost every weekend from August to December."
For Magee, the prospect of paddling a river as wide and as long as the Missouri provided an opportunity she couldn't pass up. She completed this year's 262-mile Texas Water Safari on the San Marcos and Guadalupe rivers in just over 53 hours, good for first place in the women's solo category and 38th overall. The water safari bills itself as "the world's toughest canoe race."
Mansker said Magee would easily break last year's women's solo record of 97 hours and 20 minutes for the Missouri 340 and might even challenge some of the men for a top finish.
"This year is wide open," Mansker said. "All of the records set last year will probably fall."
Missouri River 340 facts
•Racers will pass eight checkpoints along the way to the finish line in St. Charles. They must touch shore and check in with race officials each time. Checkpoints are at Lexington, Waverly, Miami, Glasgow, Cooper's Landing, Jefferson City, Hermann and Washington. Racers can camp at those locations, as well as at other public points along the river.
•The Missouri River current usually runs between 4 and 5 miles per hour, giving the boaters a good push in their effort to get downstream.
•The river is running about one foot, and as much as two to three feet, higher than it was last year, race organizer Scott Mansker said. That means a faster trip for the boaters, because with more volume comes faster currents.
•To complete the race in 40 hours, racers would have to travel continuously at 8.5 mph for all 40 hours. Figure in stops at checkpoints and to resupply, and boaters will have to go even faster.
•Racers paid a registration fee of $100 for solo entries and $180 for tandem entries. Part of that entry fee goes to Operation Breakthrough, which tries to provide a safe educational opportunity for inner-city children.
@ Go to KansasCity.com for a detailed map, facts about the race and profiles of some of the racers.
Concerns rise over vulnerability of U.S. atomic facilities to earthquakes after world's largest nuclear plant damaged by Japanese quake
July 18th, 2007
News from Beyond Nuclear
TAKOMA PARK, MD. The extensive damage at a seven-reactor nuclear power plant in Japan after an earthquake this week is stoking concern that U.S. reactors and other nuclear facilities may also be vulnerable to releases of deadly radioactivity into the environment due to earthquakes.
Tokyo Electric Power Company's Kashiwazaki-Kariwa atomic power plant, the largest in the world in terms of electricity output, suffered 50 cases of "malfunctioning and trouble" after a 6.7 tremor struck nearby two days ago. Radioactively contaminated water, now calculated at more than 600 gallons, leaked into the Pacific Ocean and an estimated 400 barrels containing radioactive waste tipped over, with 10% of the lids falling off. Hazardous radioactive isotopes, cobalt-60 and chromium-51, were emitted into the atmosphere from an exhaust stack.
Concerns that a similar event could happen here are confirmed by an incident in August 2004, when an earthquake in Illinois broke an underground pipe attached to one of the Dresden nuclear power plant's radioactive waste condensate storage tanks. The broken pipe was leaking tritium (a harmful, radioactive form of hydrogen) into groundwater, creating an expanding underground plume of hazardous radioactive contamination.
Several U.S. atomic reactors may be especially vulnerable to earthquakes. The twin reactor Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant near San Luis Obispo, California was already built before it was discovered that an earthquake fault line associated with the infamous San Andreas Fault lay just offshore in the Pacific Ocean.
Fires, such as the one that broke out in Japan, are also a legitimate U.S. concern.
"Earthquakes are notorious for sparking fires, which could spell disaster at U.S. nuclear power plants given that many are not in compliance with safety regulations for fire protection and reactor shutdown systems," said Paul Gunter, the nuclear industry watchdog at Beyond Nuclear, and an expert on nuclear plant fire protection. "An earthquake-sparked inferno, or failure to safely shut down a reactor, could lead to a meltdown, catastrophic release of radioactivity, and deadly fallout hundreds of miles downwind and downstream," Gunter added.
A 1982 U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) report, known as CRAC-2, shows that a major accident at a U.S. atomic reactor could cause tens to hundreds of thousands of radiation-related deaths and injuries, as well as hundreds of billions of dollars of property damage.
Risks extend to the radioactive wastes stored on-site at U.S. reactors as well. Environmental groups filed a federal lawsuit last month against the NRC for failing to enforce its earthquake safety regulations for outdoor storage of high-level radioactive wastes at the Palisades atomic reactor on the shores of Lake Michigan. The lake supplies drinking water for Chicago and millions downstream.
"An earthquake could bury the containers under sand causing the nuclear fuel rods to overheat, or could even submerge them under the waters of Lake Michigan," said Kevin Kamps, Radioactive Waste Watchdog at Beyond Nuclear. "This could initiate a nuclear chain reaction in the wastes making emergency response a suicide mission. In either case, it would amount to a radiological disaster for Lake Michigan and the millions who depend on it for drinking water."
Earthquake risks also plague the proposed Yucca Mountain, Nevada dumpsite for commercial and military high-level radioactive wastes. Nearly three dozen earthquake fault lines are in the vicinity, and two faults actually intersect the proposed burial spot. Many hundreds of tremors larger than 2.5 on the Richter scale have struck within 50 miles of Yucca Mountain since 1975. One jolt, measuring 5.4 on the Richter scale, struck just ten miles from Yucca Mountain in 1992, doing extensive damage to the U.S. Department of Energy's field office at the site. Critics fear that a major earthquake at the dump site could cause a radiological catastrophe by damaging waste handling surface facilities planned for the site, or could cause tunnel collapses that would breach waste burial containers, spilling their deadly contents into the drinking water aquifer below.
"The risks of earthquakes alone are reason enough to stop the Yucca Mountain dump proposal dead in its tracks right now," said Kamps.
The Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Quake Chronology
Tokyo Electric Power Company's seven reactor Kashiwazaki-Kariwa atomic power plant, the largest in the world in terms of electricity output, suffered 50 cases of "malfunctioning and trouble" after a 6.7 tremor struck nearby two days ago. Radioactively contaminated water, at first estimated to be around 315 gallons but later raised by 50%, leaked into the Pacific Ocean. Barrels containing radioactive waste tipped over, and 10% of their lids fell off; the number of barrels was first estimated at 100, but later increased to 400. Hazardous radioactive isotopes cobalt-60 and chromium-51 were emitted into the atmosphere from an exhaust stack. The first sign of trouble was not an alert issued by the company, but rather a column of black smoke pouring off a transformer fire that took two hours to bring under control. The quake, epi-centered on a previously unknown fault line just over five miles from the nuclear plant, created forces 2.5 times stronger than the plant was designed to withstand. Based upon data from the quake's aftershocks, Japanese authorities now fear an extension of the fault line may pass very near to, or even directly under, the atomic complex itself. The twelve hour delay before the company announced the radioactive leak into the ocean, the day-long delay in discovering the tipped over barrels, and the increasing magnitude of the spills and other problems has caused consternation among environmental groups, local residents and politicians, even with the Japanese Prime Minister himself.
Contact:
Linda Gunter, Beyond Nuclear
301.455.5655
linda@beyondnuclear.org
July 18th, 2007
KSDK Saint Louis
By Mike Owens
The St. Louis Metropolitan Sewer District (MSD) has been told to put up signs warning residents about some creeks and streams in the region.
The streams are polluted because of overflow from sanitary sewers, a condition caused by sewers that are too full because of rainstorms.
The overflows are all over the St. Louis area.
For example, there are ten overflow pipes on the grounds of the Forest Hills Country Club, two at Ladue High School and some near Bellerive Country Club.
There's one near the McKnight Place complex, some in parks in north St. Louis County and near the Ballwin Athletic Complex.
The pipes have flappers on them and if there's a big rain, the sewage flows from the pipe, right into the creeks.
Thus the warning signs.
Jeffrey Theerman, the head of MSD, says his agency had been working with the Environmental Protection Agency and Missouri regulators, but in May the regulators surprised MSD by taking them to court.
The suit asks MSD to explain why the agency has allowed the pipes to overflow in violation of the 1972 Clean Water Act.
MSD's position is it has been working on fixing and building treatment plants and the pipes have had to wait.
They've fixed about 300 overflows but a similar number are still dumping.
Tom Rooney, the president of Insituform, a St. Louis company which refurbishes old pipe in place, says MSD should have solved the problem years ago.
Instead of building expensive treatment plants, MSD could have fixed the pipes, with Insituform's technology, and saved the cost of the lawsuit.
Theerman says the MSD has done all it can to work on the issue, adding that a combination of fixes will be used to solve the problem.
Homeowners living near the new signs are surprised what's going on just feet from their yards.
Helen McAlevey had lived in her home for 51 years and had no idea the creek was polluted.
As to the lawsuit, she says MSD should be sued for polluting the creek.
However, Theerman says it will cost billions of dollars to fix the problems and the cost will rest most heavily on the elderly and the poor.
The EPA ordered the signs, some of which are hard to find in the weeds around the creeks.
MSD has until the end of August to get them all in place.
For a map of the locations where the pipes dump into the creeks, click here.
(EXTENDED INTERVIEW: Click here to watch more of Mike Owens' interview with Jeffrey Theerman and MSD spokesperson Lance LaComb)
Nuclear scare after Japan quake
A strong earthquake in central Japan has damaged a large nuclear power plant causing a leak of radioactive material, officials at the plant have said.
July 16th, 2007
BBC News
A small amount of water containing radioactive substances leaked into the sea, officials said, and a fire broke out at the plant in Kashiwazaki.
At least seven people were killed and hundreds injured in the earthquake.
Several hours later a second earthquake of magnitude 6.6 struck in the sea off Kyoto in western Japan.
Tokyo Electric Power Company said the small amount of radioactive material that leaked into the sea posed no environmental risk.
Reactors at the plant automatically shut during the magnitude 6.8 quake.
'Vertical jolt'
The seven deaths occurred in the city of Kashiwazaki.
Four women and three men - all in their 70s and 80s - died from injuries sustained in the earthquake, officials said.
Several hundred homes and businesses in Niigata prefecture were destroyed, roads were cracked and several landslides buried roads.
More than 800 people were reported injured, most with broken bones, cuts and abrasions from collapsing buildings and falling objects.
"First there was a sharp vertical jolt and then it shook sideways for a long time and I couldn't stand up," said Kashiwazaki teacher Harumi Mikami, who was at her school when the earthquake struck at 1013 (0113 GMT).
"Tall shelves fell over and things flew around," she told Reuters news agency.
More than 7,000 people were evacuated from their homes as aftershocks of up to magnitude 5.8 shook the area.
No damage from the second earthquake deep under the sea off Kyoto was reported but Tokyo residents said they felt buildings shake.
Safety fears
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe broke off from election campaigning to visit Kashiwazaki.
He promised to "make every effort towards rescue and also to restore services such as gas and electricity".
The safety of Japan's nuclear installations, which supply much of Japan's power, has come under the spotlight in recent years after a string of accidents and mishaps.
Japan lies in one of the world's most earthquake-prone regions and the ability of some reactors to withstand a strong tremor has been questioned.
Three years ago an earthquake in the Niigata area killed 65 people.
In 1995, a magnitude 7.3 tremor hit the city of Kobe, killing more than 6,400 people.
Solar Power Wins Enthusiasts but Not Money
July 16th, 2007
New York Times
By Andrew C. Revkin and Matthew L. Wald
The trade association for the nuclear power industry recently asked 1,000 Americans what energy source they thought would be used most for generating electricity in 15 years. The top choice? Not nuclear plants, or coal or natural gas. The winner was the sun, cited by 27 percent of those polled.
It is no wonder solar power has captured the public imagination. Panels that convert sunlight to electricity are winning supporters around the world — from Europe, where gleaming arrays cloak skyscrapers and farmers' fields, to Wall Street, where stock offerings for panel makers have had a great ride, to California, where Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's "Million Solar Roofs" initiative is promoted as building a homegrown industry and fighting global warming.
But for all the enthusiasm about harvesting sunlight, some of the most ardent experts and investors say that moving this energy source from niche to mainstream — last year it provided less than 0.01 percent of the country's electricity supply — is unlikely without significant technological breakthroughs. And given the current scale of research in private and government laboratories, that is not expected to happen anytime soon.
Even a quarter century from now, says the Energy Department official in charge of renewable energy, solar power might account for, at best, 2 or 3 percent of the grid electricity in the United States.
In the meantime, coal-burning power plants, the main source of smokestack emissions linked to global warming, are being built around the world at a rate of more than one a week.
Propelled by government incentives in Germany and Japan, as well as a growing number of American states, sales of solar panels made of silicon that convert sunlight directly into electricity, known as photovoltaic cells, have taken off, lowering manufacturing costs and leading to product refinements.
But Vinod Khosla, a prominent Silicon Valley entrepreneur who focuses on energy, said the market-driven improvements were not happening fast enough to put solar technology beyond much more than a boutique investment.
"Most of the environmental stuff out there now is toys compared to the scale we need to really solve the planet's problems," Mr. Khosla said.
Scientists long ago calculated that an hour's worth of the sunlight bathing the planet held far more energy than humans worldwide could use in a year, and the first practical devices for converting light to electricity were designed more than half a century ago.
Yet research on solar power and methods for storing intermittent energy has long received less spending, both in the United States and in other industrialized countries, than energy options with more political support.
Indeed, there are few major programs looking for ways to drastically reduce the cost of converting sunlight to energy and — of equal if not more importance — of efficiently storing it for when the sun is not shining.
Scientists are hoping to expand the range of sunlight's wavelengths that can be absorbed, and to cut the amount of energy the cells lose to heat. One goal is to make materials to force photons to ricochet around inside the silicon to give up more of their energy.
For decades, conventional nuclear power and nuclear fusion received dominant shares of government energy-research money. While venture capitalists often support the commercialization of new technologies, basic research money comes almost entirely from the federal government.
These days, a growing amount of government money is headed to the farm-state favorite, biofuels, and to research on burning coal while capturing the resulting carbon dioxide, the main heat-trapping smokestack gas.
In the current fiscal year, the Energy Department plans to spend $159 million on solar research and development. It will spend nearly double, $303 million, on nuclear energy research and development, and nearly triple, $427 million, on coal, as well as $167 million on other fossil fuel research and development.
Raymond L. Orbach, the under secretary of energy for science, said the administration's challenge was to spread a finite pot of money to all the technologies that will help supply energy without adding to global warming. "No one source of energy that we know of is going to solve it," Dr. Orbach said. "This is about a portfolio."
In the battle for money from Washington, solar lobbyists say they are outgunned by their counterparts representing coal, corn and the atom.
"Coal and nuclear count their lobbying budgets in the tens of millions," said Rhone Resch, president of the Solar Energy Industries Association. "We count ours in the tens of thousands."
Government spending on energy research has long been shaped by political constituencies. Nuclear power, for example, has enjoyed consistent support from the Senate Energy Committee no matter which party is in power — in large part because Senators Jeff Bingaman and Pete V. Domenici, the Democratic chairman and the ranking Republican, are both from New Mexico, home to Los Alamos National Laboratory and a branch of the Sandia National Laboratories.
Biofuels, mostly ethanol and biodiesel, have attracted lawmakers who support farm subsidies. Last year an impromptu coalition established a goal of producing 25 percent of the country's energy, including vehicle fuel, from renewable sources by 2025. Legislation to that effect attracted 34 senators and 69 representatives as co-sponsors; the resolutions are pending in both houses. Most of the measure's supporters are from agricultural areas.
For the moment, the strongest government support for solar power is coming from the states, not Washington. But there, too, the focus remains on stimulating markets, not laboratory research.
The federal government is proposing more spending on solar research now, but not enough to set off a large, sustained energy quest, many experts say.
"This is not an arena where private energy companies are likely to make the breakthrough," said Nathan S. Lewis, head of a solar-research laboratory at the California Institute of Technology.
Many environmental organizations are pushing for tax credits for people who buy solar equipment, which helps manufacturing but not research.
Still, some experts say government-financed research efforts often go awry. And several government officials defended the current effort, saying an outsize investment in solar research is not needed because the industry is already in high gear.
Bush administration officials say they are committed to making power from photovoltaic technology as well as "solar thermal" systems competitive with other sources by 2015.
Alexander Karsner, the lead Energy Department official for renewable energy technology and efficiency, said the expanded use of photovoltaic cells could have its greatest impact by substantially reducing the energy thirst of new buildings.
To be sure, there are some promising signs in solar energy.
Big arrays of mirrors that concentrate sunlight to run turbines, which first emerged in the early 1980s, are resurgent in sun-baked places like the American Southwest, Spain and Australia. Some developers say this solar thermal technology is competitive now with power generated by natural gas when demand, and prices, hit periodic peaks.
With more research, the solar thermal method might allow for storing energy. Currently, all solar power is hampered by a lack of storage capability.
"The scale on which things actually have to happen on energy is not fully either appreciated or transmitted to the public," said Dr. Lewis of Caltech. "You have to find a really cheap way to capture that light, for the price of carpet or paint, and also convert it efficiently into something humans can use for energy."
After more than two decades in which research on converting solar power to electricity largely lapsed, the Bush administration and lawmakers in Congress are now discussing more money for the field. Dr. Orbach said the Energy Department's proposed research plan for 2008 to 2012 includes $1.1 billion for solar advances, more than the $896 million going toward fusion.
But many scientists, perhaps seasoned by past energy cycles, doubt that the new burst of interest is sufficient to lure the best young minds in chemistry and physics. After encouraging 346 research groups last year to seek grants for surmounting hurdles to harnessing solar power, the Energy Department this year ended up awarding $22.7 million over three years to 27 projects — hardly the stuff of an energy revolution, several scientists said.
"There is plenty of intellectual firepower in the U.S.," said Prashant V. Kamat, an expert in the chemistry of solar cells at the University of Notre Dame, who has some Energy Department financing. "But there is limited encouragement to take up the challenge."
Groups Criticize Ameren Taum Sauk Plans
July 10th, 2007
By Christopher Leonard,
Associated Press Writer
Environmental Groups Criticize Ameren's Plan to Rebuild Taum Sauk
ST. LOUIS (AP) -- Environmental regulators and activists criticized parts of Ameren Corp.'s plan to rebuild the Taum Sauk reservoir in public comments submitted to federal regulators this week.
The comments were filed Monday and Tuesday with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which is deciding whether to let Ameren rebuild the mountaintop reservoir in rural southeast Missouri.
The comments focused on FERC's assessment of the environmental impact of Ameren's plan to rebuild the 55-acre reservoir, which feeds water into a nearby hydroelectric plant. This week marked the deadline to submit those public comments to FERC.
FERC regulates the reservoir, which collapsed in December 2005, devastating the nearby Johnson's Shut-Ins State Park and injuring a family of five. FERC is considering Ameren's plan to tear down and rebuild the 1960s-era reservoir in a way the St. Louis-based company says will meet modern safety standards.
Ameren's rebuilding plan calls for the reservoir's earthen walls to be replaced by a concrete dam. The new design also calls for overflow release valves in the dam that could prevent catastrophic overtopping.
The Missouri Department of Natural Resources and Department of Conservation both submitted letters saying they would like to see tweaks made to FERC's assessment of the environmental impact before Ameren is allowed to rebuild the reservoir.
Meanwhile, three activist groups -- the Sierra Club, Missouri Coalition for the Environment and American Rivers -- submitted comments that questioned whether the reservoir should be rebuilt at all.
FERC will consider the comments filed this week before its final ruling on Ameren's plan to rebuild, said spokeswoman Mary O'Driscoll. She said the agency has no firm deadline for making a ruling on the plan.
Ameren spokesman Tim Fox said the company's rebuilding plan emphasizes safety for the environment and nearby residents.
"We would not consider rebuilding the reservoir if we weren't confident that it could be done safely," he said.
DNR planner Jane Beetem said the agency supported much of Ameren's rebuilding plan but wanted the utility to add a few key provisions.
"We're very concerned about water quality and water quantity in the streams around the reservoir," Beetem said.
Ameren should more closely monitor the amount of water it releases into nearby streams to make sure there is a strong enough flow to support wildlife and the local river tourism industry, she said.
The company should also ensure there is not excessive runoff during construction, she said.
The Conservation Department's objections mirrored DNR's.
Dan Sherburne, research director for the Missouri Coalition for the Environment, said the group doesn't think the reservoir should be rebuilt because it sits above the popular Johnson's Shut-Ins State Park. If the reservoir had breached during the summer months, the resulting flood could have killed hundreds of campers, he said.
"We frankly don't think that's the appropriate place to put a facility like this," he said.
Home Depot is Challenged over Creek
July 8th, 2007
By Tim Bryant
St. Louis Post Dispatch
ST. CHARLES COUNTY — In getting government permission to move Belleau Creek to accommodate its store in O'Fallon, Home Depot agreed to keep watch over another creek a few miles away.
But an environmental group now contends that because Home Depot ignored part of the agreement, the area around the second creek is suffering soil erosion. The head of the engineering company that devised the plans said Home Depot had complied fully with the agreement.
In the middle is the Army Corps of Engineers, which approved the agreement in 1999 and says it will investigate claims made by the Missouri Coalition for the Environment.
The store, at Mexico Road and Highway K, opened in 1999. As part of the project, Home Depot got permission from the Corps of Engineers to reroute a portion of Belleau Creek. In addition, Home Depot agreed to a permanent conservation easement along part of Baltic Creek, which is several miles from the store.
Nicole Dalrymple, a spokeswoman for the corps, said Home Depot had suggested the Baltic Creek site, which is south of Highway 94 and a short distance west of Dingledine Road.
At issue is whether Home Depot monitored Baltic Creek to the
extent called for in the agreement.
Kim Knowles, the coalition's staff attorney, said Home Depot had the site checked for two years, then stopped monitoring it.
"Nobody is taking care of that area," she said. "You wouldn't walk there and think this is a conservation area."
Knowles acknowledged that the corps' permit allowing alteration of Belleau Creek is unclear on the duration of required monitoring of Baltic Creek. But she noted that Home Depot's overall plan, including the Belleau Creek changes, called for five years of monitoring.
With no one keeping an eye on the area, soil erosion has taken place on a small stream within the Baltic tract, which covers nearly nine acres, Knowles said.
Home Depot was not required to install erosion-control measures but was to "take corrective measures, if necessary," she said.
Reitz & Jens Inc. is the engineering firm that devised Home Depot's plan. Paul Reitz, head of the St. Louis-based firm, said terms of the agreement had been fully met.
Development in the Baltic Creek area, a factor in choosing it for protection, "probably degraded" the small stream in recent years, Reitz said. But he added that Home Depot was not obligated to monitor the creek "in perpetuity."
Home building has taken place near the creek. The Villas at Arden Forest, by Dean Homes, is getting under way just upstream from the conservation area on the former site of the Coon Club, which had included a shooting range.
Cups, half-buried tires, metal remains of an innerspring mattress and a mailbox still on its post were among the debris visible recently in the creek. A sunfish and a few other small fish hung motionless in the murky water.
Robert Morgan, who for 27 years has lived near the creek at the end of Cactus Junction, said heavy rain sometime swelled the Baltic until it covered part of his yard.
"Nobody takes care of this," said Morgan, a retired auto worker.
Neighborhood children seldom venture into the area, he said. But the area has residents. On a recent visit, two whitetail deer clambered noisily up the creek bank and disappeared into the trees.
tbryant@post-dispatch.com | 636-255-7212
MSD still hasn't completed 1985 wetlands deal
July 4th, 2007
By Phil Sutin
St. Louis Post Dispatch
MARYLAND HEIGHTS — The Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District failed to offset a loss of wetlands when it expanded its Missouri River treatment plant 22 years ago.
Now the district and the Missouri Coalition for the Environment differ on the needed amount of replacement wetlands.
The district proposes establishing 29 acres of wetlands, about 1.5 times the total lost acreage. The coalition says the district should replace four times the acres of wetlands that was forested and three times the amount of other wetlands.
On June 25, the district applied to the Corps of Engineers for permission to expand the plant. The corps will take into account the failure to provide the wetlands when considering the district's request, said Danny McLendon, chief of the corps' area regulatory office.
A 1985 permit required that the district preserve a 2.7-acre stand of trees and 3.3-acre swale. The permit also called for the district to enhance 17.5 acres. The district also will need an acre of wetlands when it expands the plant, said Brian Hoelscher, MSD director of engineering.
Kim Knowles, staff attorney for the coalition, complained about the lack of replacement of wetlands. "How do we put a value on 20 years of lost functions? Not by ignoring them," she said in a letter to McLendon.
Knowles said in an interview: "Wetlands make our water and environment cleaner, safer and healthier. They filter pollutants, absorb flood waters and provide critical habitat for birds, plants, fish and other animals."
Several bureaucratic snags, including changes in the definition of a wetland and in wetland regulations, a transfer of corps records from Kansas City to St. Louis and the federal government's delay in issuing some clean-water regulations stretched the wetlands issue through the years, officials of the district and corps said. McLendon added that the corps lacked staff members to make sure all promised wetlands were established.
After the area corps office studies the district's application, it will announce a 21-day period for public comment, McLendon said.
Hoelscher said the federal government had a new list of wetlands.
The district would take bids from their owners for reimbursement and select the one that is the most effective and efficient, he said. Hoelscher estimated the district would spend $750,000 to pay for 29 acres. A three-to-one replacement would double the cost.
"And that's a $1 million we can spend to eliminate" illegal sanitary-sewer bypasses, Hoelscher said.
Buying Into the Green Movement
July 1st, 2007
By Alex Williams
New York Times
HERE'S one popular vision for saving the planet: Roll out from under the sumptuous hemp-fiber sheets on your bed in the morning and pull on a pair of $245 organic cotton Levi's and an Armani biodegradable knit shirt.
Stroll from the bedroom in your eco-McMansion, with its photovoltaic solar panels, into the kitchen remodeled with reclaimed lumber. Enter the three-car garage lighted by energy-sipping fluorescent bulbs and slip behind the wheel of your $104,000 Lexus hybrid.
Drive to the airport, where you settle in for an 8,000-mile flight— careful to buy carbon offsets beforehand — and spend a week driving golf balls made from compacted fish food at an eco-resort in the Maldives.
That vision of an eco-sensitive life as a series of choices about what to buy appeals to millions of consumers and arguably defines the current environmental movement as equal parts concern for the earth and for making a stylish statement.
Some 35 million Americans regularly buy products that claim to be earth-friendly, according to one report, everything from organic beeswax lipstick from the west Zambian rain forest to Toyota Priuses. With baby steps, more and more shoppers browse among the 60,000 products available under Home Depot's new Eco Options program.
Such choices are rendered fashionable as celebrities worried about global warming appear on the cover of Vanity Fair's "green issue," and pop stars like Kelly Clarkson and Lenny Kravitz prepare to be headline acts on July 7 at the Live Earth concerts at sites around the world.
Consumers have embraced living green, and for the most part the mainstream green movement has embraced green consumerism. But even at this moment of high visibility and impact for environmental activists, a splinter wing of the movement has begun to critique what it sometimes calls "light greens."
Critics question the notion that we can avert global warming by buying so-called earth-friendly products, from clothing and cars to homes and vacations, when the cumulative effect of our consumption remains enormous and hazardous.
"There is a very common mind-set right now which holds that all that we're going to need to do to avert the large-scale planetary catastrophes upon us is make slightly different shopping decisions," said Alex Steffen, the executive editor of Worldchanging.com, a Web site devoted to sustainability issues.
The genuine solution, he and other critics say, is to significantly reduce one's consumption of goods and resources. It's not enough to build a vacation home of recycled lumber; the real way to reduce one's carbon footprint is to only own one home.
Buying a hybrid car won't help if it's the aforementioned Lexus, the luxury LS 600h L model, which gets 22 miles to the gallon on the highway; the Toyota Yaris ($11,000) gets 40 highway miles a gallon with a standard gasoline engine.
It's as though the millions of people whom environmentalists have successfully prodded to be concerned about climate change are experiencing a SnackWell's moment: confronted with a box of fat-free devil's food chocolate cookies, which seem deliciously guilt-free, they consume the entire box, avoiding any fats but loading up on calories.
The issue of green shopping is highlighting a division in the environmental movement: "the old-school environmentalism of self-abnegation versus this camp of buying your way into heaven," said Chip Giller, the founder of Grist.org, an online environmental blog that claims a monthly readership of 800,000. "Over even the last couple of months, there is more concern growing within the traditional camp about the Cosmo-izing of the green movement — ‘55 great ways to look eco-sexy,' " he said. "Among traditional greens, there is concern that too much of the population thinks there's an easy way out."
The criticisms have appeared quietly in some environmental publications and on the Web.
GEORGE BLACK, an editor and a columnist at OnEarth, a quarterly journal of the Natural Resources Defense Council, recently summed up the explosion of high-style green consumer items and articles of the sort that proclaim "green is the new black," that is, a fashion trend, as "eco-narcissism."
Paul Hawken, an author and longtime environmental activist, said the current boom in earth-friendly products offers a false promise. "Green consumerism is an oxymoronic phrase," he said. He blamed the news media and marketers for turning environmentalism into fashion and distracting from serious issues.
"We turn toward the consumption part because that's where the money is," Mr. Hawken said. "We tend not to look at the ‘less' part. So you get these anomalies like 10,000-foot ‘green' homes being built by a hedge fund manager in Aspen. Or ‘green' fashion shows. Fashion is the deliberate inculcation of obsolescence."
He added: "The fruit at Whole Foods in winter, flown in from Chile on a 747 — it's a complete joke. The idea that we should have raspberries in January, it doesn't matter if they're organic. It's diabolically stupid."
Environmentalists say some products marketed as green may pump more carbon into the atmosphere than choosing something more modest, or simply nothing at all. Along those lines, a company called PlayEngine sells a 19-inch widescreen L.C.D. set whose "sustainable bamboo" case is represented as an earth-friendly alternative to plastic.
But it may be better to keep your old cathode-tube set instead, according to "The Live Earth Global Warming Survival Handbook," because older sets use less power than plasma or L.C.D. screens. (Televisions account for about 4 percent of energy consumption in the United States, the handbook says.)
"The assumption that by buying anything, whether green or not, we're solving the problem is a misperception," said Michael Ableman, an environmental author and long-time organic farmer. "Consuming is a significant part of the problem to begin with. Maybe the solution is instead of buying five pairs of organic cotton jeans, buy one pair of regular jeans instead."
For the most part, the critiques of green consumption have come from individual activists, not from mainstream environmental groups like the Sierra Club, Greenpeace and the Rainforest Action Network. The latest issue of Sierra, the magazine of the Sierra Club, has articles hailing an "ecofriendly mall" featuring sustainable clothing (under development in Chicago) and credit cards that rack up carbon offsets for every purchase, as well as sustainably-harvested caviar and the celebrity-friendly Tango electric sports car (a top-of-the-line model is $108,000).
One reason mainstream groups may be wary of criticizing Americans' consumption is that before the latest era of green chic, these large organizations endured years in which their warnings about climate change were scarcely heard.
Much of the public had turned away from the Carter-era environmental message of sacrifice, which included turning down the thermostat, driving smaller cars and carrying a cloth "Save-a-Tree" tote to the supermarket.
Now that environmentalism is high profile, thanks in part to the success of "An Inconvenient Truth," the 2006 documentary featuring Al Gore, mainstream greens, for the most part, say that buying products promoted as eco-friendly is a good first step.
"After you buy the compact fluorescent bulbs," said Michael Brune, the executive director of the Rainforest Action Network, "you can move on to greater goals like banding together politically to shut down coal-fired power plants."
John Passacantando, the executive director of Greenpeace USA, argued that green consumerism has been a way for Wal-Mart shoppers to get over the old stereotypes of environmentalists as "tree-hugging hippies" and contribute in their own way.
This is crucial, he said, given the widespread nature of the global warming challenge. "You need Wal-Mart and Joe Six-Pack and mayors and taxi drivers," he said. "You need participation on a wide front."
It is not just ecology activists with one foot in the 1970s, though, who have taken issue with the consumerist personality of the "light green" movement. Anti-consumerist fervor burns hotly among some activists who came of age under the influence of noisy, disruptive anti-globalization protests.
Last year, a San Francisco group called the Compact made headlines with a vow to live the entire year without buying anything but bare essentials like medicine and food. A year in, the original 10 "mostly" made it, said Rachel Kesel, 26, a founder. The movement claims some 8,300 adherents throughout the country and in places as distant as Singapore and Iceland.
"The more that I'm engaged in this, the more annoyed I get with things like ‘shop against climate change' and these kind of attitudes," said Ms. Kesel, who continues her shopping strike and counts a new pair of running shoes — she's a dog-walker by trade — as among her limited purchases in 18 months.
"It's hysterical," she said. "You're telling people to consume more in order to reduce impact."
For some, the very debate over how much difference they should try to make in their own lives is a distraction. They despair of individual consumers being responsible for saving the earth from climate change and want to see action from political leaders around the world.
INDIVIDUAL consumers may choose more fuel-efficient cars, but a far greater effect may be felt when fuel-efficiency standards are raised for all of the industry , as the Senate voted to do on June 21, the first significant rise in mileage standards in more than two decades.
"A legitimate beef that people have with green consumerism is, at end of the day, the things causing climate change are more caused by politics and the economy than individual behavior," said Michel Gelobter, a former professor of environmental policy at Rutgers who is now president of Redefining Progress, a nonprofit policy group that promotes sustainable living.
"A lot of what we need to do doesn't have to do with what you put in your shopping basket," he said. "It has to do with mass transit, housing density. It has to do with the war and subsidies for the coal and fossil fuel industry."
In fact, those light-green environmentalists who chose not to lecture about sacrifice and promote the trendiness of eco-sensitive products may be on to something.
Michael Shellenberger, a partner at American Environics, a market research firm in Oakland, Calif., said that his company ran a series of focus groups in April for the environmental group Earthjustice, and was surprised by the results.
People considered their trip down the Eco Options aisles at Home Depot a beginning, not an end point. "We didn't find that people felt that their consumption gave them a pass, so to speak," Mr. Shellenberger said. "They knew what they were doing wasn't going to deal with the problems, and these little consumer things won't add up. But they do it as a practice of mindfulness. They didn't see it as antithetical to political action. Folks who were engaged in these green practices were actually becoming more committed to more transformative political action on global warming."
Looking for Leadership on Renewable Energy
July 1st, 2007
By Erin Noble
Letter to the Post Dispatch
With the exception of long-overdue increases to fuel efficiency standards, the Energy Bill the U.S. Senate enacted is weak and misguided.
Corn ethanol is a not a solution to our problematic addiction to foreign oil and dirty coal. Producing ethanol from corn is energy- and water-intensive. Growing corn uses harmful pesticides and fertilizers that pollute our lakes and streams and create a dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico.
As more corn is used for ethanol, less is available for food, raising the price of corn and the livestock we feed with corn. Despite this, the bill mandates a sevenfold increase in corn ethanol production.
The Energy Bill did not include renewable electricity standards, which require utility companies to produce some electricity from renewable sources. A standard is the most important action Congress could take to spur development of renewable energy, wean the country off dirty fossil fuels and fight climate change.
Our local leaders have failed us as well. While 23 states already have a renewable electricity standard, Missouri does not. Instead, the state Legislature has given us "voluntary targets." But voluntary doesn't work. With 85 percent of Missouri's electricity coming from coal, it's past time for a renewable standard.
Let's hope our national leaders see the weaknesses in the Senate bill and give us sound renewable energy policy. If not, it may be time for Missouri to enact a renewable electricity standard.
Blunt-Emerson-Department of Natural Resources announce Johnson's Shut-Ins State Park will open Monday with limited access this Summer
June 29th, 2007
Press Release
Jefferson City
Visitors to Johnson's Shut-Ins
State
Park near Lesterville can once again swim in the shut-ins this summer,
Governor Matt Blunt, Congresswoman Jo Ann Emerson and Director of the
Missouri Department of Natural Resources Doyle Childers announced
today.
The shut-ins area of the park will officially open at 8 a.m. Monday,
July
2. Visitors can splash in the shut-ins area of the park, picnic nearby
and
visit the park store. Interpretation will be offered to explain what
happened to the park and the recovery process. The park will remain
open
daily from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. through Sept. 3, 2007.
"We have been working extremely hard to help make certain that visitors
will once again be able to visit Johnson's Shut-Ins State Park, which
is
one of Missouri's most popular parks," said Gov. Blunt. "Opening the
shut-ins in anticipation of the holiday weekend will also help local
businesses and increase tourism opportunities, which is crucial for
jobs
and the local economy for Missourians in Lesterville and the
surrounding
area."
"The Johnson Shut-Ins are one of Southern Missouri's crown jewels and
an
important driver for our tourism economy," said Congresswoman Jo Ann
Emerson. "I am very grateful to all of the men and women who put in a
tremendous effort to be sure the park will be open for the Fourth of
July.
I encourage everyone in Missouri to come to the Shut-Ins this summer
and
see why this place is so special to our state, and I am visiting the
Johnson Shut-Ins on July 3rd to tour the park and see the great
progress
which has been made there."
The shut-ins, parking area, picnic sites and the store are the only
areas
that will be open for the season. Visitors will be able to visit the
store, which has drinking water and other amenities, then walk down the
trail and boardwalk to the shut-ins.
"We are glad that Ameren reached the goal of opening the park by the
Fourth of July," said Doyle Childers, director of the Department of
Natural Resources. "Making portions of the park available to visitors
is
one more step to show progress in the overall development of the new
Johnson's Shut-Ins State Park."
All other areas of the main park remain closed. These areas are
considered
construction zones and people will not be allowed in these areas for
safety reasons. There will be no camping available. The nearby area of
Goggins Mountain where the equestrian trail and trailhead are located
is
closed as plans continue for rebuilding of the campground in that area.
Johnson's Shut-Ins State Park was closed following the Dec. 14, 2005,
breach of the nearby Taum Sauk Reservoir, which flooded the park. Plans
continue for the redevelopment of the park, which the department hopes
will be fully operational in 2008.
Also available in the area are other state parks and historic sites,
including Taum Sauk Mountain State Park near Ironton, Fort Davidson
State
Historic Site in Pilot Knob and Elephant Rocks State Park near
Belleview.
There are many other attractions in the Lesterville/Arcadia Valley area
as
well.
For more information on these other attractions, go to
www.experienceblackriver.com.
For more information on Missouri state
parks
and historic sites, go to www.mostateparks.com or call the department
at
1-800-334-6946 (voice) or 1-800-379-2419 (Telecommunications Device for
the Deaf).
For news releases on the Web, visit www.dnr.mo.gov/newsrel. For a
complete
listing of upcoming meetings and events in the state park system, visit
the online calendar at www.dnr.mo.gov/calendar/parkssearch.do###.
Developer, contractor fined by EPA:
$146,833 fine over Grindstone Wal-Mart project is regional record
June 19th, 2007
By Laura Myers
Columbia Missourian
Columbia developer THF Grindstone Development LLC and contractor Emery Sapp & Sons have been fined $146,833 for violations of the Clean Water Act occurring in the development of the Wal-Mart Supercenter and shopping center on Grindstone Parkway.
The fine, which must be paid in 30 days, is the largest of its kind imposed by Environmental Protection Agency Region 7, which includes Missouri, Iowa, Kansas and Nebraska, according to a news release.
The U.S. EPA released details Monday of the settlement of two construction-related infractions.
Although steps are being taken to remedy the effects of the violations, Ken Midkiff of the Sierra Club said the terms of the settlement aren't enough.
"It solves the problem with that developer, but the problem is that Hinkson Creek is still polluted," he said.
Between fall 2005 and spring 2006, the construction site lacked sufficient erosion controls, leading to runoff of concrete and sediment into a tributary of Hinkson Creek, said Delia Garcia, an EPA environmental scientist.
THF and Emery Sapp also built concrete culverts directly into the tributary and its banks without a permit required by the Clean Water Act, which increased erosion in the stream and worsened the water quality in the creek's watershed.
In early June 2006, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers notified the EPA about the illegal culverts, and inspectors visited the site on June 16, 2006, according to Garcia.
"During EPA inspection, our inspector documented sediment in the water," said Diane Huffman, EPA water enforcement chief for Region 7. "He could actually see sediment from the site in the water."
The construction changes needed to fix the problems were made "virtually upon discovery," according to Frank Hackmann of Sonnenschein, Nath & Rosenthal LLP, the lawyer representing THF Grindstone on environmental concerns.
"We're very pleased to have the matter resolved and move ahead," Hackmann said.
Hackmann said the violations were a result of "some miscommunication."
No one from Emery Sapp was available to comment.
In addition to the fine, the settlement states that the firms will plant trees, shrubs and grasses along Hinkson Creek near Scott Boulevard to prevent erosion. Hackmann said that THF is aiming for a fall planting to meet the one-year deadline set by the EPA.
Hank Ottinger, also of the Sierra Club, hoped that the settlement sends a message to local developers.
"I would hope that such a decision would catch the attention of developers in the city and perhaps be a cautionary tale," he said.
More ethanol means more corn -- and more water pollution
June 10th, 2007
By Bill Lambrecht
Post Dispatch Washington Bureau Chief
CHARLESTON, Ill. — Kayaking in green algae is not Ron Easter's idea of the pleasant outing he seeks as he sets out three or four evenings a week to paddle the Embarras River in the farmlands of eastern Illinois.
But on journeys up the Embarras last summer, algae are what Easter, 52, a high school biology teacher, found himself gliding through.
"You wonder what is washing off those farm fields," he said while pulling his kayak out of the river recently.
What is washing off those fields is nitrogen and phosphorus from fertilizers applied in ever-increasing amounts to grow more corn to fuel the ethanol boom.
American farmers intend to plant more corn this year than at any time since the food-shortage years of World War II — 90.5 million acres, according to Agriculture Department estimates.
Farmers in Illinois, second only to Iowa in corn production, planned to plant 1.6 million more acres of corn. Their Missouri counterparts intended to plant corn on an additional 700,000 acres.
That's just this planting season. With the ethanol industry predicting that it will more than double production by 2010 — and with Washington politicians leaping on the biofuels bandwagon — it seems certain than the nation will need more corn in coming years to keep pace.
The robust growth benefits farmers and the Corn Belt economy. It might chip away at energy imports as advertised, even though much of the fertilizer that farmers use is made with imported natural gas. But those successes have one certain cost: more oxygen-stealing chemicals running off farms to choke rivers and lakes with algae.
Like newborn babes, those tiny, willowy corn plants demand plenty of feeding — an average of 156 pounds of nitrogen and 80 pounds of phosphorus per acre on Illinois' corn crop since 2000, according to government figures. Unlike soybeans, alfalfa and certain other crops, corn requires heavy applications of fertilizer because it is unable to take nitrogen from the atmosphere.
The new corn planted across the country translates to millions of pounds of extra fertilizer, an additional pollution burden that could further harm rivers and lakes already damaged by farm chemicals.
Computer models
A prime example is the Embarras River (pronounced EM-bra), which begins near the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign and flows through farmland in eastern Illinois. It's among dozens of Illinois waterways where crop production has been linked to nutrient pollution, erosion and other problems.
Computer models run for the Post-Dispatch in the University of Illinois' Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering showed what can happen if farmers plant considerably more corn.
Studies over the past decade determined that when acreage in the Embarras' watershed is planted half in corn and half in soybeans, the usual crop rotation, about 31 pounds of nitrogen from fertilizer runs off every acre of land in the upper stretches of the river.
What happens if two-thirds of the acreage is planted in corn? Using a computer model called SWAT, or Soil and Water Assessment Tool, University of Illinois researchers projected that the nitrogen runoff would increase to more than 40 pounds per acre each year — an increase of more than 29 percent.
J. Wayland Eheart, the University of Illinois civil engineering professor who supervised the modeling, said that more study is needed on increased pollution from ethanol production and ethanol plants' heavy use of water.
"Not only might the ethanol plants be causing more pollution to be put into water, they might be using up the water that dilutes the pollutants we already have," said Eheart, noting that it takes more than 3 gallons of water to produce 1 gallon of ethanol.
The Post-Dispatch reported this spring that Illinois and Missouri were among several Midwestern states where water use by ethanol plants has become a growing dispute.
'Green gunk'
The problem often begins with algae blanketing the surface of water. It looks like trouble brewing, and it is. Pollution from fertilizer spoils rivers and lakes for many uses.
In a 2006 Illinois Environmental Protection Agency report identifying water pollution problems around the state, crop production was listed as a potential source at more than 600 stretches of rivers, streams and lakes where excess nitrogen and phosphorus were causing problems, according to an analysis by the Post-Dispatch.
Those waters were classified by the EPA as "impaired," meaning they had lost at least one of their intended uses, such as swimming, fishing or existing as a habitat for aquatic life.
Fertilizer pollution kills aquatic life by suffocation. With oxygen diminished, the aquatic food chain is upset and fish become scarce. Water clouded with sediment and covered with algae no longer is inviting.
"Nobody wants to swim in a lake where there's green gunk," observed Albert Ettinger, staff attorney for the Environmental Law and Policy Center in Chicago.
Then there are the occasions when nitrates — compounds formed when nitrogen and oxygen mix — threaten public water supplies.
Illinois officials are especially concerned about algae in lakes that provide drinking water. Besides harmful nitrate accumulations, algae can clog water intake pipes and filters and even promote dangerous bacteria.
That's why the federal EPA sets limits on nitrates in public water supplies and warns people that they can cause serious illness and even death.
Nitrates in water are occasionally cited in livestock deaths and were blamed in the late 1990s for sickening people in Monterey County, Calif. Human fatalities are rare, but nitrates in well water were believed to have caused the death of a 2-month-old girl in South Dakota in 1986.
Steve Via — an engineer at the American Water Works Association, which calls itself the world's biggest organization of water professionals — said communities might be spending more to filter out the nutrient pollution.
"We're talking about a significant increase in corn production. That's enough to get everybody's attention in the Midwest drinking water community," he said.
Not just farms
Missouri produces just one-fourth the amount of corn as Illinois and has experienced far fewer nitrogen pollution problems as a result of crop production.
Missouri's most serious nutrient problems are due to livestock and wastewater treatment plants, according to the state's biannual water quality report, released this spring. The report expressed concern about nutrient problems at Lake of the Ozarks, Table Rock Lake and other reservoirs important for recreation.
But the increase in corn planting gives Missouri environmentalists another cause for concern: Some of the new corn acreage had been unplanted, sensitive lands enrolled in the government's conservation reserve program.
Heavy concentrations of nutrients have become a problem along America's coast as well as in its heartland. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration asserted recently that nutrient pollution has become a persistent problem in the Gulf of Mexico, Chesapeake Bay, Lake Erie, Puget Sound and many important waterways around the country.
NOAA issued warnings six months ago that problems with nitrogen and phosphorous were growing especially fast from the Mid-Atlantic region to Maine, and pointed to development as a main source of the problem. The federal agency predicted a 10 percent to 25 percent increase in nutrient concentrations in coastal areas around the country as a result of sewage treatment plants, farming and other causes.
In the Chesapeake Bay, where farming and poultry production are blamed for expanses of oxygen-depleted water, federal agencies in May announced a special program and monitoring to curb runoff.
But while federal regulations exist for pollutants from sources like sewage, clean-water laws don't apply to farm runoff. As a result, government agencies must rely on the environmental stewardship of farmers and incentive programs that encourage farmers to take fragile lands out of production.
weary of criticism
Nitrogen pollution is a touchy issue. For many farmers, springtime planting is like walking into a casino — it's a gamble, on the weather, future crop prices and global attitudes toward food and energy.
They have lost some bets in recent years as a result of rising fuel prices, European dislike of genetically modified crops and corporate consolidation that has left them feeling squeezed and vulnerable.
Finally, corn growers are enjoying healthy profits thanks to the ethanol boom. So many farmers resent it when the ethanol industry gets criticized, rightly or wrongly, for taxpayer subsidies, higher food prices, and pollution and odor from refineries.
Nutrient pollution, corn growers point out, also results from sewage treatment plants and runoff from golf courses and fertilized lawns. Farmers are growing weary of getting blamed for environmental harm.
"People act like we're a bunch of greedy destroyers of the land. But we're environmentalists. Working environmentalists," said Larry Hasheider of Okawville, Ill., interviewed recently while driving his tractor.
Hasheider, 52, and his family farm 1,700 acres along the Kaskaskia River, one of the Illinois watersheds listed for "high priority" problems in the state EPA inventory of troubled waterways.
Hasheider argues that the farmers he knows will be seeking to minimize fertilizer use even as they grow more corn. One reason is purely economic: Because of demand, the cost of his nitrogen fertilizer has soared from $450 a ton last year to $550 this planting season.
On his farm, Hasheider is able to limit his purchases by injecting hog manure into the ground to fertilize corn. Even so, he recognizes that more needs to be done.
"We need to solve this problem, not just criticize everybody," he said.
Like many other farmers, Hasheider is growing more corn — 15 percent more than he planted last year to take advantage of what he regards as "one of the monumental milestones" in the history of farming.
"Right now, ethanol is a race horse galloping so fast, it's scary," he said.
'Amazing' times
In Assumption, Ill., Len Corzine, a fifth-generation Illinois farmer and a former president of the National Corn Growers Association, is seizing the day: He planted corn on 90 percent of the more than 2,000 acres he farms. Five years ago, he was splitting his plantings equally between corn and soybeans.
Corzine, 57, described what the recent high prices mean for farmers. At 200 bushels per acre for 1,000 acres, an increase of $1 per bushel means an additional $200,000 in receipts.
"It's pretty amazing," he said. "You can do more things with your family. You can give more at church."
Waters from Corzine's land flow north, ultimately to the Sangamon River, another Illinois waterway with problems from farm chemicals.
In its report last year of troubled waters in Illinois, the state EPA said that aquatic life had been damaged in several stretches of the river and noted that it was plagued by nitrogen, phosphorus and oxygen problems.
Like many modern farmers, Corzine deploys satellite tracking for soil testing to prevent over-fertilizing with phosphorus. He's meticulous about it, displaying records that date back several years. But he suggests that there is room for improvement.
"If I'm going to do some more of these things, you need to help me out a little bit," he said, referring to the need for more robust government programs paying farmers for buffer strips and other efforts to stop runoff.
push to conserve
As watershed coordinator for the Embarras River Management Association, Greg Sherwood has worked to persuade farmers to be more conservation-minded. His work won him one of 24 Environmental Hero Awards presented in Illinois last year by Lt. Gov. Pat Quinn.
Sherwood also has a substantial investment in one of Illinois' new ethanol plants, which he views as economic salvation to decaying towns in southeastern Illinois. He, too, is taking advantage of high corn prices, planting corn on two-thirds of the 600 acres he farms in Crawford County rather than the usual half.
On a tour of his farm, Sherwood showed some of the vegetation he has planted alongside cornfields — called buffer strips — that act as filters reducing runoff. Persuading other farmers to do likewise isn't always easy, he says.
"You meet people with a certain mind-set, and you just can't get through to some of them," he said of his discussions with other farmers.
"You tell them that they can still make a living with an environmentally sensitive way of doing business. But they'd rather have those extra six rows of corn than plant filter strips to keep in sediments and nutrients. Some farmers will listen and some won't. I guess that's just the nature of the beast."
Grant Slater of the Post-Dispatch Washington bureau contributed to this report.
blambrecht@post-dispatch.com
202-298-6880
Restoring natural flood plains eases flood risks
June 10th, 2007
St. Louis Post Dispatch
By Edward J. Heisel and Robert E. Criss
Remember a few weeks ago when we were warned that a wall of water was headed down the Missouri River toward St. Louis? By the time it reached here, however, local sightseers were disappointed when they peered over the levee, and river-bottom farmers suffered only a few sleepless nights.
So why did the dire forecast for the flood of May 2007 prove so inaccurate further downstream? One reason is that we humans have begun sharing more of the flood plain with the river.
After the 1993 flood, some long-term thinking went into how large rivers should be managed. In a few areas, those thoughts became action:
In mid-Missouri, more than 10,000 acres of farmland that had been walled off with levees were returned to the river's natural flood plain. Entire valleys of Missouri River bottomland upstream of Jefferson City were bought by state and federal agencies from owners who were all too willing to sell: The '93 flood had ripped giant holes in levees and deposited several feet of sand on once-fertile fields. The farmers found a way out, and public agencies found a way to restore some ecological balance to the river. In that sense, at least, it was a win-win situation.
These river restoration efforts are starting to pay significant dividends.
The flood last month was a disaster in western Missouri, with the Missouri River's floodwater reaching heights nearly equal to those of 1993 just downstream of Kansas City. But a funny thing happened when the flood hit mid-Missouri: It "lost" water.
River gauges between Kansas City and Hermann showed a significant decrease in the peak discharge as the flood moved downstream. The water escaped from the river into the flood plain, either through broken levees or at restoration sites where levees had been removed. It was then released downstream days later as the river receded.
The bottom line is that thousands of acres of farmland in central and eastern Missouri were spared a disastrous flood because huge volumes of water were temporarily stored in upstream flood plains.
A hundred years ago, people seemed to understand these principles better than we do today. Historical accounts of life on the Mississippi River recount "levee wars" in which one community sabotaged levees built by towns on the other side of the river. The saboteurs understood that water has to go somewhere; if it doesn't flood their town, it's likely to flood ours.
Of course, allowing rivers occasionally to reclaim their flood plains also has huge benefits for wildlife and outdoor recreation. Historically, large rivers like the Missouri and Mississippi would rise nearly every spring, spread out over their vast flood plains and provide fish and waterfowl with an abundance of food.
But as levees were constructed, hundreds of thousands of acres of critical habitat were lost. River ecologists now believe that restoring even a modest percentage of the river's flood plain would be enough to avert the extinction of species and increase the amount of wildlife overall.
The story of Missouri River flood plain restoration is only in its early chapters. Despite the proliferation of strip malls on floodplains near St. Louis, the overall picture on the river today is better from an ecological standpoint than it was 20 years ago. And with each year, it's becoming clearer that farmers, towns and industries that remain near the river benefit from natural flood control.
However, restoration projects such as the Big Muddy National Wildlife Refuge remain unfinished and need public support and funding. Only one-fifth of the refuge's authorized acreage has been purchased to date. And some farmers continue to express vehement opposition to refuge expansion, despite the benefits to their fields of flood reductions.
We have by no means seen the last of huge floods on the Missouri River. But the wiser we become about floodplain management, the less often these events will occur and the less damage they will do.
Robert E. Criss is a professor in the department of earth and planetary sciences at Washington University. Edward J. Heisel is the clinic attorney for the Interdisciplinary Environmental Clinic at the university's school of law.
PRESS RELEASE: Citizens for Groundwater Control Protection
May 31st, 2007
Citizens for Groundwater Protection today filed post trial motions and
suggestions alleging multiple trial court errors and asking Columbia,
Missouri Circuit Judge Conley to reconsider and reverse his May 4, 2007
decision. The post trial motions are the first step in an appellate process
that may end in the Missouri Supreme court.
Primary emphasis was made in Plaintiffs' motions on Judge Conley's reliance
on a 1928 Missouri Supreme Court case that Defendants claimed holds that the
standard of proof for prospective injunctive relief for nuisance in Missouri
is "certainly and inevitably." Plaintiffs claim that burden of proof
standard was changed by another case before the Missouri Supreme Court in
1973 and by the Missouri General Assembly in the Missouri Clean Water Act to
"reasonably certain. Plaintiffs allege that the "certainly and inevitably" standard is outmoded and useless as a legal criteria since it 1) is stricter
than beyond a reasonable doubt standard in criminal law; 2) has been
distinguished if not overruled by subsequent case and statutory law; 3)
effectively blocks access to courts as a legal remedy because it is an
impossible standard to meet; and 4) is contrary to the whole notion of
injunctive relief for prospective legal harms.
Among other areas of claimed error are failure to declare and properly apply
the "reasonable use "doctrine to GBE's proposed use of the amount of
groundwater and the qualitative and quantitative discharge of waste water
and effluent from the site. Also, the trial court ignored common law
remedies, instead relying on the existence of Federal and State regulation,
which reliance Plaintiffs claim is in direct contradiction of a 1980
Missouri Supreme Court case and express language of the Missouri Clean Water
Act. That all such remedies are cumulative and the common law remedies are
not preempted by Federal and State regulation, and that in fact the Missouri
General Assembly intended to expand rather than contract such remedies.
Further, the trial court allowed incompetent evidence and inexpert testimony
in evidence and refused to consider other competent evidence and expert
testimony from witnesses who had been tendered to and accepted by the trial
court as expert witnesses. Also, the trial court did not decide all the
issues before it; therefore, the May 4, 2007 judgment is not final.
The filing of post trial motions by Plaintiffs is the beginning of an
appellate process tha tleads from the Circuit Court to the Missouri Court of
Appeals -Southern District and possibly to the Missouri Supreme Court. The
entire process could possibly exceed one year of additional uncertainty as
to the final outcome of this legal proceeding.
ST. LOUIS: Neil Andre Founder, director of Earth Angels children's environmental group
May 28th, 2007
St. Louis Post Dispatch
Neil Andre, director and founder of Earth Angels, an environmental group focusing on inner-city children, died Friday (May 25, 2007) at his home in Cool Valley of complications from lung cancer. He was 57.
In 1981, Mr. Andre was a social worker at Dignity House when he came up with an idea to start an environmental project for children. Instead of launching a gang- or drug-prevention program aimed at telling kids what not to do, he chose to engage youths in something that would raise their self-esteem and improve the environment.
Every Saturday for two decades, Mr. Andre led groups of children, ages 6 to 13, on trash walks, "glass passes" and "can scans." Armed with trash bags, they picked up cans, glass, plastic bottles and other recyclables, cleaning up the alleys and streets of their neighborhoods. Mr. Andre taught them about the environment and what they could do to help on a global scale. The children voted on what to do with the proceeds from their recycled trash. Often, they chose to make even bigger contributions, from saving dolphins from fisherman's nets to purchasing plots of rain forest in Brazil. They even sent 60 solar cookers to African refugee camps.
Mr. Andre's group was originally named the Dolphin Defenders in honor of the marine mammals known for their methods of sticking together to protect an injured dolphin. The group was renamed Earth Angels when Mr. Andre received help from The Guardian Angel Settlement Association. Eventually more than 150 children took part in variations of the group around the city. He helped them create and maintain 10 wildlife habitats, plant trees in Turtle Playground and start the Forest of Life in Forest Park, where they plant a tree in honor of every child who dies because of violence. In 1998, the Earth Angels earned two national environmental awards — the National Arbor Day Foundation Award and one from Renew America.
Born in Lead, S.D., Mr. Andre moved to St. Louis as a child. He attended St. Louis Community College at Meramec and Webster University, before earning his bachelor's degree in philosophy at the University of Missouri-Columbia.
A memorial service will be held at 11 a.m. Saturday at Turtle Playground at Oakland and Tamm avenues in Forest Park. The body will be cremated.
Among the survivors are his wife, Rochelle Andre of Cool Valley; a sister, Janet Smart of St. Louis; and a brother, Rex Andre of San Francisco.
Memorial contributions may be made to the Wild Canid Survival & Research Center, P.O. Box 760, Eureka, Mo. 63025; or the St. Louis Audubon Society, 325 North Kirkwood Road, Kirkwood, Mo. 63122.
An article in the Alert (Spring 1995) applauds Neil and his work with the group of inner-city children to improve the environment. Niel nurtured the group for many years, and it has won numerous local, state and national awards, including being named 1994's "Conservationist of the Year" by the National Wildlife Federation. In 1992 they participated the Forest Park referendum, contributing hard earned cash collected through their recycling efforts.
Below are just three of many websites about the work of Neil and the Earth Angels:
EPA news release
http://www.envirolink.org/resource.html
http://www.volunteermatch.org/orgs/org3805.html
Intel Gets the Lead Out
By Kimberly Hill
May 24th, 2007
TechNews World
In addition to eliminating lead, Intel is seeking to use improved materials to make its chips more energy-efficient while continuing the meet the demand for higher-powered devices. The 45nm Hi-k chips also will employ strained silicon, which will allow Intel to house them in smaller devices, targeting the demand for mobile Internet access.
Intel (Nasdaq: INTC) will be eliminating a toxic heavy metal from its computer chip manufacturing process starting in the second half of this year.
It will begin using lead-free solder with next-generation 45nm Hi-k chips in the Intel Core 2 Duo, Core 2 Quad, and Xeon families, the company announced Wednesday.
Lead has been a concern in computer manufacturing, as it contributes to the toxic waste stream left behind when machines are discarded. Since many computers are replaced every few years, disposal has become a serious problem.
This is a "big deal," Frank Gillett, vice president with Forrester Research, told TechNewsWorld. Especially in Europe, consumers are becoming more aware of the byproducts of computer manufacturing.
Previously, the environmental focus in the industry has been on making more energy-efficient devices, he noted. Now, attention is shifting toward the materials used in making computers and the pollutants that may leech into the ground or water supply through their disposal.
Smaller, Safer
Instead of lead-based solder, Intel will use a proprietary substance made of tin, silver and copper. The alloy will replace the combination of tin and lead currently used to attach chips to their outer containers.
Due to previous improvements in its manufacturing process, Intel currently uses just 5 percent of the amount of lead it used before 2002 to connect the silicon die of the chip to the substrate of the package that holds it. Now, that 5 percent will go as well.
It has taken a long time to cross this threshold, Gillett said. "Getting this last bit of lead out of chips has been a challenge."
In addition to eliminating lead, Intel is seeking to use improved materials to make its chips more energy-efficient while continuing the meet the demand for higher-powered devices. The 45nm Hi-k chips also will employ strained silicon, which will allow Intel to house them in smaller devices, targeting the demand for mobile Internet access.
Company Focus
Intel has long touted its commitment to environmental issues. It has taken a leadership role in the semiconductor industry by reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Also, the company has a prominent water conservation program in place, and claims to have reduced water consumption by about 40 percent for each square centimeter of silicon it produces.
In addition to reducing hazardous materials used in the manufacturing process, Intel recycles more than 70 percent of its chemical and solid wastes, it says.
Among hazardous materials, lead is one of the most well-known. Lead poisoning in children became a public health concern after it was learned that paint in older buildings often contained high levels of lead.
Now, consumers are more aware of the myriad ways that toxic substances can make their way into water supplies, soil, the food chain and, ultimately, human bodies. Thus, consumer concern over toxic waste from computers is increasing and the public is becoming more aware of the necessity to dispose of them properly to avoid contaminating the environment, Gillett said.
HEMATITE: The accidental attorney, Local housewife argues case before state Supreme Court, and wins
By Chris Campbell
May 23rd, 2007
Suburban Journals
Clarissa Eaton was understandably nervous.
The mother-of-three from Hematite was about to address the Missouri Supreme Court. Eaton, who has no formal legal training, was representing herself and her husband, Jerry.
She glanced across the courtroom.
The presence of multiple corporate attorneys milling about on the opposing side did little to relieve her anxiety.
"It was such a sight in there," Eaton said.
"They had a legal dream team on one side and me on the other."
The moment, ripe with courtroom theater, had attracted more than a few curious attorneys.
"Almost every lawyer stayed around to watch," Eaton said.
The court proceedings began with an introduction.
"At the Supreme Court, you have to have an introduction before the Court," Eaton said.
"A woman stood and said 'I would like to introduce to you Clarissa Eaton, a housewife from (Hematite).'''
Then, the "housewife from Hematite" prepared to plead her case before the highest court in the state.
"I was so nervous," she said.
"Emotional and angry. I cried a little, but not much. I didn't know the specifics of what I should say, but at the same time, I thought they are the ones that dragged me here."
A Note on the Door
Just less than a decade ago, the Eatons purchased a home in Hematite.
They loved the woodsy feel of the area, and the spacious lot on which their home sat.
It all seemed idyllic--until Clarissa Eaton came home and saw an ominous note posted on her front door "There was a note on our front door telling us not to drink the water," Eaton said.
"We were horrified." Several homes in the neighborhood received the same note, and cases of bottled water.
The donor?
The owners of a nuclear fuel processing plant situated down the road.
While the water contamination originated from solvents, and was not radiological in nature, the Eatons were badly shaken by the disclosure.
"We didn't know the plant existed," she said. "We couldn't believe it. We didn't want to believe it."
The plant, which was used for uranium fuel fabrication during much of the Cold War, ceased operations in 2001.
Westinghouse Inc., one of six different owners of the plant during its life span, purchased the facility from Swiss-based ABB in 2000 and began decommissioning in 2001.
Cleanup efforts are expected to take at least three more years.
For the Eatons, the prospect of living in the shadow of a former nuclear fuel processing plant was unacceptable.
"We wanted them to buy our home so we could relocate and feel good about where we live," Eaton said.
Following the water contamination issues in Hematite, affected residents were offered payments to compensate for home depreciation.
Eaton said she was offered about $26,000, to drop a subsequent lawsuit, but never considered taking the money.
"The money isn't the thing," she said. "We assume liability if something ever goes wrong. (The plant) should be the seller."
Following a fruitless 10-hour mediation session from which they stood up and walked out, the Eatons filed suit against Mallinckrodt Inc., operator of the plant for much of its life as a fuel producer, and several other corporations.
Despite their unwillingness to settle, the Eatons nearly had that very settlement forced on them.
Eaton said that following negotiations her then-attorney, Morry Cole, accepted terms of the deal on her behalf.
The Eatons refused to sign the agreement and ended their relationship with Cole.
Lawyers representing the current and former owners of the plant then sued to enforce the settlement.
The plant's lawyers prevailed at the circuit court level.
Eaton was shocked, believing she was not allowed to present evidence on her behalf at the circuit court hearing.
"The lawyer we were working with at that time was really discouraged," she said.
Undeterred, Eaton filed to have the decision reversed in the Missouri Court of Appeals--representing herself.
A long legal road
Representing herself in front of the Court of Appeals, Eaton needed a legal education on-the-fly.
She proved a quick study, parsing legal jargon while running a household. "Even though I have three kids I fit in some legal studying," she said. "I did it in between diaper changes."
Writing countless motions while dealing with gnawing self-doubt wasn't easy, however. "Many, many times I doubted myself and was having such a hard time mentally and emotionally," she said. "I wanted to quit."
Two people helped her press forward despite the struggle. "My husband and Kay Drey," Eaton said.
Drey, an environmental activist who became aware of Eaton's work, often stepped in with encouragement and legal assistance.
"I've done a lot of work on nuclear power and radioactive waste contamination," Drey said. "I contacted her and asked if I could be of help."
Eaton, often swamped with motions and paperwork deadlines related to her appeal, was deeply appreciative.
"She gave me courage and wisdom," Eaton said.
"I'll forever be grateful for her taking me under her wing."
With Drey's help and her husband and children's support, Eaton fought on, ultimately prevailing in the Court of Appeals.
It was a significant personal and legal victory, but case referral to the state Supreme Court loomed.
Pleading her case
This March, as she appeared in front of the Supreme Court and an audience of professionals, Eaton was frightened.
But after the endless paperwork, persistent frustration and emotional swings of the previous years, she was resolved.
"I thought I'm here, so I'll make the most of it," she said. "But I couldn't believe how strict the rules are."
Fifteen minutes later, she concluded her oral argument.
It was a success. "She was remarkable," said Drey, present in court that day. "Eloquent and well-informed."
As she departed the courtroom, Eaton received handshakes from lawyers.
"A lawyer told me I had no idea what I had just done," she said. "Most lawyers don't argue in front of the Supreme Court."
Then, she waited.
Last week, word finally arrived.
In her mailbox sat a letter, and in that letter, a result: A unanimous verdict in her favor.
"I couldn't believe it," Eaton said. "My son went to the mailbox and there it was."
While a victory, Eaton's case is far from over.
While the Supreme Court decision voided enforcement of the settlement, the case could end up back in Circuit Court.
"They can take us back to court but this time we will be able to show our evidence," Eaton said.
And though Drey, Jerry Eaton, and her three children, Kyle, Kelsey and Jeremy, have all expressed pride and admiration in her efforts, Eaton knows nothing has been resolved--yet.
"I don't know what the future holds," she said. "We're still stuck in this house."
But Eaton, dubbed "the accidental attorney" by friends, has not lost any desire to see the case through.
"They thought they could intimidate me," she said. "But I've had my confidence restored in our judicial system."
Freshman Dem representative attaches bill for greener Missouri
By Kellie Houx, Associate Editor
May 22nd, 2007
KC Community News
Freshman Rep. Jason Holsman, D-south Kansas City, is moving forward to make Missouri a more energy-efficient state.
Holsman's bill, Easy Connection Act, cleared the House and the Senate. Now Holsman said he waits for Gov. Matt Blunt to sign the bill this summer.
"It was a combination of good fortune, a good piece of legislation and the right support to get this passed," Holsman said.
The bill encourages the development and utilization of technically feasible and economical technologies, creating cleaner and more sustainable forms of energy for the residents of Missouri. It sets targets for electricity generation from renewable fuel sources and features an amendment allowing citizens to generate their own energy to offset overall energy consumption – a process called "net metering."
Sen. Chris Koster, R-Harrisonville, sponsored the legislation. Essentially, the bill streamlines the net metering application process, allowing customers to generate up to 100KW at their residence. Kansas City Power & Light supported the amendment and provided information used in the draft legislation.
"For one of the first times in recent memory, the utilities, the environmentalists and the legislators got together at the same table to make this happen," Holsman said." I feel gratified that I helped bring them together."
The bill also requires utilities to pay property owners fair compensation for excess electricity generated by solar panels, wind turbines or other forms of generation. "The Easy Connection Act will make it easier for homeowners to embrace alternative forms of energy and reduce carbon emissions created by coal," Holsman said.
The bill authorizes the Missouri Public Service Commission to establish standardized regulations governing connection procedures. Currently, the ease of hooking up to the grid depends on where the property is located and what electric company serves that area.
The bill also establishes a single net-metering relationship to the grid, adding Missouri to the list of 41 other states that have adopted net-metering legislation.
"If you have solar panels on your home, the utilities require dual meters to track the flow of energy. The Easy Connection Act allows for a single bi-directional meter that spins in favor of the utility when you are consuming from the grid and spins in favor of the homeowner when you are consuming from your energy generation system," Holsman said.
Mark Fogal, Missouri Votes Conservation executive director, said he is encouraged by Holsman's commitment to improving the environment.
"This important piece of legislation faced many obstacles. To get it through the House on its first attempt is an achievement. To have the sponsor be a freshman from the minority party is outright impressive," Fogal said.
Great Plains Energy Chairman Mike Chesser said KCP&L will continue to support legislation such as the Green Power Initiative.
"It sets reasonable expectations for use of renewable fuels and, through the net metering provision, makes it easier for customers to help us offset consumption and lower emissions," he said. "The renewable fuels target is especially important because it helps balance-operating costs with the need to protect our environment
Human Exposure 'Uncontrolled' at 114 Superfund Sites
By Joaquin Sapien
May 18th, 2007
The Center for Public Integrity
EPA secrecy about sites' toxic dangers extends even to senators' inquiries
WASHINGTON — Scattered across the country, from New Jersey to California, are 114 toxic waste sites where the federal government has determined that the threat to humans from dangerous and sometimes carcinogenic substances is "not under control."
According to the Environmental Protection Agency, which oversees cleanup of the sites, hazardous chemicals and toxins there are poisoning the soil, water or air — or all three.
More than 25 million people live within 10 miles of these sites, according to a review of U.S. Census data of the 2000 population and more than 100 schools are located within one mile, a Center for Public Integrity analysis of government records show.
Yet, the EPA has resisted releasing information about cleanup plans or the sites' danger to the public other than offering a list of the sites' locations and a brief description about how people might become exposed — information buried so deep in the EPA's Web site that it is difficult to find.
The 114 sites are among 1,623 dangerously toxic areas currently or formerly included or proposed for action by Superfund, a law passed in 1980 to identify and supervise the cleanup of America's most toxic and polluted areas.
The sites are considered "not under control" by the EPA because the materials contaminating them could reach and harm people. Exposure to some of these toxins and hazardous chemicals has been linked to various forms of cancer, respiratory disease and heart disease and has stunted mental development in children.
Information that the EPA has been reluctant to release includes:
A ranking of which sites are the most dangerous
Plans for addressing the health threat at the sites
A timetable for cleaning up each site
Funding needs for each cleanup
Whether the EPA is investigating 181 more sites throughout the country for which the agency says it has "insufficient data" to determine whether they pose uncontrolled risks for humans
Sens. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., Barack Obama, D-Ill., and Dick Durbin, D-Ill., have aggressively sought more information about the 114 sites, with limited success. And much of the information provided to them by the EPA is not available to the public.
The EPA withholds funding and cleanup scheduling from the public so parties that could be responsible for the sites will not be aware of the agency's priorities, said Susan Bodine, who heads the Superfund program.
Bodine released some of this information to the senators, "with the understanding that these were sensitive documents," Bodine told the Center.
"[This] is ridiculous," said Alex Fidis, a staff attorney specializing in Superfund issues for U.S. PIRG, a public interest group. "The fact that information as paramount as making sure that humans are not being exposed to contamination is being withheld from the [Senate] Environment and Public Works Committee is outrageous."
Toxic neighbors
New Jersey, which has the most Superfund sites overall, also has the most sites (15) where human exposure to contaminants is not under control. California and New York tie for second with seven each.
The EPA lists a total of more than 260 pollutants at the sites where human exposure is not under control. Some of the most common and most dangerous are arsenic, lead, mercury, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and vinyl chloride, according to data from the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, the federal public health agency that provides information on contaminants found at Superfund sites.
There are also 224 Superfund sites where the migration of contaminated groundwater beyond the site is not under control.
EPA's priorities questioned
People living near some of the most contaminated areas complain that the EPA favors private interests over their own and that their health suffers the consequences of government neglect.
Cass Davis grew up in Smelterville, Idaho, where he said he was exposed to high concentrations of lead as a child in 1973 when a fire at a nearby smelter damaged pollution control filters. Lead fallout spewed over the surrounding area, contributing to the worst childhood lead-poisoning epidemic in U.S. history.
Davis blames his exposure to lead for a "plethora of learning disabilities," including attention-deficit disorder. "I am ADD to the max," Davis said.
Located in a region of Idaho called the Silver Valley, the Smelterville area is part of the 150-square-mile Bunker Hill Mining and Metallurgical Complex, whose long history of soil and water contamination earned it a spot on the list of toxic sites where human exposure is not under control.
A long-established mining district, the area was contaminated by 62 million tons of mine waste, called "tailings," that were dumped directly into streams near the town from 1884 to 1968. The tailings contained 880,000 tons of lead and at least 720,000 tons of zinc, according to the EPA.
Observers in the scientific community say the lingering threat has been downplayed by health studies led by state and federal agencies, which conclude that the ongoing cleanup, which began in 1986, has caused lead blood levels to decrease. But environmental health scientists disagree, charging that the limited sampling for the presence of lead in children in the area prevents any valid conclusions on the success of the cleanup.
"Studies that have been carried out in the Silver Valley over the last 10 years to assess lead blood levels in young children have not been epidemiologically sound, carefully crafted [and have not used] statistically valid samples to indicate what the prevalence of childhood lead poisoning is or is not in the Bunker Hill area," Dr. John F. Rosen, head of environmental sciences at Children's Hospital at Montefiore and the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, said in an interview with the Center.
In a 2002 assessment of the site, Rosen concluded that "public health has not been adequately addressed or protected by federal and state agencies" at Bunker Hill.
Local environmental activist Barbara Miller said she worries that more children are being exposed to high levels of lead and said she believes that the EPA's cleanup efforts were designed more to save the mining companies' money than to protect the surrounding community.
"This site has affected five generations of people," said Miller, executive director of the Silver Valley People's Action Coalition. "But EPA is still negotiating with mining companies and avoiding the human health problem as though it doesn't exist."
Bunker Hill is not the only "uncontrolled" site where scientists and activists say that the EPA has done a poor job of protecting the community.
At the Picayune (Miss.) Wood Treating Site, 33,000 residents live within 10 miles of the dioxin-contaminated area and seven schools are located within one mile.
Exposure to dioxin has been linked to an increased risk of developing cancer by the EPA and the World Health Organization. Dioxin can also cause a skin disease called chloracne and liver damage, according to the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry.
Wilma Subra, a chemist who heads her own environmental consulting firm dedicated to helping communities get hazardous waste cleaned up, told the Center, "The location of the schools is unacceptable. Exposure to the dioxin emissions from the Superfund site is endangering not only the [surrounding] community, but all of those attending schools in the area."
At another Superfund site in Pensacola, Fla., the EPA plans to place a giant tarp covered with soil and clay over "Mt. Dioxin," a nearly 600,000-cubic-yard mound of dirt contaminated with arsenic, dioxin, PCBs and other highly toxic material harmful to human health and whose exposure to humans is "not under control," according to the EPA.
The Pensacola site was created by another wood-treating facility, operated by Escambia Wood Treating Co. The EPA has determined that migration of groundwater off the site is also not under control.
In deciding among proposed cleanup plans, the EPA acknowledged that the one it settled on, which emphasizes containment, would not be as effective as alternatives that focus on treatment. But the agency maintained that its approach would "result in a substantially equivalent degree of protectiveness" at one-fifth the cost.
Several scientists and activists disagree.
"It's a high-tech engineered version of burying the stuff in a plastic bag," said Frances Dunham, a leading member of Citizens Against Toxic Exposure, an environmental watchdog group in Pensacola, Fla.
According to Subra, who helps the surrounding community deal with the EPA, contamination from the site is likely to seep into the area's groundwater, which already contains high levels of benzene, lead and arsenic, among dozens of other toxins. "There will be very little separation of the waste and the groundwater," Subra said.
While the EPA's own documents show that the area's groundwater is already contaminated with a long list of chemicals in concentrations exceeding state and federal safety standards, residents have been warned about only one item on the list: napthalene. The warning came not from the EPA, but from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, and the EPA has not warned the community about any of the other contamination, Subra and Dunham said.
"All of this information is not getting out in an adequate manner for the communities living over the plume," Subra said. "They still use those wells to irrigate their gardens, water their lawns, wash their cars. And the kids play in sprinkler systems." This type of exposure, Subra said, could cause skin rashes and increase the risk of cancer.
Inadequate work at other sites poses similar risks, she said.
Due to financial constraints, "the Superfund program has been moving more towards containment and not treatment, and in this case it is inadequate containment that is being proposed," Subra said. "This means that the public is going to be suffering from contamination of groundwater on an ongoing basis, at not just this site, but sites across the country."
Nailing down the list
One issue of concern to experts is the reliability of the list of the 114 sites considered not under control. At least 47 sites listed by the EPA in June 2006 were no longer on the list by October 2006. Some scientists doubt whether the EPA could have controlled human exposure at that many sites in just four months.
"There is no way that they could have done something to interrupt the pathway [of exposure] of [47] sites in that short a period of time," said Subra, the environmental consultant.
Richard Clapp, of the Boston University School of Public Health's Environmental Health Department, agreed. "It is just not physically possible to do that much cleanup in that period of time, so I think there might be some sleight of hand going on … calling things controlled that maybe aren't controlled," he said.
During the same period, 26 sites were added. "What happened at these 26 sites?" Subra asked. "Did they suddenly become a threat, or had they been a threat and they just suddenly got to the point where they were evaluating them?"
Superfund head Bodine said the list changed so extensively because the data had been reexamined and updated by the EPA's regional offices during the summer of 2006. "So some of the changes you are seeing are a result of improved data, and some are a result of [exposure] pathways being cut off," Bodine said.
Critics scoffed at that explanation. "Once there is a problem uncovered, EPA's typical response is to just cover it back up," said U.S. PIRG's Fidis.
Experts also say there are other sites not designated as Superfund sites but that have dangerous hazardous waste deposits where human exposure may not be controlled.
David Carpenter, an environmental health professor at the University of Albany in New York, told the Center, "The number of sites posing health risks is very much greater than the list that you've found," and includes places that are not even on the EPA's National Priorities List, which the agency considers the most hazardous.
Carpenter said a good example is in Anniston, Ala.
In 2002, Anniston gained national notoriety when court proceedings revealed that for more than 40 years, Monsanto Co. had dumped PCB-contaminated wastewater into areas where residents could be directly exposed to it. The plant is now owned and operated by its spinoff company, Solutia Inc.
The wastewater left the plant at the edge of town before entering streams, ditches and landfills throughout the small town. While groundwater has not been affected, during heavy rains the ditches and landfills would flood, sending the wastewater into homes and contaminating soil in yards.
When Carpenter testified as an expert witness in a lawsuit against Monsanto brought by residents alleging that their exposure to PCBs caused health problems, he called Anniston one of the most polluted areas in the country.
Michael Stevenson, a senior EPA attorney who became involved with the Anniston site after the agency and Monsanto settled on a cleanup plan in 2003, said the contaminated area, while hazardous, is not on the Superfund list because it doesn't need money from the Superfund program.
Carpenter said human exposure could be an issue even during the cleanup because residents might still be inhaling PCB-contaminated dust as the waste is transferred from backyards to nearby landfills. Carpenter said he thinks the excavation process is inadequate.
"While I am very much in favor of removing contaminated soil from people's backyards, stashing it away somewhere near someone's home is probably going to increase the spread" of PCB pollution, said Carpenter.
Some environmental health experts also say the criteria for choosing the sites are vague.
"I think there are probably a lot more" than 114 sites, said Clapp, of Boston University. The Lipari Landfill site in Pitman, N.J., listed as a Superfund site in 1983, is a prime example of the EPA's inability to determine whether human exposure is sufficiently controlled, Clapp said. More than a dozen contaminants have been found at the landfill, where 3 million gallons of liquid waste and 12,000 cubic yards of solid waste were dumped between 1958 and 1971.
"The Lipari landfill is supposedly controlled, but there is definitely ongoing exposure there," he said. "It is a huge landfill with a fence around it, and there are holes in the fence," allowing children to go through and play in the landfill.
Looking for answers
Sens. Boxer, Obama, Durbin and John Thune, R-S.D., have battled the secrecy that muddles the financial and hazardous condition of the Superfund sites that are not under control. Through briefings, letters and testimony at congressional hearings, they have demanded that the EPA tell them how the agency intends to pay for and conduct the cleanup of the sites — and to inform the public about the dangers.
In July 2005, Durbin and Obama asked for a review of all the "uncontrolled sites," a list of which ones posed the greatest risk and a timetable for controlling human exposure at each site.
The senators also asked that the EPA further study whether people were being exposed to hazardous materials at 181 additional toxic waste sites where the EPA had "insufficient data" to determine if human exposure was under control.
Nine months later, in April 2006, the EPA responded to the two senators but didn't rank the most dangerous sites or provide a specific plan to address them. The EPA did provide limited details on the sites themselves, such as whether the agency knew that people were being exposed to the pollution. At times, the answer to that question was "unknown."
In May 2006, the two senators wrote another letter to the EPA.
"After 10 months, we are disappointed that many of our questions remain unanswered," they said. "We are genuinely concerned about these sites and what seems to be the EPA's inattention to the human exposure that may be occurring."
In response, a month later in June 2006, EPA provided information on five sites in Illinois the senators had asked about where human exposure was not under control. At this time the total number of sites designated this way had expanded to 139.
After more correspondence, the Environment and Public Works Committee's Subcommittee on Superfund and Waste Management called its first oversight hearing in over four years in June 2006. Boxer, who has since become chairman of the parent committee, complained about the quality, confidentiality and delayed nature of the EPA's response.
"It is really stunning to see the casual way EPA treats the public's right to know," Boxer said. "Many of the documents I have asked for at these sites, especially those relating to timing of cleanup, funding shortfalls and related tasks are stamped 'PRIVILEGED' across the whole page in bright red ink."
She also said the EPA asked that access to the documents she received be limited and reviewed only under supervision.
Lois Gibbs, the housewife-turned-activist who came to be known as the "Mother of Superfund" in 1980, said the obstacles the senators have encountered reflect how difficult it is to get information on Superfund sites from the EPA.
"The fact that even Congress can't get this information speaks volumes to the degree of secrecy maintained by EPA," said Gibbs, who now heads the Center for Health, Environment and Justice, a nonprofit organization that helps draw attention to how toxic waste affects communities. "This should be an open public process and it should be open to people who have an interest in the situation."
According to Mollie Churchill, environmental network coordinator for OMB Watch, a Washington, D.C.-based government watchdog, "This type of behavior is curtailing people's ability to actively engage in the process.
"If they don't know about what is in their backyard, they are not going to be putting pressure onto their representative," she said. "If that pressure was there, maybe there would be more money for the Superfund."
Development Rises on St. Louis Area Flood Plains
By Susan Saulny
May 15th, 2007
New York Times
ST. LOUIS, May 14 — Miles and miles of bigger and stronger levees have been built along the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers since the deadly floods of 1993, and millions of dollars have been spent on drainage improvements.
Yet as the rush of water that caused the Missouri River to overflow its banks and submerge dozens of towns last week rolled toward St. Louis on Monday, attention was turned to a metropolitan region that since 1993 has seen runaway residential and commercial development in the rivers' flood paths.
About 28,000 homes have been built and more than 6,000 acres of commercial and industrial space developed on land that was underwater in 1993, according to research by Nicholas Pinter, a geologist who studies the region at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale.
Building is happening on flood plains across Missouri, but most of the development is in the St. Louis area, and it is estimated to be worth more than $2.2 billion. Though scientists warn about the danger of such building, the Missouri government has subsidized some of it through tax financing for builders.
"No one has really looked at the cumulative effect," said Timothy M. Kusky, a professor of natural sciences at St. Louis University, who calculates that there has been more development on the Missouri River flood plain in the years since 1993 than at any other time in the history of the region.
The good news for St. Louis right now is that forecasters say the two rivers will crest well below their 1993 levels by Tuesday, sparing the area significant flooding.
But many scientists remain concerned that the effect of the new construction, should a levee break, could eventually be even more severe flooding.
Levees constrict a river's path and raise its water level, which causes higher, faster flow. A flood plain, conversely, exists in nature to absorb a river's overflow.
"The more levees we build, the higher we have to build them," Professor Kusky said. "It's a self-perpetuating problem."
Still, people have been drawn to the area, assured by the sense of security the levees provide. Disincentives beyond the possibility of flooding seem to be few.
"This was absolutely a dodged bullet," Professor Pinter said. "This could have been a very bad situation for St. Louis, but luckily it was a near-miss."
People living in the flood plains are eligible for the National Flood Insurance Program or for any private insurance they can secure, though the private alternatives are increasingly difficult to obtain. And they are entitled to whatever federal disaster relief is offered to the state after a flood, be it temporary housing or buyouts, said Butch Kinerney, a spokesman for the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
THF Realty Inc. used Missouri's tax program, known as tax increment financing, to build what is said to be the largest strip mall in the country on land in the Chesterfield Valley area of St. Louis County that was submerged in the floods of 1993. The shopping center, which cost $275 million to build, opened in 1999 and now has more than two million square feet of retail space, mall officials said.
The developers spent more than $35 million on levee and storm drainage improvements, replacing an old levee that had offered protection against a 100-year flood with a levee that met the standards for a 500-year flood. And, they said, they have brought jobs and revenue to a formerly sleepy part of the county.
"We built the shopping center and interchange that opened the entire valley," said Marian Nunn, the chief operating officer of THF Realty. "The difference is that the levee is maintained now, on top of being bigger, stronger and better. The risks are really substantially mitigated."
The company was able to use the special financing because Missouri allows it for projects in areas that are considered blighted, or where development is not likely to occur without help.
"We will continue to build even more," Ms. Nunn said.
Faith in the levees seems to trump other concerns here.
"We're not even close to having any issues," said Brian McGownd, the deputy director of public works in Chesterfield. Of the new levee, Mr. McGownd said, "We have 100 percent confidence that it's done right, and the way it's supposed to be, and that it will be a good, strong levee for many years."
Fear of flooding did not appear to scare off prospective buyers at the New Town at St. Charles, a housing development whose sales office hummed with activity on Sunday, even as the Missouri River was rising. Although the community is near the confluence of the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers, residents are not required to have flood insurance, because they are beyond the 100-year flood plain.
The location was a selling point for Ken Snider, a high school teacher from St. Louis.
"It's not going to flood here for another 100 years," Mr. Snider said, "and I won't be around by then."
But critics of the developments say someone else is likely to be around then, and taxpayers in general will carry the tab after the next disaster bailout.
"If history tells us anything, it's that levees once built eventually fail," Professor Pinter said. "But instead of being farmland there, now it's a strip mall or residential area, or a whole city."
The floods of 1993 killed 38 people and caused $16 billion in damage across the Midwest. More than 500 counties were declared federal disaster areas.
Adolphus A. Busch IV, a member of the Anheuser-Busch brewing family who helped found the Great Rivers Habitat Alliance in St. Louis in 2000, is alarmed at the pace of development in the rivers' paths after the 1993 flood.
"That was the milestone for us," Mr. Busch said. "At that point the federal government came in and did major buyouts, and people said, ‘Look, we've learned our lesson: no more development.' Well, that lasted for about six or seven years."
He continued, "We always realized that there would be fringe development, but we never envisioned after 1993 that anyone would try to build major levees and enclose thousands of acres."
Some people already living in the flood plain at the time of the last big flood now say that it just makes economic sense for them to stay close to the river, and that it is an issue of personal-risk calculation and property rights.
Doris Hulst, a 65-year-old school bus driver, is the sole homeowner on a 109-acre swath of land that once housed three trailer parks near the Missouri River in St. Charles County.
"They all took the buyout," Mrs. Hulst said of her neighbors who relocated after the flood. "I took the buyout on a trailer I owned across the street, but you didn't make enough money to buy anything decent."
Today, Mrs. Hulst's trailer is elevated on three rows of cinder blocks. "We'll be fine as long as the Mississippi doesn't back up," she said.
Alan Dooley, a spokesman for the Army Corps of Engineers, St. Louis District, said people, like water, had certain natural inclinations.
"People have a tendency to locate near water," Mr. Dooley said. "These people vote; they pay taxes. It's kind of difficult to go through with a broad brush and say, ‘You all ought to get out of here.' "
Malcolm Gay contributed reporting.
Averting the IT Energy Crunch
By Rachael King
May 14th, 2007
Business Week
For a Business Week guide to green computers click here.
As a threat to operations and the bottom line, corporate computing's
fast-growing power consumption is forcing companies to adopt green energy
practices
Engineers at Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) made a startling realization about the servers running the company's computing systems. Surging power consumption, along with rising energy costs, will soon make it more expensive to keep a server going for a year than to acquire one in the first place. Left unchecked, costs like these could interfere with HP's goal of cutting energy consumption 15% by 2010.
So when HP began constructing a new 50,000-square-foot building to house high-powered computers, it sought advice from Pacific Gas & Electric (PCG). By following the California power company's recommendations, HP will save $1 million a year in power costs for that data center alone, PG&E says.
Like HP, companies across the globe are adding equipment to keep up with surging computing needs—and then are forced to make substantial changes to curtail the leap in costs associated with running the big buildings, or data centers, housing all that gear. "Data centers use 50 times the energy per square foot as an office [does]," says Mark Bramfitt, principal program manager at PG&E.
Industry experts say the power consumption of data centers is doubling every five years or so, making them one of the fastest-growing drags on energy in the U.S. "The IT industry is where the automotive industry was 20 years ago," says Rakesh Kumar, research vice-president at consulting firm Gartner (IT). "We are so backwards when it comes to using alternative-energy and energy-efficient technologies."
Chilling Data
To keep servers at the right temperature, companies mainly rely on air-conditioning. The more powerful the machine, the more cool air needed to keep it from overheating. By 2005, the energy required to power and cool servers accounted for about 1.2% of total U.S. electricity consumption, according to a report released in February by staff scientist Jonathan Koomey of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and sponsored by chip manufacturer AMD (AMD). Gartner reckons that by 2010, about half of the Forbes Global 2000 companies will spend more on energy than on hardware such as servers. Energy costs, now about 10% of the average IT budget, could rise to 50% in a matter of years, Kumar says.
That is, unless companies take some radical measures—soon. The first step is coming to terms with the power constraints of existing data centers and then deciding whether to construct new ones. That's a pricey choice, considering a new data center can cost $1,000 per square foot, by PG&E's estimates.
Another, often more alluring option: operating current centers in a more energy-efficient way—a tack taken by a growing number of companies, including Sun Microsystems (SUNW), Verizon Wireless, and Wells Fargo (WFC). They're lowering energy bills by making better use of existing gear and harnessing advances in cooling techniques and data-center design. "We've avoided roughly $20 million in build-out costs by being more efficient," says John Hinshaw, chief information officer at Verizon Wireless. The joint venture of Verizon Communications (VZ) and Vodafone (VOD) cut its number of data centers from 10 to 3, he says.
Who Gets the Electric Bill?
But if cutting costs isn't enough incentive, some executives may soon have little choice in the matter. Before now, at many organizations, the chief information officer didn't even see the utility bill, and operations or facilities departments often picked up the energy tab. But at a growing number of companies, reducing energy consumption is becoming part of the CIO's job description. "More [chief financial officers] are becoming aware of the energy bill and are starting to hold CIOs responsible," says David Douglas, vice-president of eco-responsibility at Sun Microsystems.
And while the boss won't enforce the greening of IT, Uncle Sam might. In December, Congress passed a law requiring the Environmental Protection Agency to assemble a report about power consumption in data centers by midyear. One aim: to outline possible incentives and voluntary programs for promoting energy-efficient computer servers and data centers. "It's big enough to get the government's attention," says Andrew Fanara, a team leader at Energy Star, an EPA-created program that encourages energy efficiency. Gartner's Kumar says it's possible that in the next few years, companies will face environmental legislation that would essentially tax data-center costs.
That could be bad news for companies such as Microsoft (MSFT), Yahoo! (YHOO), and Google (GOOG) that have rushed to build massive new data centers in recent years to meet demand for Web-based software and services (see BusinessWeek.com, 6/12/06, "Servers as High as An Elephant's Eye").
Reliability vs. Conservation
For now, there's still a lack of incentive to conserve energy in many cases. "There's a legitimate concern on the part of IT managers and facility managers not to mess with something that's working," says PG&E's Bramfitt. "They don't want to do anything that might reduce reliability."
Yet that's just what might ensue for companies that fail to act until they hit the upper limits of power consumption in data centers. In some situations, the problem stems from electric companies that simply can't supply any more power. "In the last two months, I've heard from three customers that suddenly they can't get more power to data centers on Wall Street. That's a big deal," says Sun's Douglas.
Douglas declined to say which companies faced constraints, but there's little surprise that financial institutions would be among the hardest hit. Many banks and brokerages rely heavily on servers to process transactions. About four years ago, Wells Fargo noticed that some of its data centers were reaching full capacity. "That spurred on the need to conserve energy," says Bob Culver, senior vice-president of the technology information group at Wells Fargo.
Toward More Efficient Cooling
Gartner estimates that anywhere from 30% to 60% of the energy in a data center is wasted. One big culprit is the inefficiency of the cooling systems required to keep servers from overheating. Any company serious about reducing energy in data centers will need to deal with cooling systems since they consume nearly half of a data center's power, PG&E's Bramfitt says.
When Wells Fargo built two new data centers, one in Minnesota in August, 2005, and the other in Arizona in January, 2006, it worked with an outside firm to devise energy-efficient cooling systems that could ratchet up or down as needed—a move Wells Fargo says will reduce energy consumption 15% in those centers. The Minnesota facility also uses systems that take advantage of cool outside air to moderate the temperature in its data centers, a technique known as "freecooling." "When the air temperature is about 40 to 42 degrees Fahrenheit, we shut off the chillers entirely," says Culver. For each chiller shut down, the company saves 300 kilowatts an hour.
One of the best ways to conserve energy in data centers is to make better use of existing servers. Unlike with desktop computers that can simultaneously run a number of software programs for e-mail, word processing, and spreadsheets, servers in data centers conventionally run one program per machine, for reliability reasons. Over time, servers have become more powerful so that the utilization of the average server is only around 5% to 15%. Researcher IDC estimates that there's $140 billion in excess server capacity worldwide.
On May 10, IBM (IBM) grabbed headlines with plans to invest $1 billion a year in products and services that will help reduce IT power consumption in data centers. By using new techniques, within the next three years IBM plans to double the computing capacity of its data centers—more than 8 million square feet worldwide—without increasing power consumption.
The Virtual Solution
Software company VMware, a subsidiary of EMC (EMC), has created software that lets companies reliably run multiple software programs on a single server through a process known as virtualization (see BusinessWeek.com, 2/9/07, "EMC's Billion-Dollar IPO").
By using one server in that manner, companies can significantly reduce the hardware in data centers. PG&E's Bramfitt says that just taking one server out of operation can save a company $600 to $1,200 per year in power and cooling costs.
PG&E gives customers a rebate of $150 to $300 for every server they virtualize. It's working with the U.S. Postal Service. "We think they might go from 6,000 servers to 500," says Bramfitt. By using VMware software to consolidate servers, Solvay Pharmaceuticals has been able to save roughly $67,000 a year in heating and cooling costs.
Some companies such as Sun and HP are also consolidating data centers. Sun has been replacing older equipment with smaller, newer gear, so the company can fit more hardware into the same space. By upgrading some older systems in its Colorado data center with more energy-efficient equipment, Sun will save about $100,000 in energy costs per year, Douglas says.
HP has chosen to completely overhaul its data centers by taking 86 data centers and consolidating them into 6. The idea is to take the design used in that first center, with PG&E's advice, and apply it to the remaining five, the last of which will be built in 2008. HP has not only devised efficient cooling systems, but has paid close attention to other details such as room layout, more efficient power supplies, and power management software. With all this newfound knowledge, HP is helping other firms create energy-efficient data centers.
Alternative Energy to the Rescue?
Down the road, companies may even opt for alternative sources of energy to keep data centers cool. One small data center in Romoland, Calif., has figured out how to run on only alternative energy. "We use no electricity from the power grid," says Phil Nail, chief technology officer of Web hosting company AISO.net. The company operates its 2,000-square-foot data center with solar energy captured via ground-mounted solar panels. But right now alternative energy is not a viable option in most cases. "The day is not upon us when you'll see windmills on mission-critical facilities," says Energy Star's Fanara.
The folks at HP look forward to when that and any number of other methods for saving power do become realistic possibilities. In its bid to cut consumption by 2010—a drive that includes reducing product energy consumption 20%—HP is leaving no stone unturned. "This is going to be pretty darn aggressive," says John Frey, manager of corporate environmental strategies for HP. "A lot of this involves HP innovation that doesn't exist yet."
Rachael King is a writer for BusinessWeek.com in San Francisco.
Lessons in Leniency:
In the "spirit of compromise,"
state environmental regulators routinely reduce pollution penalties assessed against large animal farms.
By Gavin Off Special to the Tribune
May 6th, 2007
Columbia Tribune
JEFFERSON CITY — For years, the Missouri Department of Natural Resources has levied civil penalties against large water-polluting animal farms, only to later reduce the penalties to about a quarter of the original amount, records show.
Although department officials say the downward adjustments to the civil penalties are all part of the negotiating process, critics call them handouts to industrial agriculture and slaps on the wrist to some Missouri polluters.
Examples of the consistent reductions in penalties are contained in more than 4,000 pages of department documents made available through Missouri's Open Meetings and Records Law. The records show the department often made the reductions in "the spirit of compromise."
The record of penalty cuts provides a sample to help measure DNR's regulatory performance at a time when some state legislators want to increase the agency's role in governing concentrated animal feeding operations, known as CAFOs. These are large-scale farms housing thousands of animals.
The state Senate recently considered a controversial bill that would have nullified local health ordinances governing CAFOs and would have essentially made DNR the sole regulatory authority over those operations. The bill died in the face of opposition from farmers, environmentalists and county officials.
Some opponents said the state regulatory agency could not protect local residents from the potential of air, land and water pollution from the large agricultural operations. A special interim legislative committee will study the large animal operations over the summer.
One place for the committee to start its work is an examination of CAFO violation records.
Since 2000, DNR's central office in Jefferson City has compiled more than 20 violations of state permits and the Missouri Clean Water Law by 12 animal farms. The records reviewed in Jefferson City represent only a sample of CAFO violation reports. Other violations are recorded in regional offices.
Of the records reviewed in Jefferson City, one case is still under investigation. Another case has been settled between the agency and the CAFO without negotiating a civil penalty. DNR never issued a penalty for a third animal farm because the CAFO immediately corrected the problem, reports showed.
But for nine farms, the department slashed the civil penalties it once deemed appropriate. Some penalties were reduced several times — all by thousands of dollars.
DNR records show the department reduced the nine civil penalties from a total of $167,000 to $45,000. Farms also paid for damages and the state's investigative costs when such costs arose. In agreeing to the settlements, the animal farms' owners admitted no wrongdoing.
Problems cited in the documents include spilling hog waste into rivers, spraying manure onto public roads, operating without state permits, failing to turn in annual water-monitoring reports and leaving a "pool of dead animal juices" at a farm composter.
"In the last two years, the DNR is really a joke out here in the countryside," said Rhonda Perry, program director for the Missouri Rural Crisis Center. "I don't think anybody out here trusts the DNR to do their job."
POLLUTION PENALTIES
DNR's responsibility is to protect Missouri's environment. Among its many duties, the agency enforces regulations and permits dealing with CAFOs.
Doyle Childers, department director, said DNR negotiates penalties with CAFO operators after department officials impose the penalties and farmers present the state with mitigating evidence. Such evidence, he said, shows farms could not entirely control the situation.
For example, a pump might have malfunctioned, sending hog waste into a nearby creek, or torrential rains might have washed chicken litter onto a neighboring property.
Childers said the negotiations and the resulting reductions are a "standard practice."
He said the bottom line is teaching CAFO operators to correct their violations, prevent future mishaps and help them become more environmentally friendly businesses. If the department could do that with limited penalties, so be it, Childers said.
"One of the things I would want to look at is what are the circumstances of the violations," Childers said. "Is it something that couldn't be quickly repaired? Are they trying to resolve it?"
Childers said department officials weigh additional factors, including a farm's violation history. The department tends to go easier on first-time offenders, he said, and treats repeated offenders "much less friendly."
DNR records might suggest otherwise.
Murphy Family Farms' Bellamy Pyramid operation consists of three hog farms near Nevada in Vernon County in southwest Missouri. In November 2005, the farms housed about 23,000 hogs.
A farm irrigation pipe broke in August 2003, spilling about 5,000 gallons of hog waste onto the property, according to a settlement agreement among Murphy Family Farms, the attorney general's office and DNR.
Less than two months later, a 1,000-gallon spill happened at the same spot.
"The above listed violations are significant because they have an adverse impact on the quality and beneficial uses of the receiving stream, an unnamed tributary of Walnut Creek," wrote Ed Galbraith, director of DNR's Water Protection Program, in a letter to Murphy Family Farms.
Then, in July 2004, another irrigation pipe ruptured, this time sending about 20,000 gallons of hog waste into a neighbor's pond and the tributary, the records said. The spill flooded the pond with 294,000 gallons of a waste/rainwater mix.
The report said the three violations lasted a total of six days.
Under the Clean Water Law, the state could fine farms as much as $10,000 a day for each violation, or in this case $60,000.
DNR said the spills' potential harm was "moderate" and assessed the damage at $30,000.
In a letter from the department's compliance and enforcement section, however, DNR later cut the assessment, saying a $25,000 penalty "is appropriate for this matter."
Later, the department reduced the penalty again.
After negotiations — at which time CAFO operators said the spills had no environmental effect and the farm had spent more than $500,000 to prevent future spills — Murphy Family Farms and DNR settled on a $6,000 civil penalty.
The settlement measured 24 percent of the original penalty of $25,000 and 10 percent of the maximum allowed under Missouri law.
Civil penalties are supposed to act as a deterrent against future violations. Environmentalists and residents said reducing the penalties merely perpetuates violations.
"It's like getting charged with a $100 speeding ticket, and they drop it down to $1," said Melody Torrey, a Unionville resident who lives next to a hog farm. "Would that make you stop speeding?"
FINES REDUCED
Childers, a former state lawmaker whom Gov. Matt Blunt appointed to head DNR in 2005, said the cuts in penalty amounts are a balancing act. Childers has said in the past that while enforcing the state's environmental laws, he also wants to help develop Missouri's economic development potential.
If CAFO operators contain a waste spill to the farm, Childers said, DNR would likely reduce the civil penalty. DNR is more demanding of CAFOs whose violations severely affect neighboring properties, he added.
Records show civil penalties are reduced even when they harm state waters or affect neighbors.
As of last year, the Simpson-Zeysing Farm in Caldwell County in northwest Missouri was home to 9,000 nursery hogs. The animal farm sits just off an unnamed tributary to Kettle Creek.
In April 2005, the farm was cited for polluting state waters, this time after hog waste — spread on the land as fertilizer — washed into the tributary. The discharge killed 4,117 fish and polluted 4.5 miles of stream for at least three days, records show.
DNR cited the farm for five violations.
"Although this is the only incident of record, it is particularly egregious because it included a fish kill, and it appears Mr. Simpson was negligent with maintaining best management practices during wastewater application," wrote Mary Ann Redden, a DNR environmental specialist, in the July 2005 report.
After the CAFO owner, Byron Simpson, said he could not afford to pay the civil penalty, DNR cut its initial $12,000 penalty to $4,000.
In the final settlement agreement, DNR cut the penalty to $2,000. The owner also paid for damages and DNR's investigation, which totaled $3,429.
In all, the department cut the civil penalty by 83 percent.
Terry Spence, a Unionville cattleman who has fought CAFOs for the last 12 years, said such reductions show Missouri is a CAFO-friendly state.
"They know up front that they're not going to get harmed," Spence said of CAFOs that break state laws. "It's just going to be a little slap on the hand."
Similar reductions unfolded for nearly all of the 12 farms that were issued violation notices and recorded in the department's Jefferson City office.
? Fletcher Hog Farm, near Sweet Springs in Saline County: According to an August 2002 settlement agreement, hog waste discharged into an unnamed tributary of Jordan Creek, killing 3,817 fish. The department assessed the penalty at $28,000 but because of the size of the farm, levied only a $12,000 penalty. DNR cut the penalty to $2,500, the settlement agreement said.
? Forkner Farms in Vernon County in southwest Missouri: According to an August 2003 notice, hog waste discharged into Douglas Branch. In a report the next year, the department declined to issue a civil penalty because the CAFO immediately corrected the problem.
? Delbert Fry Farm in Morgan County: According to an April 2002 letter from Fry, the department sought a $20,000 penalty after Fry discharged hog waste into an unnamed tributary of Flat Creek. DNR cut the civil penalty in half but also said it could be cut down to $2,000, provided that the farmer complied with specific conditions.
? Tompkins Livestock Farms in Miller County: According to a July 2004 report, the department assessed an $8,000 penalty against the farm for discharging hog waste into an unnamed tributary of South Moreau Creek. DNR cut the penalty to $2,000, the settlement agreement said.
? Climax II Hog Farm near Ashley in Pike County: According to a July 2004 letter, the department sought a $60,000 civil penalty against the farm for discharging hog waste into parts of the Cuivre River. DNR cut the penalty to $20,000.
? Glen Scott Poultry in Barry County in southern Missouri: According to a DNR report last May, the department sought a $10,000 civil penalty against the farm for operating without a valid permit and failing to turn in annual water-monitoring reports for seven straight years. DNR cut the entire penalty and sought only a $300 permit fee, a department letter said.
? Diamond T Farm, Miller County: According to DNR letters in March 2006 and June, the department cut a civil penalty from $12,000 to $1,500. The CAFO had discharged hog waste into an unnamed tributary of Blythes Creek.
? Niebruegge Farm, Cooper County: According to a DNR report last May, the department and the farm agreed to a $3,500 civil penalty after two animal waste discharges. Under state law, the penalty could have reached $10,000 a day for each violation.
? Kip Cullers Poultry in Barry County: According to an August DNR report, the department, "in the spirit of compromise," cut a civil penalty from $8,000 to $1,000. The CAFO was operating without a valid permit and had failed to turn in annual water-monitoring reports for six straight years.
The list of reductions surprised even those who already had little confidence in DNR. "They really are pretty shocking," said Perry, of the Rural Crisis Center. "I think it's totally clear that companies believe it pays to be a polluter because it's just a cost of doing business."
NEGOTIATION STRATEGY
Childers stood by DNR but said the department's system of starting with a large demand for a civil penalty and then negotiating the settlement downward could change.
Although he said the mere threat of a hefty penalty could scare some CAFOs into compliance, Childers said if the department is settling for fractions of the initial penalty, "you've probably started out too high for negotiating purposes."
"In fact, there's been discussion about whether we're starting out too high with that, if you ought to have a more realistic number and less flexibility." Childers said. "That's been an internal discussion."
Kevin Mohammadi, compliance and enforcement chief of DNR's Water Pollution Control Branch — which oversees the Clean Water Law and Missouri Clean Water Commission regulations — said he was unaware of such discussions.
He's also against the idea.
"You really can't" start lower, Mohammadi said. "We use an administrative penalty template that is in the regulation. We use that to determine the amount of the penalty."
Mohammadi said DNR's settlement agreements are adequate and that he couldn't recall any case in which the department didn't offer to negotiate a civil penalty.
"That doesn't mean you let them all go easy," said Charles Speer, a Kansas City attorney who represents people who have filed complaints against CAFOs.
Speer has tried dozens of CAFO cases, including more than 200 current nuisance odor cases against hog producer Premium Standard Farms. He said DNR has failed to keep CAFO pollution in check.
A former DNR employee also questioned the department's ability to regulate CAFOs.
The department is simply understaffed and underfunded, said Jim Vaughn, 61, of Dexter. Vaughn spent more than 20 years as a DNR geologist, inspecting more than 2,000 hog lagoons and wastewater sites statewide. He retired in 2002.
Too often, DNR officials failed to inspect how CAFO lagoons were built, Vaughn said. They left that to engineering firms and corporate representatives.
"If enforcement is too lax — the fines, in other words — there's probably not much incentive for them to pay attention to the DNR," Vaughn said. "Until CAFO companies and owners of other major livestock operations become highly responsible for environmental quality, you simply have to have people out there looking over their shoulder."
But given the numbers, that could be difficult.
The department now employs 14 water-quality inspectors. Missouri is home to 511 CAFOs.
DNR inspects the larger CAFOs sometimes once a year. Smaller CAFOs monitor themselves, a DNR official said.
"I think the counties have decided to take the matter into their own hands because they feel the state has failed them," Speer said.
Some 20 Missouri counties have zoning and health ordinances governing everything from CAFO livestock odor to setbacks between CAFOs and neighbors' homes. The bill considered earlier this session in the state Senate would have nullified those ordinances and would have turned most regulatory authority over CAFOs to DNR.
Supporters said the change would provide uniformity of enforcement. Opponents said it would weaken local health protections.
Sen. Chris Koster, R-Harrisonville, sponsored the bill, saying that if regulations varied from county to county, it could drive farmers out of state to locations where laws are unified and more lenient.
Koster said he quickly became aware of the rift between rural Missourians and DNR. Now he's calling for legislative action.
"Policymakers in Jefferson City need to take note of that frustration and ensure that the civil enforcement duties of the Department of Natural Resources are active and effective in their environmental role," Koster said.
Koster said he supports a legislative committee review of DNR's effectiveness. But even if there's a legislative review, residents and environmentalists could still bear some of the burden of policing large-scale animal farms.
Some DNR notices stem from local residents reporting the problem.
For example, an anonymous call prompted a March 2004 inspection of Tompkins Livestock Farms, records showed.
The inspector's attention turned to a nearby creek, which "contained brown and black colored water and smelled of hog manure."
The hog waste polluted more than two miles of a local stream, a DNR report said.
But the department cut the penalty by 75 percent, suggesting to some that the state had folded to industrial animal farms.
"They need to fine them the full amount, instead of a piddling amount," said Torrey, the resident of Unionville. "In my opinion, it's saying Missouri is easy."
Missouri air panel approves lead plan for Herculaneum
By Ken Leiser
April 27, 2007
St. Louis Post Dispatch
HERCULANEUM — Missouri is taking another run at airborne lead in this Jefferson County town. The state's Air Conservation Commission on Thursday approved the latest battery of measures to reduce emissions from the Doe Run Co. lead smelter. Herculaneum is one of only two areas of the country that doesn't meet the federal Clean Air Act standard for lead.
Despite gains since the late 1990s, measurements of airborne lead continue to consistently exceed the federal standard near the Herculaneum smelter. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has ordered the state to do more to reduce the emissions.
Under the latest plan, Maryland Heights-based Doe Run must build enclosed structures where lead ore and other materials are handled; improve truck washing; clean streets near the smelter; and install sprinklers to reduce dust. Doe Run risks financial penalties if it misses deadlines for the improvements.
"If you are over (the standard), you are over," said John Rustige, project manager for the Department of Natural Resources. "We have to take the administrative process to fix that."
The attorney general's office will file a consent judgment in Jefferson County circuit court before the air plan goes to the EPA for final review.
Some of the lead-control measures already are in place, Rustige said. The remainder will be completed by April 2008. "I am very confident that this is going to meet" the national lead standard, said Aaron Miller, environmental coordinator for Doe Run's Missouri operations. "We were there already, either just above or just below."
Miller said Doe Run will be making a multimillion-dollar investment toward reducing lead emissions from the plant.
In 2002, state health officials found that nearly half of Herculaneum's children under age 6 living within a half-mile of the Main Street smelter had elevated levels of lead in their blood. Doe Run has bought more than 130 houses, and many have been torn down in the area near the smelter.
Lead is a neurotoxin that interrupts normal brain development and has been traced to behavioral problems in children. Adults can tolerate higher levels of lead than children but can still suffer health problems.
The federal government is looking at possible changes to the lead standard. While some industry advocates want the standard weakened — or done away with altogether — scientists and environmental groups believe it should be strengthened.
Kathleen Logan Smith, executive director of the Missouri Coalition for the Environment, said the state has left itself too little margin for error to even meet the existing U.S. standard.
"There are still some significant shortcomings," she said. "And they are significant enough that I bet in three years, we will be looking at a new (state plan)."
Homeowners want simpler way to sell back power
By Jeffrey Tomich
April 27, 2007
St. Louis Post Dispatch
Before Cheryl Marcum moved back to Missouri from the suburbs of Washington, she and her husband spent years studying ways to make their southwest Missouri home among the state's most energy efficient.
Along with soy-foam insulation, Energy Star appliances and other design elements meant to minimize energy use, their 3,700-square-foot house has solar panels on the roof to help run the dishwasher, computer and other appliances. On sunny days, the couple often have a little extra electricity to put back on the grid.
By generating their own electricity, the Marcums are among a small but growing number of Missourians choosing to offset their energy consumption with small-scale renewable power systems to help lessen the nation's dependence on coal, oil and natural gas and cut emissions of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas linked to global warming.
But producing power is one thing; selling it is another. Marcum and others with solar- and wind-power systems in Missouri say they've had a difficult time reaching terms with utilities that would enable them to put excess generation back on the grid.
"We thought we knew exactly what we needed to do and then everything fell apart," she said. "This has taken seven months, countless telephone calls, countless e-mails. It's got to be easier."
Missouri enacted a law in 2002 establishing standards for customers who want to connect to the grid. But renewable-energy advocates, environmentalists and legislators say the state's rules are too cumbersome and fall short of their intended goals.
"It's a very convoluted process that varies from utility to utility," said state Rep. Jason Holsman, D-Kansas City. Complaints about the current process prompted Holsman to sponsor the Easy Connection Act, which would make it simpler for homeowners and businesses to connect to the grid. The Illinois Legislature is considering a similar measure, sponsored by Rep. Naomi Jakobsson, D-Champaign.
The bills have strong support from environmentalists because Missouri and Illinois are among just nine states without true "net metering" standards, according to the Interstate Renewable Energy Council, which tracks renewable-energy policies and incentives.
"Forty-one states have already done it and it's shown to be successful, so it's the low-hanging fruit," said Erin Noble, outreach and development director for the Missouri Coalition for the Environment.
The utility industry in Missouri doesn't oppose net metering but wants to make sure the state is careful to require customers pushing electricity back onto the grid to meet certain standards, said Chuck Caisley, president of the Missouri Energy Development Association, the trade group representing investor-owned utilities.
"Our biggest concern is that the system is safe and reliable," Caisley said.
Illinois gets just 1.9 percent of its electricity from renewable sources such as wind and sun. In Missouri, it's just a fraction of 1 percent, according to the Energy Information Administration, an arm of the Energy Department.
In fact, Missouri had only two residential net metering customers in 2005, the most recent data available. By contrast, California had more than 17,000. Other leading states include New Jersey, Oregon and Montana, though the numbers of customers selling power back to utilities in those states can be measured by the hundreds, not thousands.
Cost is the biggest reason that development of small-scale renewable energy systems has been so limited, said Warren Wood, head of utility operations for the Missouri Public Service Commission staff.
A two- to three-kilowatt solar power system costs $15,000 to $30,000. While there's a $2,000 federal tax credit available to help defray the cost, there are no state tax incentives available in Missouri, and electricity rates in the state are lower than in many others, such as California, Texas and Northeast states.
Tony Loman of Kirkwood installed a one-kilowatt solar power system in his home last July. Like Marcum, he has yet to reach an agreement to sell excess power back to the municipal electric supplier, but he hopes to do so soon.
Loman, a sociologist, decided to install solar panels not to make money, but because he has had a long-standing interest in the environment, and he has become increasingly concerned about the direction of the nation's energy policy.
"I feel like this is the wave of the future," he said. "I also feel a social responsibility to push this kind of thing."
Ditto for Gary Steps, a retired IBM engineer who now runs an energy consulting business.
While solar systems like his are out of reach for many homeowners, the economics are changing, he said. Prices for coal and natural gas have been climbing in recent years and costs of solar and wind-power systems are dropping as technologies advance and manufacturers benefit from economies of scale.
Sitting at the kitchen table of his home in Webster Groves, Steps can monitor a computer system that tracks how much electricity his 2.1-kilowatt solar system is generating (205 kilowatts since March 1); how much backup power is stored by the battery system in his basement (12.4 hours); and how much carbon dioxide he has prevented from being vented into the atmosphere by generating some of his own electricity (335.5 pounds).
Steps thinks a carbon tax or other similar regulation being considered by Congress could further raise prices for power from coal-fired power plants and make solar and wind-power systems more feasible for consumers.
Steps, in fact, said he is ready to "double down" on his solar investment if the economics improve. "If that were to happen next year, you'd see me put another set of panels up," he said.
Geologists discover world's largest fossil forest
in the ceiling of an Illinois coal mine
By Eric Hand
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
04/24/2007
Illinois geologists have discovered the remains of one of the world's oldest tropical rainforests, preserved in the ceiling of a coal mine 250 feet below the surface.
The four-square-mile fossil forest — the largest find ever — is just south of Danville in Vermilion County, Ill., in the 300-million-year-old Herrin coal bed, a 6-foot-thick strip mined by a subsidiary of St. Louis-based Peabody Coal.
Plant fossils are common in coal beds. Coal, after all, is the compacted result of peaty plant material. But scientists are surprised by the size of this fossil bed, which they suspect came about because of a freak, fortuitous event: an earthquake that flooded and buried the forest. The vast extent of the fossil forest, which existed in a swampy time of giant dragonflies and tree ferns, has allowed the scientists to infer subtle ecological changes across the ancient landscape.
"This is almost as good as insects in amber," said Scott Elrick of the Illinois State Geological Survey and one of the authors of the study, which was published in the May issue of the journal Geology.
Black Beauty Coal, the Peabody subsidiary, operates two mines in Vermilion County, where the Herrin coal bed is thickest. The Riola mine opened in 1996, and the Vermilion Grove mine was developed in 2001. In the past decade, as miners excavated room after room, they began to notice the imprints of leaves, logs and stumps in the ceiling. Some stumps were 5 feet in diameter, and one log was more than 100 feet long.
These are the remnants of extinct plants from a geological period 300 million years ago, called the Carboniferous, when the world was covered in a riot of green. Illinois was near the equator and much warmer and wetter.
It was also a time before flowering plants had evolved, and so the plants would seem bizarre to modern eyes, said study co-author Howard Falcon-Lang, a geologist at the University of Bristol in the United Kingdom.
"These are some of the earliest known rainforests to evolve on our planet," he said. "It was like something out of Jules Verne."
Giant tree ferns would have formed a lower canopy 30 feet high. Poking up through the ferns would have been 100-foot-tall clubmosses — asparagus-like poles that sprouted crowns full of spores. It was the age of insects, with 6-foot-long millipedes and dragonflies with yard-long wingspans.
"Imagine these forests alive with chirping and all these creepy crawlers," Falcon-Lang said.
Trees stuck in time
An earthquake preserved all this for posterity. Elrick says it was akin to the 1811-12 earthquakes near New Madrid, Mo., which dropped a block of earth containing the Mississippi River, creating a natural dam that made Reelfoot Lake in Tennessee.
When the ancient earthquake hit, a sudden flooding in the submerged block killed the rainforest. Mud and silt rushed into the depression, preserving the stumps and logs in a layer that eventually became shale.
And that was the state of things until, 300 million years later, miners noticed shiny, funnel-shaped concretions that occasionally fell from the shale layer above them. They called them "kettlebottoms." But they were really fossilized stumps, whose roots fingered the peaty layer that ultimately became the coal seam the miners were working in.
"What's extraordinary about this discovery is that this forest has been preserved in its growth position," said Falcon-Lang. "It's an upright forest with trees still standing upright."
Lead study author Bill DiMichele, a paleobotanist at the Smithsonian Institution, said the lateral extent of the fossils allowed him to notice subtle changes in species diversity as he did surveys. As mining continues, the size of the exposed fossil forest grows by the day.
DiMichele is now doing inventories of ancient plants in two other actively mined Illinois coal seams, the Danville and the Springfield, which sit above and below the Herrin, respectively, and are separated by about a half-million years of geological time. Where most botanists do their work by walking through a forest, DiMichele takes elevators down mine shafts — to get beneath the forest.
"We get to walk under it and look up at it," he said. "It's the earthworm's view."
MSD could face suit over sewage spills
By Ken Leiser
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
04/14/2007
An environmental group intends to sue the Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District for ongoing raw sewage spills into local creeks and rivers.
The Missouri Coalition for the Environment on Friday formally notified the district of its intent to bring a lawsuit under the Clean Water Act unless the agency commits to solving the sewage overflow problem. Heavy rains overwhelm the sewer system, causing the overflows at more than 500 locations.
Kathleen Logan Smith, executive director of the coalition, said MSD has failed to generate a comprehensive plan to prevent spills in the sewer system, one of the country's oldest. As a result, she said, the agency relies on streams to serve as a backup sewer system. "They have delayed for decades," Logan Smith said Friday. "This first came up on their radar in the late '80s."
There are two sources of overflows. One is from the combined sewer system, which carries both sewage and stormwater in the same pipes through older parts of St. Louis. Rainwater gets into the dedicated sewer lines serving the remainder of the MSD area and causes additional overflows.
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The "poorly designed and maintained" sewer system also causes sewage to back up in residential basements, she said. The coalition wants a timetable for system repairs and upgrades. MSD has 60 days under the Clean Water Act to address the issues raised by the coalition or face a lawsuit.
MSD officials say they've spent more than $1 billion to eliminate "hundreds of sewer overflows" and that more work is planned.
About 300 of the dedicated-sewer overflows will be eliminated by keeping water out of the pipes or expanding the system, said Jeff Theerman, the district's executive director. Work on the 200 or so combined-sewer overflows will be based in part on water-quality standards that are not finalized.
Terrible hidden costs of ethanol production
By David Kennell
April 12, 2007
St. Louis Post Dispatch
A recent Post-Dispatch editorial hailed the use of ethanol and biodiesel in seeking energy independence and reductions in greenhouse gases. "That's a no-brainer," it said. Here, then, are some brainers:
The grain required to fill a 25-gallon SUV fuel tank with ethanol could feed one person for one year. The diversion of grains to fuel for the world's 800 million cars will increase the price and decrease the production of food to feed the two billion poorest people of the world who suffer chronic hunger, according to the Earth Policy Institute. This competition for the raw material of the world's food is another serious threat stemming from the growing energy crisis.
Ethanol production, while supplying only 3 percent of the auto fuel in the United States for 2006 consumed 17 percent of that year's domestic corn crop. It will consume more this year. There are 114 U.S. ethanol refineries and 80 more under construction.
All this affects the food supply in a number of ways:
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First, the price of corn recently reached $3.94 per bushel — almost twice the $2 a bushel it had been for years before the ethanol boom. Corn is a major ingredient in foods from tortillas to corn syrup sweetner. As corn prices have risen, sugar prices have doubled.
Second, corn is the main feed for livestock, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture recently reported that demand for corn for ethanol is driving up prices for animal feed; the price of chicken feed, for example, has risen by 40 percent. The price of meats will rise dramatically.
Third, increased acreage used for corn plantings for ethanol will decrease the land available for other agricultural crops and destroy natural ecosystems, such as forests and wetlands. In late March, the U.S.D.A. projected that 90.5 million acres of corn will be planted in 2007 — a 15 percent increase over 2006. That's the most corn acreage since World War II.
This surge could come at the expense of soybean acres, which are projected to drop by 11 percent, and cotton, the production of which could drop by 20 percent. Arkansas farmers, for example, plan to plant 66 percent more acres in corn and decrease cotton acreage from 1.2 million to only 740,000 acres.
This new industry is causing ecological devastation in many parts of the world. Eighty percent of Brazil's greenhouse gas emissions come from the deforestation resulting from land cleared to plant half its sugarcane crop for ethanol. Brazil has destroyed vast areas of the Amazon rainforest to plant "hundreds of miles" of sugarcane for ethanol, and Malaysian and Indonesian rainforests are being destroyed for palm oil plantations; palm oil gives the highest yield of biodiesel of any crop.
Loss of forests can lead to soil erosion and flooding and contributes to global warming by removing carbon "sinks" — forested areas that absorb carbon dioxide and store carbon.
Here in the United States, the Bush administration recently announced plans to shrink the Conservation Reserve Program, which paid farmers roughly $2 billion per year to forego cultivation on 37 million acres. Instead, it will convert protected lands to corn planting.
Since its inception in 1985, the CRP has protected 2 million acres of wetlands and planted trees and grass to reduce 450 million tons of soil erosion per year while increasing duck populations. Conservation groups are up in arms over the destruction of these ecologically sensitive areas.
Archer Daniels Midland, the largest U.S. producer of ethanol, is listed as the tenth worst corporate air polluter on the "Toxic 100" list of the Political Economy Research Institute. ADM's corn processing plant in Clinton, Iowa, generated nearly 20,000 tons of pollutants in 2004; 100 tons per pollutant is defined by the EPA as a major source. And corn production itself is especially demanding of water, fertilizers and pesticides, contributing more to erosion and runoff pollution of water supplies.
The 5 percent or so gain in fuel supplies from ethanol could be met many times over by raising auto fuel efficiency by an easily obtainable 20 percent, by a major investment in public transportation and bicycle paths, by countering our throwaway economy with a massive recycling industry, by rejuvenating our urban centers while limiting suburban sprawl or by major investments in renewable energy sources.
The diversion of food crops to fuel production will have dire consequences, especially for the poorest billions of people who live in chronic hunger and for the ecology of the planet. The only winners will be the multinational agrichemical corporations.
No-brainer, indeed.
David Kennell of University City is professor emeritus of molecular microbiology at the Washington University School of Medicine.
70 pct. Vote to Protect City Parkland
By Jake Wagman
April 4, 2007
St. Louis Post Dispatch
A charter amendment to protect city parkland won at the polls on Tuesday, a late victory for opponents of Barnes-Jewish Hospital's plan to lease part of Forest Park.
Proposition P earned 70 percent of the vote, well beyond the three-fifths majority it needed.
The proposal seeks to preserve green space by requiring voter approval before land in city parks can be "sold, leased, given away or otherwise disposed of."
"This really struck a chord that it's time to take the politics out of our parks," said Carla Scissors-Cohen, a leader of the group Citizens to Protect Forest Park.
The hospital lease deal was sealed early last month, but not before opponents collected more than 20,000 signatures to put Prop. P on the ballot.
Although the hospital lease eventually enjoyed broad support at City Hall, Citizens to Protect Forest Park continued to campaign for the ballot question, in hopes of thwarting similar transactions in the future.
City officials have criticized the measure as too ambiguous, potentially subjecting everything from pavilion rentals to festival permits — which the city argues are technically "leases" — to referendum.
"This proposition was so poorly written and so vague that we wouldn't be surprised if it ended up in court," said Ed Rhode, a spokesman for Mayor Francis Slay.
Even so, if turnout was any indication, the issue failed to energize city voters — less than one in 10 went to the polls on Tuesday, marked by an afternoon of foul weather.
The light turnout also could have been blamed on a lack of other races on the ballot. In the only contested ward race, veteran Republican Fred Heitert cruised to an eighth term by besting Democrat James Pree in the 12th Ward.
Fourteen other candidates for alderman, all Democrats, secured their seats without any opposition. Incoming Board of Aldermen president Lewis Reed, who ousted incumbent Jim Shrewsbury in last month's primary, was unopposed as well on Tuesday.
Doe Run's legacy lingers
February 17, 2007
St. Louis Post Dispatch
HERCULANEUM — Linda Dunn's neighborhood once bustled with playing children.
Today, this quiet stretch of Broadway Street marks the edge of a ghost
town, where the Doe Run Company bought more than 130 houses in the shadow
of its lead smelter.
Many have been torn down. Others sit empty.
That's what Dunn sees across the street when she walks out her front door. "This is the only street where they went down the middle rather than taking
both sides," she said. "I want them to buy us out."
Nearly five years after the widespread contamination of streets, yards and
houses tore a hole in this town of 2,800, state and federal regulators are
still grappling with the issue of lead in the environment.
On Friday, the Missouri Department of Natural Resources proposed new ways
for Doe Run to minimize releases from the plant and meet federal air
standards for lead.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is reviewing its lead
standards, including whether it should drop them altogether.
Herculaneum, about 30 miles south of St. Louis, is one of only two places
in the United States that fail to meet the federal Clean Air Act standard
for lead.
Some Missouri officials worry that federal changes could undermine any
attempt to put tighter controls on the smelter. State law could prevent
Missouri from issuing regulations stricter than those of the federal
government.
Despite clean-air gains in recent decades — most notably the removal of
lead from gasoline — environmental groups and public health professionals
argue that there's still lead in the air and that the standard should be
tougher.
Missouri clean-air regulators warned the EPA last month that revoking the
lead standard would be "ill considered" in light of the latest science. The
Department of Natural Resources said this year that it was worried about
"recontamination" of yard soils near the smelter that had previously been
replaced.
"We all recognize ... that there is recontamination that is occurring, and
we are trying to focus on measures to reduce it," Robert Geller, director
of the state agency's hazardous waste program, said last week.
Gary Hughes, general manager at the Doe Run smelter, said that
recontamination "is still an open and unsettled question" and that the data
were still under review. Emissions have reached their lowest levels in the
smelter's history, he said. Doe Run has replaced soil in 439 yards since
May 2001, and more work will be done this year.
Dunn's yard was replaced about five years ago after lead was discovered at
2,000 parts per million in spots. Retests, she said, have shown lead is
returning. Typically, 400 parts per million triggers soil removal in town.
When Dunn and her husband, Glenn, bought their home nearly seven years ago,
their youngest daughter was 3.
Children under age 6 are considered to be most susceptible to the toxic
effects of lead. In 2002, state health officials reported that nearly half
of the children of that age living within a half-mile of the Doe Run
smelter had elevated levels of lead in their blood. Lead poisoning has been
linked to learning disabilities, behavioral problems, anemia and kidney
disorders.
Blood tests showed none of the Dunns' four children had lead levels
exceeding the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's level of concern
of 10 micrograms per deciliter of blood.
Dunn recalled how a state health worker asked her in a telephone
conversation why she had ever moved so close to the smelter.
"It never crossed my mind that there was something dangerous here, and the
government was letting it happen," she said.
Eve Bieber wants out, too. She and her husband, Greg, live in a
three-bedroom house outside the buyout area on Thurwell Street, about a
half-mile from the smelter. They are concerned about the environment where
they are rearing their youngest son, Dylan, 9, and their grandson, Haiden,
2. Dylan once was tested with an elevated level of lead in his blood, but
it ultimately dropped below 10 micrograms.
"What I would like to see is Doe Run buy our house for what it's worth and
let us get out so our kids are safe," she said.
Greg Bieber said he had "backed off" his work on the community advisory
group meetings several months ago. It was frustrating. But his leaving
freed up time for pursuits many families take for granted, such as watching
Dylan play ball.
Doe Run completed its buyouts more than a year ago. There are no plans to
go beyond the current boundaries, Hughes said.
A positive side
Hughes said Doe Run strove to be a good neighbor. Smelters, such as the one
in Herculaneum, are essential to the quality of life Americans enjoy, he
said. Last year, lead production at the aging primary smelter reached a
five-year high of 169,000 tons, most of it for lead-acid batteries such as
those found in cars.
"People like to jump in the car and turn the key on and away they go, but
they aren't sure what it really takes in order for them to enjoy that
quality of life," he said. "They look at the emissions, the negative side,
and don't understand the positive benefits that are right in front of
them."
A significant share of lead production has shifted to secondary, or
recycling, smelters, Hughes said, but there is still a market for processed
lead from Missouri mines.
Larry O'Leary, who serves on a Community Advisory Group that was formed to
deal with the lead contamination problems, said he was frustrated by the
lack of hard deadlines for making things better. Too often, he said,
measures must be negotiated with Doe Run and reviewed by agencies. And that
takes time.
"I think where we're at right now is really on guard, wanting to make sure
that Doe Run is a good neighbor and takes responsibility," said O'Leary, an
industrial-organizational psychologist whose home overlooks the Mississippi
River.
Records show the Doe Run plant generated just over 28 tons of lead
emissions in 2005, roughly on par with previous years. Traces of lead have
been found in the soil across the river in Illinois.
Air quality near the plant has improved since 2001, according to
monitoring data. But quarterly emissions exceeded the National Ambient Air
Quality Standard of 1.5 micrograms of lead per cubic meter of air at the
nearby Broad Street monitor five times since January 2005.
Without a national lead standard, "the community and the people of
Herculaneum have no tool to get this facility to clean up its mess," Kathleen Logan Smith, executive director of the Missouri Coalition for the
Environment, told the EPA's scientific advisory panel earlier this month in
North Carolina.
Plans for improvements
Missouri's latest plan would change the way lead ore is handled within the
plant, would seek to prevent lead dust from escaping buildings and would
reinforce how trucks are washed before leaving the plant. It also calls
for Doe Run to perform frequent building inspections and undertake "continual improvement" projects, said John Rustige, project manager for
the Department of Natural Resources.
A public hearing on the plan will be held at 7 p.m. March 20 at the high
school in Herculaneum.
Under the plan, the company would continue dispatching a new, brushless
street sweeper over the haul routes.
Trucks hauling concentrated lead ore from the mines of southeastern
Missouri to Herculaneum and elsewhere have tracked lead onto Herculaneum
roads.
Despite a truck wash at the smelter and a regular street sweeping regimen,
the EPA found dangerously high concentrations of lead on some city streets
last summer.
Truck traffic has been funneled to one route, which follows the mostly
residential stretch of Main Street, after a bridge over Joachim Creek fell
into disrepair and was closed.
For all the debate inside and outside of Herculaneum, the buyouts have
removed many young children from harm's way. Elevated blood-lead levels
inside the Herculaneum ZIP code have dropped markedly.
The biggest change is that there are fewer children living near the
smelter, said Denise Jordan-Izaguirre, an official with the federal Agency
for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry.
Next year, Herculaneum will celebrate its bicentennial. The divisive lead
issue will be part of the town's history forever.
The condemned bridge over Joachim Creek has been torn down and a new one is
being built in its place — a move expected to take truck traffic off Main
Street. Work will begin soon on a 500-year levee around the smelter's
charcoal-black slag pile to keep metals out of the creek and the
Mississippi River. And talk has turned to potential future uses within the
buyout zone.
Bill Whitmer, the city administrator, hopes the land surrounding the
smelter can be revitalized with light-industrial businesses. There's talk
of a potential port along the Mississippi. Meantime, new homes are being
built in the western part of town, and Whitmer says the city is poised to
double in size in the next five years.
"Trust me," Whitmer said on a driving tour through the older section of
town, "it is not all doom and gloom by any means."
O'Leary, whose wife serves on the Board of Aldermen, said he too has sought
more of a role in shaping the town's future through a group called
Herculaneum Today and Tomorrow.
"At the same time," O'Leary said, "if that's all you do, you are kidding
yourself. The fact is that there is a toxic quality to this city, and
ignoring that elephant in the middle of the room doesn't do Herculaneum any
good."
Bush Directive Increases Sway on Regulation
January 30, 2007
New York Times
WASHINGTON, Jan. 29 — President Bush has signed a directive that gives the White House much greater control over the rules and policy statements that the government develops to protect public health, safety, the environment, civil rights and privacy.
In an executive order published last week in the Federal Register, Mr. Bush said that each agency must have a regulatory policy office run by a political appointee, to supervise the development of rules and documents providing guidance to regulated industries. The White House will thus have a gatekeeper in each agency to analyze the costs and the benefits of new rules and to make sure the agencies carry out the president's priorities.
This strengthens the hand of the White House in shaping rules that have, in the past, often been generated by civil servants and scientific experts. It suggests that the administration still has ways to exert its power after the takeover of Congress by the Democrats.
The White House said the executive order was not meant to rein in any one agency. But business executives and consumer advocates said the administration was particularly concerned about rules and guidance issued by the Environmental Protection Agency and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.
In an interview on Monday, Jeffrey A. Rosen, general counsel at the White House Office of Management and Budget, said, "This is a classic good-government measure that will make federal agencies more open and accountable."
Business groups welcomed the executive order, saying it had the potential to reduce what they saw as the burden of federal regulations. This burden is of great concern to many groups, including small businesses, that have given strong political and financial backing to Mr. Bush.
Consumer, labor and environmental groups denounced the executive order, saying it gave too much control to the White House and would hinder agencies' efforts to protect the public.
Typically, agencies issue regulations under authority granted to them in laws enacted by Congress. In many cases, the statute does not say precisely what agencies should do, giving them considerable latitude in interpreting the law and developing regulations.
The directive issued by Mr. Bush says that, in deciding whether to issue regulations, federal agencies must identify "the specific market failure" or problem that justifies government intervention.
Besides placing political appointees in charge of rule making, Mr. Bush said agencies must give the White House an opportunity to review "any significant guidance documents" before they are issued.
The Office of Management and Budget already has an elaborate process for the review of proposed rules. But in recent years, many agencies have circumvented this process by issuing guidance documents, which explain how they will enforce federal laws and contractual requirements.
Peter L. Strauss, a professor at Columbia Law School, said the executive order "achieves a major increase in White House control over domestic government."
"Having lost control of Congress," Mr. Strauss said, "the president is doing what he can to increase his control of the executive branch."
Representative Henry A. Waxman, Democrat of California and chairman of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, said: "The executive order allows the political staff at the White House to dictate decisions on health and safety issues, even if the government's own impartial experts disagree. This is a terrible way to govern, but great news for special interests."
Business groups hailed the initiative.
"This is the most serious attempt by any chief executive to get control over the regulatory process, which spews out thousands of regulations a year," said William L. Kovacs, a vice president of the United States Chamber of Commerce. "Because of the executive order, regulations will be less onerous and more reasonable. Federal officials will have to pay more attention to the costs imposed on business, state and local governments, and society."
Under the executive order, each federal agency must estimate "the combined aggregate costs and benefits of all its regulations" each year. Until now, agencies often tallied the costs and the benefits of major rules one by one, without measuring the cumulative effects.
Gary D. Bass, executive director of O.M.B. Watch, a liberal-leaning consumer group that monitors the Office of Management and Budget, criticized Mr. Bush's order, saying, "It will result in more delay and more White House control over the day-to-day work of federal agencies."
"By requiring agencies to show a ‘market failure,' " Dr. Bass said, "President Bush has created another hurdle for agencies to clear before they can issue rules protecting public health and safety."
Wesley P. Warren, program director at the Natural Resources Defense Council, who worked at the White House for seven years under President Bill Clinton, said, "The executive order is a backdoor attempt to prevent E.P.A. from being able to enforce environmental safeguards that keep cancer-causing chemicals and other pollutants out of the air and water."
Business groups have complained about the proliferation of guidance documents. David W. Beier, a senior vice president of Amgen, the biotechnology company, said Medicare officials had issued such documents "with little or no public input."
Hugh M. O'Neill, a vice president of the pharmaceutical company Sanofi-Aventis, said guidance documents sometimes undermined or negated the effects of formal regulations.
In theory, guidance documents do not have the force of law. But the White House said the documents needed closer scrutiny because they "can have coercive effects" and "can impose significant costs" on the public. Many guidance documents are made available to regulated industries but not to the public.
Paul R. Noe, who worked on regulatory policy at the White House from 2001 to 2006, said such aberrations would soon end. "In the past, guidance documents were often issued in the dark," Mr. Noe said. "The executive order will ensure they are issued in the sunshine, with more opportunity for public comment."
Under the new White House policy, any guidance document expected to have an economic effect of $100 million a year or more must be posted on the Internet, and agencies must invite public comment, except in emergencies in which the White House grants an exemption.
The White House told agencies that in writing guidance documents, they could not impose new legal obligations on anyone and could not use "mandatory language such as ‘shall,' ‘must,' ‘required' or ‘requirement.'
" The executive order was issued as White House aides were preparing for a battle over the nomination of Susan E. Dudley to be administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs at the Office of Management and Budget.
President Bush first nominated Ms. Dudley last August. The nomination died in the Senate, under a barrage of criticism from environmental and consumer groups, which said she had been hostile to government regulation. Mr. Bush nominated her again on Jan. 9.
With Democrats in control, the Senate appears unlikely to confirm Ms. Dudley. But under the Constitution, the president could appoint her while the Senate is in recess, allowing her to serve through next year.
Some of Ms. Dudley's views are reflected in the executive order. In a primer on regulation written in 2005, while she was at the Mercatus Center of George Mason University in Northern Virginia, Ms. Dudley said that government regulation was generally not warranted "in the absence of a significant market failure."
She did not return calls seeking comment on Monday.
Input sought decades later on Big River lead issue
January 7, 2007
Joplin Independent
The Big River rises in Iron County, MO, and flows from southwest to northeast, just an hour's drive from St. Louis. The river begins near Elephant Rocks State Park in the Mark Twain National Forest and flows 138 miles down to St. Francois State Park, then through Washington State Park and on down to the confluence of the Meramec River.
A major spill of lead mining tailings contaminated the Big River in the 1970s. A health study released in 1997 clearly and scientifically demonstrated a direct correlation between these waste piles and blood lead levels in area children and qualified the area to be part of a Superfund cleanup.
"Missouri's Big River is a favorite among folks on the east side of the state. I've heard dozens of stories of huge fish that anglers once caught there - always followed by a heavy sigh and the sad sentiment that those days were lost after the river was contaminated with lead, said Kathleen Logan Smith, executive director of the Missouri Coalition for the Environment.
Now the Missouri Department of Natural Resources is scheduling the first in a series of meetings designed to form a volunteer community action group for the Big River watershed. According to Logan-Smith, the purpose of the group would be to engage the public in helping to remediate damage to the Big River Basin from mining waste in particular, as well as any other environmental issues the group chooses to address.
The first meeting, in which the DNR will discuss the draft of the river's Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) document, will take place beginning at 6 p.m., January 11, 2007, at Central High School Auditorium, 116 Rebel Dr., Park Hills. This TMDL document is currently part of a 30-day public notice period which began on December 20, 2006.
Weak Knees at the EPA
Editorial
December 18, 2006
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Lead, once widely used in plumbing, paint and gasoline, has been known for
decades to pose a serious human health risk, especially for young children. High
levels of lead in children's blood can cause permanent brain damage resulting in
development delays and learning and behavior problems. For that reason, lead is
one of six air pollutants subject to tougher health standards than other
pollutants under the Clean Air Act.
Nationally, the amount of lead in the air has fallen substantially since the 1980s, primarily because of the phase-out of leaded gasoline. But airborne lead is still a problem in some parts of the country — Missouri chief among them.
That's why it is especially alarming — although not surprising, given the anti-science, pro-industry bent of the Bush administration — that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is considering eliminating the national air pollution standard for lead. Doing so would put Missourians' health at risk. It also could make it impossible for the state to enforce its own air pollution standards, which by law can't be tougher than federal standards.
Once the largest lead-producing state in the union — and currently the site of the only active primary lead smelter in the United States — the legacy of lead pollution lingers in Missouri. According to the EPA, three of the seven largest point sources of lead emissions are in Missouri. One is a mining operation in Reynolds County. Another is a smelter in Iron County.
The third, the Doe Run lead smelter in Herculaneum, sits about 30 miles south of St. Louis. Long the focus of regulatory battles with the state, lead has contaminated the air, soil, roads and homes near the smelter. Last year it emitted 25 tons of lead, according to EPA. Herculaneum is one of two parts of the country that regularly fails to meet the federal air pollution standard for lead.
What made the EPA consider dropping its lead standard? The idea was proposed in a letter sent to the agency last summer by a trade group representing battery manufacturers and smelters. The group suggested the EPA might be able to make more efficient use of its resources by applying them to something other than enforcing the lead air pollution standard, given the progress made in recent years.
That brings to mind a teenager telling her parents they could make more efficient use of their time if they'd just stop bugging her to clean up her room and do her homework. We've got to admire their chutzpah.
As it is, the EPA's lead standards are out of date. They are supposed to be reviewed every five years but have not been revisited since 1990. That prompted the Missouri Coalition for the Environment and Missouri Attorney General Jay Nixon to sue to compel the government to set a tougher, updated standard.
Dropping the lead standard for air pollution would be a big mistake for Missourians. At this point, the EPA says it is only an idea that will be subject to a scientific review and public input.
But there's good reason to worry about the integrity of that process.
Two weeks ago, the EPA revealed that it has changed the way it has reviewed and set air pollution standards for the past 25 years. In the past, staff scientists and outside independent scientists reviewed the standards before sending them along to senior agency staffers, mostly political appointees, then to the White House and the Office of Management and Budget. Now, independent scientists will be asked to comment only at the end of the process.
This is another example of the Bush administration's unabashed efforts to diminish, marginalize, subvert or suppress science that runs counter to its political agenda or the interests of industry. We've seen it in administration's weakening of mercury and soot standards, in refusing to curb carbon dioxide emissions and in disregarding staff scientists' views on Plan B birth control.
Weaker air pollution standards may suit American industry just fine. But in exchange for dirtier air and greater risks to public health, they're a bad bargain.
Low Water Mark
Editorial
November 5, 2006
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
The Clean Water Act is a wickedly complex piece of legislation that spills over
200 pages in federal law books. At its heart, though, it's pretty simple.
Federal and state governments are supposed to protect rivers, lakes and streams
from pollution. They're supposed to clean up waterways that already are
polluted. And they're supposed to file periodic reports spelling out what
they're doing and why.
Missouri's environmental regulators — the Department of Natural Resources and
the Clean Water Commission — haven't been exactly scrupulous in fulfilling
those obligations. But even for weak achievers, a federal ruling released this
week represents a new low.
In 2003, the Missouri Coalition for the Environment sued the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency. It argued that because the DNR had failed to set water
quality standards for thousands of state waterways, the federal government was
required to set them on its own. The suit was settled in December 2004 with an
agreement that the state would set those standards for about 4,000 rivers,
streams and lakes, subject to review by the federal government.
Last year, the Clean Water Commission set those standards: Most Missouri
streams and rivers were to be kept clean enough to swim in or canoe on. But 142
streams and rivers were exempted because they were either too polluted, too
shallow or too uninviting for recreation. Among them were a 195.5 mile stretch
of the Mississippi River; the Missouri River; parts of the River Des Peres and
Maline Creek.
This week, federal regulators told the DNR to go back to the drawing board on
99 of the 142 rivers it exempted. That's a high rate of rejection, and it could
carry significant economic costs. About 100 small towns, sewer districts and
businesses could be forced to reduce their discharges into Missouri streams and
rivers, and that could cost millions of dollars.
For the record, let us state here that it would take a hotter, more humid day
than ever has baked St. Louis for us to contemplate a cooling dip in the River
Des Peres (although we know people who have done it). The EPA did agree to
exempt the Missouri River from the highest water quality standards; it hasn't
yet ruled on the Mississippi.
But even a fast perusal of EPA's response to the new standards indicates how
inadequately the DNR and Clean Water Commission did their jobs. They used data
collected during a drought to argue some streams were too shallow for
recreation. They made other determinations without adequate data. And in some
cases, the data submitted showed they visited the wrong stream to collect
information. That's just sloppy.
The Clean Water Commission, whose members are gubernatorial appointees, will
have to review the federal denial and decide what to do next. Its members
should think long and hard before trying to make another half-baked end run
around the Clean Water Act.
It's tough to tell taxpayers and customers they have to dig deeper to reduce
water pollution. But it's even tougher to tell our children and grandchildren
that we wrote off the health of our most important rivers, lakes and streams
because we decided they weren't worth the trouble.
EPA: Make more rivers clean for swimming, boating, fishing
By Ken Leiser
November 2, 2006
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said Wednesday that Missouri
regulators failed to justify their decision to exempt 99 rivers and streams
from Clean Water Act protections for recreational use.
Benjamin H. Grumbles, assistant EPA administrator for water, told Missouri
Department of Natural Resources Director Doyle Childers in a letter that those
waterways — including reaches of the River Des Peres and Maline Creek, locally
— should be protected for recreation.
The streams in question represent a fraction of Missouri's 4,000 rivers and
lakes that have been classified for such sports as swimming, boating and
fishing, said John DeLashmit, chief of the water quality management branch at
the EPA's regional office in Kansas City, Kan.
Last fall, Missouri's Clean Water Commission designated 3,600 stream segments
and 400 lakes for recreational use but also approved exemptions for 142
streams. The designations took effect earlier this year.
The EPA upheld 42 of those designations and will spend the next year further
studying why a separate exemption was granted for a 195.5-mile stretch of the
Mississippi River.
"What happens after this is the state will have some time to address the
issue," DeLashmit said Wednesday. Missouri officials "may be able to provide us
with more information to change our minds."
The remaining 99 streams should have to meet water quality standards for
recreation, the EPA found. The agency found that data supporting the exemptions
were gathered in drought conditions, were insufficient or were inconclusive.
For instance, the EPA found stream depths in 73 of those segments were deep
enough for full-body contact.
In a few instances, the EPA found, state field workers analyzed the wrong
stream segments.
"We are disappointed by EPA's decision," said Ed Galbraith, director of the
water protection program at the Missouri Department of Natural Resources. He
said he thinks the state's Clean Water Commission "followed a sound scientific
process, that they considered public comment, (and) that they did their best to
apply the whole-body contact rule where it is truly attainable."
Galbraith said the state hasn't reviewed the EPA request in depth, but based on
what his agency has seen so far, "we feel the commission's original
determination was the correct one."
The Missouri Coalition for the Environment, which successfully sued the EPA to
force tougher scrutiny of the state's clean water efforts, applauded the
federal government's findings.
"I think it is a wake-up call that (Missouri regulators) need to be more
careful in how they apply their own protocol and the kinds of information they
take into account," said Dan Sherburne, the coalition's research director.
The EPA questioned exemptions granted to a short segment of Maline Creek near
the Mississippi River and a stretch of River Des Peres near Interstate 55. Both
are subject to sewage overflows.
Brian Hoelscher, director of engineering at the Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer
District, said reclassifying the streams for recreation could force the agency
to make upgrades sooner than planned.
Bush lets factory farms gut the Clean Water Act
Letter to the Editor
by Kim Knowles, Missouri Coalition for the Environment
Sunday, October 15, 2006
Columbia Daily Tribune
Editor, the Tribune: On its 25th anniversary, former Vice President Al Gore praised the Clean Water Act as one of America’s most important environmental laws. The vice president recognized clean water as a "precious natural resource" that forms the very "fabric of life itself."
Among its many victories, the CWA has kept billions of pounds of pollutants out of our nation’s waters and has slowed the reckless loss of our wetlands. Now the act is 34, and, to our dismay, we lack a vice president to sing its praises. Instead, our current leadership appears intent on taking back important clean water victories.
Under President George W. Bush’s leadership, the EPA has proposed rules that allow factory farms - the source of huge quantities of fecal waste in northern and southwestern Missouri - to police themselves. Under current CWA rules, the largest of these farms need a federal permit because there is a very real danger that animal waste will contaminate our rivers. The EPA now wants factory farms to decide for themselves whether they need a permit at all.
The proposal is particularly frightening given the latest deadly outbreak of E. coli in spinach and the well-known fact that livestock are a common carrier of these deadly bacteria. This "free ride" for factory farms is just one of the administration’s many assaults on the CWA.
In its 34th year, let’s not let the Bush administration weaken the CWA. Let us recognize the importance of maintaining and even strengthening the act, and together, let us sing its praises.
Kim Knowles
Missouri Coalition for the Environment
6267 Delmar Blvd., 2E
University City
Our Parks are Not for Sale
By Rebecca Wright
Sunday, October 15, 2006
South City Journal
During the last century, Forest Park experienced an extended period of decline. Parts of the park fell prey to development. Highway 40 plowed through the south side of Forest Park, cutting off the green space that lies between the highway and Oakland Avenue. Kingshighway formerly turned east along what is now Barnes Plaza. The hospital's administrators requested that it be straightened. The result: Kingshighway cut through the park and severed the 9-acre section (that was once a rose garden) from the rest of the park. Barnes later leased that section from the city for an underground parking garage, promising it would always maintain it as a park. Later, Kingshighway was widened, shaving off the east edge of Forest Park.
Many other projects were proposed that would have whittled away at the park: seven and one-half acres for a private parking lot for the old Arena, 13 additional acres for the Zoo for a "living farm" and more parking, 22 more acres for the Art Museum -- mostly for parking. The Science Museum wanted to build in the park next to the planetarium, but fortunately, found a home in the old Falstaff Building across the highway, south of the park. Children's Hospital wanted to build over Kingshighway and anchor on the north side of the park. At one point, a plan to have MetroLink bisect the park was considered.
Public outcry, legal challenges and legislation opposing these projects convinced city officials that people did not want further paving and building within the park.
As a result of the assaults on park land, there were several attempts to develop a master plan for Forest Park. In 1993, the planning process began, with the ideal of gathering a broad range of public input. But the public was soon replaced by a select, pro-development executive committee.
The public had asked that the institutions restrict expansion to locations outside the park. The resulting Master Plan promised significant improvements, but the various institutions were free to expand within the park.
Since then, the History Museum has doubled in size and added more parking lots. The Art Museum plans to expand and to build an underground parking garage on 4.7 additional acres which it leased from the city in 1998. Other institutions may also choose to expand again in the future. The one thing the Master Plan supposedly assured was "No Net Loss of Green Space!"
Now, suddenly, with no public input, the section of Forest Park south of BJC doesn't figure into that promise. For several years after the parking garage was built the area looked bleak, and people forgot that it was once a real part of Forest Park.
The area includes a playground, and tennis and racquet ball courts. Finally, it has many mature trees shading the walkways and benches, and it is used by the public. The playground draws families from the Central West End and Forest Park Southeast. Hospital patients and their families, hospital workers, and faculty and staff of the Washington University School of Medicine stroll or sit in the shade.
We should have known - promises are not laws. The land that our forbearers had the foresight to reserve as green space, so that city dwellers might enjoy natural areas within the built environment, will be parsed out to the highest bidders.
As the countryside recedes at the far reaches of urban sprawl, land that was retained for parks in the city can also be sold for development because it is not protected by any law.
Saint Louis City residents support public parks. Twice in the last ten years they have voted for tax increases (1993 half-cent sales tax, and 2000 Metro Parks Sales tax) earmarked for capital improvements for city parks. However, "earmarked" doesn't mean the money actually gets spent for parks. It's designated "general revenue" and can be spent as general revenue. What's more, should the BJC deal go through, the $1.6 million a year being offered for the land above its parking garage would go into general revenue and may or may not be spent on Forest Park.
BJC knows it needs to replace many of the buildings within its complex. Let it reconfigure within the footprint of its existing space. It could begin by replacing its shorter buildings with taller ones and proceed from there, growing up rather than spilling into the park.
We do not need high maintenance parks that exceed our means. We do not need to sell park land to fund city parks. If necessary, let our parks be simple - places for picnics and concerts, and places for children to play. Let them be safe. Most of all, keep them green. Hopefully, they will be there, undiminished, to welcome children and adults in generations to come. Our park is not for sale.
Rebecca Wright is an archival librarian and a resident of the Lafayette Square neighborhood. She serves on the steering committee of Citizens to Protect Forest Park and the board of the Missouri Coalition for the Environment.
'Safe' Levels Of Lead May Not Be That Safe After All
By Melissa Healy,
Los Angelos Times Staff Writer
October 2nd, 2006
Efforts to reduce lead exposure in the United States have been a good news-bad news affair -- and the bad-news side of the ledger just got a bit longer.
Although the removal of most lead from gasoline and paint in the United States has driven exposure levels down -- way down from levels seen 30 years ago -- new research sharply lowers the level of lead exposure that should be considered safe. And it expands the population of people who need to worry about the toxic chemical.
Concern about lead exposure has long focused on children, who can suffer mental impairment and later fertility problems at elevated levels. More recently, children with blood levels of lead long considered safe have been found more likely to suffer from attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
Among adults, elevated levels of lead exposure have been found in recent years to raise the risk of high blood pressure and kidney disease. But now comes news that levels long considered safe for adults are linked to higher rates of death from stroke and heart attack. The latest study was published in the Sept. 26 issue of the American Heart Assn.'s journal, Circulation.
Researchers used a comprehensive national health survey of American adults to track 13,946 subjects for 12 years and looked at the relationship of blood lead levels and cause of death. They found that compared with adults with very low levels of lead in their blood, those with blood lead levels of 3.6 to 10 micrograms of lead per deciliter of blood were two and half times more likely to die of a heart attack, 89% more likely to die of stroke and 55% more likely to die of cardiovascular disease. The higher the blood lead levels, the greater the risk of death by stroke or heart attack.
The dangers of lead held steady across all socioeconomic classes and ethnic and racial groups, and between men and women.
Study authors acknowledged that they were unsure how lead in the blood impaired cardiovascular functioning. But they surmised that it might be linked to an earlier finding: that lead exposure stresses the kidneys' ability to filter blood. Lead may also alter the delicate hormonal chemistry that keeps veins and arteries in good tone, the authors wrote.
Federal standards, however, don't reflect the new research. Although almost 4 in 10 Americans between 1999 and 2002 had blood lead levels in the newly identified danger range, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, the federal agency that regulates toxic exposures in workplaces, considers up to 40 micrograms of lead per deciliter of blood to be safe for adults. And recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention allow for up to 10 micrograms per deciliter for women of childbearing age.
Paul Muntner, an epidemiologist at Tulane University and one of the study's authors, says the findings suggest strongly that the federal government should revisit the limits of lead exposure it considers safe for adults. In total, about 120 occupations -- including roofing, shipbuilding, auto manufacturing and printing -- can bring workers in contact with high levels of lead.
For individuals, Muntner adds, the study underscores that every small bit of prevention is worth the trouble. Worried consumers can purchase lead-detection kits from hardware stores.
melissa.healy@latimes.com
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