Thursday, December 4, 2003

A Little Mercury With
Your Salmon?
Bush EPA Dumps Strict Regulation Of Mercury Emissions

One would think, in a time of greater human awareness of our impact on the environment, that the bucking of new environmental regulations would be considered, if not un-American, then at least passé. So "20th Century."

But then again, coal made its debut in the late 19th century. So I suppose it befits Big Coal's old-school nature to be twisting our President's arm to dispense with stringent regulations on emissions of mercury, imposed on coal-fired power plants by the Clinton Administration.

Mercury is a nasty element that combines with other compounds in our waters to form methyl mercury - which often ends up in fish, and then in us, when we eat the fish. It can cause a variety of health problems and is especially dangerous, even in small quantities, to unborn babies.

According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, however, everyone should be curtailing their fish consumption. EPA's website warns "You can safely eat 12 ounces per week of cooked fish. A typical serving size of fish is from 3 to 6 ounces." In a restaurant, a typical serving is at least 6 ounces, and often a decent salmon steak is at least 12 ounces. So, you might only want to eat fish once per week.

Imagine the rippling of outrage that would emanate from our beef producers if the EPA announced a similar warning about beef consumption. Sadly, the fishing industry hasn't started lobbying on behalf of its products.

Despite this threat to public health, the Bush Administration is happily accommodating the power plants and coal producers, which account for the largest portion of mercury emissions: estimated at 49 tons per year, in addition to 40 tons caught in pollution filters for sulfur dioxide, according to a report by the Environmental Working Group.

The power plants argue that the new regulations would force them to switch to burning natural gas.

Switching to natural gas would be a good thing - for you and me, and the health of our ecosystem. Perhaps not for Big Coal, and initially not for the power plants and their executives - but it would certainly be a victory for our public health.

There's something disturbing about the fact that we have to watch how much fish we eat, to avoid mercury poisoning. It's downright irresponsible that, given our understanding of the situation, our government is prepared to turn its back on the problem, and let the power plants have their way. Just as smoking cigarettes, once in vogue, has become a reprehensible, unhealthy, if not disgusting habit banned in many public places - unnecessary, unhealthy polluting by industry deserves the same reputational fate.

The tobacco companies paid their dues - in the courts. While the power plants will not face such a threat, they still shouldn't get off easy. The Bush Administration should insist that they meet the more stringent standards by 2007 as planned, not by 2010, when the Bush's quasi-regulations would begin. The revised Bush regulations would incorporate an emissions trading scheme, where some companies could pay to pollute more. But why not simply have these companies pay to pollute less, by installing the necessary technology?.

Since the Clinton Administration's regulations didn't kick in until 2007, the utilities will have had a full seven years to comply. Instead of doing so, they poured money into Republican campaign coffers and then came whining, bribing, and complaining to the White House. And our elected officials - they reward this behavior. All to the detriment of our public health.

The response from President Bush and others should have been: Is 2007 to early for you? Well, maybe you'd prefer 2005 then?

Too bad our President doesn't hold the public health to a higher political standard. Anyway - he's from Texas. He'd probably just say to all of us, "So eat steak!"

Mercury has been with us for a long time and now it is posing a problem. Like PCBs, which the U.S. Government banned in 1977, mercury accumulates in our ecosystem over long periods of time. Nearly 30 years since being banned, many of our waters still contain high levels of PCBs, another major reason to limit your fish consumption, especially of fish you catch yourself (See what the EPA recommends for fish from Ohio's various rivers and lakes). If we want our children's children to enjoy mercury-free fish, we need to get serious about reigning in mercury emissions.

It's unfortunate that fish are so contaminated with mercury - it may well be the healthiest meat available: most fish are low in saturated fat and many species contain high levels of omega-3 fatty acids which protect against heart disease and have shown to play a role in alleviating depression. The varied, natural diet of wild fish makes it a very healthy mealtime option - or would, were it not for the pollutants we've added to the dish.