=======================Electronic Edition========================
RACHEL’S HAZARDOUS WASTE NEWS #341
— June 10, 1993 —
News and resources for environmental justice.
——
Environmental Research Foundation
P.O. Box 5036, Annapolis, MD 21403
Fax (410) 263-8944; Internet: erf@igc.apc.org
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INCINERATION: NEW EVIDENCE OF DANGER
EPA’s reform of incineration rules, announced on the front page
of the NEW YORK TIMES May 18, may have even less substance than
we first reported (RHWN #338). EPA’s May 18th announcement
contained several features, but for incinerator fighters the two
main ones are:
First, a moratorium on new hazardous waste incinerators;
Second, a promise of new scrutiny for existing machines that
began the permitting process as early as 1984 but have never
received a full operating permit.
Clarification of the Announced Moratorium
We reported May 20 that EPA’s “moratorium” on new hazardous waste
incinerators does not affect new incinerators that may be
proposed in 46 states. These 46 have been authorized by EPA to
operate the RCRA [Resource Recovery and Conservation Act]
programs which issue licenses (called permits) to incinerators
and other waste disposal facilities. RCRA-authorized states are
free to continue issuing licenses to new hazardous waste
incinerators, if they choose to.
It is true that EPA does retain ultimate authority over every
RCRA facility, including all incinerators. The RCRA regulations
say very clearly that the EPA administrator can deny, amend, or
cancel any RCRA permit at any time to protect public health and
safety.[1]
However, based on recent history, it seems unlikely that EPA
chief Carol Browner would exercise this authority to prevent the
operation of a new hazardous waste incinerator after a state has
allowed such a machine to be built. Ms. Browner was specifically
asked to exercise such authority in at least one case (the WTI
incinerator in East Liverpool, Ohio), and she has refused.
In the case of WTI, there were several compelling reasons that
EPA could have used to deny WTI a permit for commercial
operation. The East Liverpool incinerator failed two parts of
its test burn–it failed to destroy carbon tetrachloride (a known
human carcinogen) with the required 99.99 percent efficiency, and
it emitted more than three times as much mercury as is allowable
into the local community during the test burn. Despite these
documented failures, EPA has allowed WTI to begin commercial
operation.
Dioxin emissions from WTI provide another reasonable basis upon
which WTI’s permit could be denied or revoked. The dioxin danger
from WTI was scrutinized in a federal court in Ohio during
February, 1993. Federal judge Ann Aldrich concluded, in her
written opinion March 5, 1993, that “…[T]his Court finds it
clear that the operation of the WTI facility during the post
trial burn period clearly may cause imminent and substantial
endangerment to health and the environment. It is patently unsafe
to subject the population exposed to the facility’s emissions to
the risks involved in incineration while the US EPA determines
what the risk is and what risk is acceptable.”
Despite Judge Aldrich’s conclusion that commercial operation of
WTI is “patently unsafe,” EPA refuses to restrict WTI’s
operations. Why? Vice-President Al Gore explained to a town
meeting in Omaha, Nebraska March 10th that there were two
reasons: because the Bush administration had tied the Clinton
administration’s hands by issuing WTI’s first permit, and because
WTI had “invested tens of millions of dollars.”[2] The part about
the Clinton administration’s hands being tied was simply not
true, as a matter of law. The part about WTI having gained the
right to operate a dangerous machine because they had invested a
lot of money building it was surprising not for its logic but for
its candor.
Since EPA’s May 18th “moratorium” on incinerators will allow
states to issue permits to build new incinerators, heavy
investments in new incinerators will likely force EPA to rubber
stamp commercial operating licenses, just as happened at WTI.
Stricter Control of BIFs–But When?
EPA’s May 18th announcement covered 184 hazardous waste
incinerators.
Even more importantly, the announcement also affected 171
so-called BIFs (boilers and industrial furnaces), including 34
cement kilns that burn hazardous waste as fuel for making cement.
Together, these incinerators and BIFs burn 5 million tons of
hazardous waste each year.
The main question is whether BIFs (boilers and industrial
furnaces, including cement kilns) will be brought under stricter
controls soon. Of the 171 BIFs operating today, none has a final
RCRA permit; all are operating under “interim status.”
In announcing the imposition of new, stricter controls on
existing BIFs, EPA chief Carol Browner said the new BIF standards
were needed to “immediately strengthen the environmental
safeguards” of these facilities.
However, the DAILY ENVIRONMENT REPORT [DER], a Washington
insider’s newsletter, on May 20 published interviews with EPA
officials putting the agency’s new incineration policy into
perspective:[3]
** State officials, and EPA regional offices, have been given up
to 3 years to develop a process that would bring BIFs under new,
stricter controls. Agency officials told DER that new, stricter
incinerator rules will be proposed in 18 months to 2 years.
After regulations are proposed, they will be subject to comment
and public hearing, further study and revision by EPA, and
eventually final issuance.
** States and EPA regional offices will have 12 months before
they must begin to review interim permits for 34 cement kilns
that now burn hazardous waste on a commercial basis.
** Fred Chanania, an EPA official in Washington, told DER that
EPA would “not by any stretch of the imagination” be ready to
issue final BIF permits in the next 18 months.
In sum, President Clinton’s first term may well have ended before
today’s BIFs are brought under stricter control.
And stricter control is clearly needed now.
An official EPA summary of a meeting held December 7, 1992,
between four EPA officials and 19 BIF operators says, “We are
finding violations of basic, long-standing, fundamental
requirements of the RCRA program. Many of the requirements we
are discussing have been in place for 12 years….”[4]
The summary goes on to describe the following kinds of violations
by BIFs:
Sixty-two percent of BIFs have violated feed-rate regulations
(measuring, controlling and documenting the rate at which
hazardous wastes are fed into BIFs).
Fifty-six percent of BIFs have violated the requirements for
analyzing wastes (to find out what is in them before they are fed
into the furnace).
The summary provides evidence of many other violations of law and
regulations by BIFs. The BIF record of compliance, as revealed
in this document, is nothing short of scandalous.
Furthermore, there is growing evidence that operation of
incinerators and BIFs is taking a toll on human health. Last
month in Atlanta, Georgia, at the International Congress on the
Health Effects of Hazardous Waste, five separate studies linked
various illnesses to exposure to hazardous waste incinerators:[5]
No. 1: Charles E. Feigley at University of South Carolina in
Columbia interviewed a randon sample of 894 residents, 508 of
whom lived downwind of a commercial hazardous waste incinerator,
and 386 of whom lived upwind. Downwind residents reported a 50
to 100 percent greater prevalence of coughing, phlegm, wheezing,
sore throat and eye irritation, compared to upwinders. Even
after adjusting for age, and exposures to tobacco smoke, mold,
and pets, downwinders were 20 to 90 percent more likely than
upwinders to have been diagnosed with emphysema, pneumonia, sinus
trouble, asthma, or allergies.
No. 2: Using Feigley’s questionnaire, Dietrich Rothenbacher at
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill polled some 400
households in two communities near a hazardous waste
incinerator–one upwind, the other downwind. Downwinders
reported more diagnoses of emphysema, sinus trouble, and
sleep-rousing or morning coughs. No. 3: Michael Straight and his
co-workers at the federal Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease
Registry (ATSDR) in Atlanta compared 713 people living within 1.5
miles of a hazardous waste incinerator to 588 people about 8
miles from the plant. The closer community reported almost nine
times more coughing and wheezing, 2.4 times as much neurologic
disease (such as seizures and tremors), and 40 percent more
neurologic symptoms (including tingling, blackouts, and
incoordination).
No. 4: Melody M. Kawamoto of the National Institute for
Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) in Cincinnati followed up
documented reports of headaches, hot flashes, irritability,
memory problems, tremors, and erratic blood pressure changes in
workers from a then-closed hazardous waste incinerator. All 14
symptomatic former employees suffered headaches, dizziness, and
memory problems.
No. 5: A team of researchers led by Woodall Stopford of Duke
University Medical Center in Durham, N.C., examined 29 men, ages
23 to 50, who complained of chronic nausea, headache, dizziness,
and feelings of intoxication. All the men had worked at
hazardous-waste incinerators. Eight of the 15 men with joint pain
had arthritis of unknown cause; more than half the men had
middle-ear disease causing vertigo [a sensation as if the
external world were revolving about the individual] or gait
problems; roughly half had memory problems; and 22 exhibited
sweating or wide fluctuations in pulse and blood pressure. Sleep
disorders, severe depression, and recurring suicidal thoughts
plagued 27 of the 29 men. “And all [27] had difficulty
controlling impulses–rage reactions–either verbally or
physically,” Stopford said. Sixteen of the men said they had
“homicidal thoughts.”
–Peter Montague, Ph.D.
[2] Gore quoted in a transcript of a March 10th meeting, attached
to Moorer’s letter, cited above.
Descriptor terms: incineration; hazardous waste incinerators;
epa; us environmentap protection agency; carol browner; interim
status; rcra; bifs; bif rule; waste technologies, inc.; wti; east
liverpool, oh; carbon tetrachloride; mercury; dioxin; ann
aldrich; al gore; cement kilns; international conference on the
health effects of hazardous waste; morbidity data; mortality
data; statistics; studies;