=======================Electronic Edition========================
RACHEL’S HAZARDOUS WASTE NEWS #284
—May 6, 1992—
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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A BREAKTHROUGH IN CONTROL OF TOXICS
An important breakthrough in control of toxics occurred during
April. The International Joint Commission (IJC), a government
body with responsibility for environmental quality of the Great
Lakes, made far-reaching official recommendations which, for the
first time, embody a truly modern approach to the identification
and control of toxic chemicals. It appears to be a real first
step toward a sustainable world. In a nutshell, the IJC now
recommends[1] that the U.S. and Canada:
a) Ban incineration in certain areas near the Great Lakes;
b) Phase out the use of chlorine in manufacturing;
c) Adopt a “weight of the evidence” approach, not waiting for
scientific certainty to be established but taking action to
protect against toxics as soon as the “weight of the evidence”
indicates the need for action.
d) Define many chemicals as “persistent toxic substances” and
then ELIMINATE them because recent history tells us persistent
toxics cannot be safely managed.
Although the first two recommendations–ban incineration and
phase out chlorine–are the most startling, it is really the last
two recommendations that constitute a radical departure from the
past.
In recommending a “weight of the evidence” approach and in
recommending the elimination of all persistent toxic substances,
the IJC has turned its back on risk assessment and numerical
standards. Today risk assessment and numerical standards form the
backbone of the U.S. regulatory system for controlling toxic
substances. The IJC says the traditional regulatory system has
failed and must be abandoned.
In their joint 1978 Water Quality Agreement, the U.S. and Canada
defined a “toxic substance” as “a substance which can cause
death, disease, behavioral abnormalities, cancer, genetic
mutations, physiological or reproductive malfunctions or physical
deformities in any organism or its offspring, or which can become
poisonous after concentration in the food chain or in combination
with other substances.”
The IJC now recommends defining a class of chemicals called
“persistent toxic substances,” which should then be ELIMINATED
because they cannot be managed safely.
The IJC recommends that a persistent toxic substance be defined
as any toxic chemical that bioaccumulates, or any toxic chemical
that has a half-life greater than eight weeks in any medium
(water, air, sediment, soil, or living things). Substances with
either of these characteristics should be ELIMINATED, the IJC
says.
The “half life” of a substance is the time it takes for half of
it to disappear. For example, DDT has a “half-life” of about 20
years in soil; if a pound of DDT is released into soil today,
half of it will still exist 20 years from now. The IJC recommends
that any toxic substance with a half-life greater than 8 weeks be
considered too dangerous to be released and should be ELIMINATED.
A substance bioaccumulates if its concentration increases as it
moves through the food chain. For example, DDT may be found at
one ppm (part per million) in fish and at 10 ppm in fish-eating
birds. Thus DDT bioaccumulates. The IJC says any toxic substance
that bioaccumulates should be ELIMINATED.
What is the IJC?
The IJC was created in 1909 by the governments of Canada and the
U.S. to oversee the Boundary Waters Treaty, which guides Great
Lakes-related behavior of the two nations. Starting in 1912, and
again in 1945 and 1964 the IJC was asked by the two governments
to report on water quality of the lakes. The studies revealed
progressive deterioration. In 1972 and again in 1978 the two
nations signed Water Quality Agreements aimed specifically at
improving water quality in the lakes. The goal of the 1978
Agreement was broad: “to restore and maintain the chemical,
physical and biological integrity of the waters of the Great
Lakes Basin Ecosystem.” It is up to the IJC to manage and monitor
efforts to achieve the goals of the 1978 Agreement. In 1981, the
IJC began issuing a report every two years, describing the
condition of the lakes in relation to the goals of the 1978
Agreement. The 6th biennial report from the IJC, released in
April, 1992, contains these far-reaching recommendations.
U.S. EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) and its Canadian
counterpart, Environment Canada, must respond to the IJC
recommendations within six months. In the past, many IJC
recommendations have been adopted by the governments of the U.S.
and Canada because IJC recommendations are typically buttressed
by many studies and much data. That is the case with the present
recommendations.
Regarding the Great Lakes environment, the IJC report says, “The
principal problem is the presence and impact of persistent toxic
substances on all sectors of the ecosystem.” The report says the
old way of protecting ourselves against these toxic materials has
failed: “…the Commission concludes that attempts to regulate
persistent toxic substances have not resulted in an efficient or
successful set of programs.” The IJC report says, “Surely it is
time to ask whether we really want to MANAGE persistent toxic
substances after they have been produced, or whether we want to
ELIMINATE and PREVENT their existence in the ecosystem in the
first place.”
The report goes on, “It is clear to us that persistent toxic
substances have caused widespread injury to the environment and
to human health. As a society we can no longer afford to tolerate
their presence in our environment and in our bodies…. Hence, if
a chemical or group of chemicals is persistent, toxic and
bioaccumulative, we should immediately begin a process to
eliminate it. Since it seems impossible to eliminate discharges
of these chemicals through other means, a policy of banning or
sunsetting their manufacture, distribution, storage, use and
disposal appears to be the only alternative.” The IJC defines
“sunsetting” as “a comprehensive process to restrict, phase out,
and eventually ban the manufacture, generation, use and disposal
of a persistent toxic substance.”
The IJC says, “Such a strategy should recognize that all
persistent toxic substances are dangerous to the environment,
deleterious to the human condition, and can no longer be
tolerated in the ecosystem, whether or not unassailable
scientific proof of acute or chronic damage is universally
accepted…. Therefore the focus must be on preventing the
generation of persistent toxic substances in the first place,
rather than trying to control their use, release, and disposal
after they are produced.”
This is a very important point. The IJC is urging adoption of a
“weight of the evidence” approach to controlling toxics, not
waiting until absolute scientific proof is available because by
then it may be too late. On this point the IJC says:
THE COMMISSION RECOGNIZES THAT SCIENTIFIC DATA ARE OPEN TO
INTERPRETATION AND THAT, NOTWITHSTANDING THE CONFIRMED
CAUSE-AND-EFFECT LINK IN SOME CASES, UNEQUIVOCAL CONCLUSIONS MAY
BE DIFFICULT TO REACH IN OTHERS, ESPECIALLY IF INDIVIDUAL STUDIES
ARE CONSIDERED IN ISOLATION. WITH LOW CONTAMINANT CONCENTRATIONS,
SUBTLE EFFECTS AND POTENTIALLY CONFOUNDING FACTORS, UNEQUIVOCAL
EVIDENCE OF INJURY TO HUMANS BY PERSISTENT TOXIC SUBSTANCES MAY
BE DIFFICULT OR IMPOSSIBLE TO OBTAIN.
CRITICS HAVE ATTEMPTED TO FIND FLAWS WITH INDIVIDUAL STUDIES IN
ORDER TO DISCREDIT FINDINGS AND CONCLUSIONS ABOUT PERSISTENT
TOXIC SUBSTANCES. WHILE LIMITATIONS TO STUDY DESIGN MAY EXIST,
THIS DOES NOT NECESSARILY INVALIDATE THE FINDINGS AND CONCLUSIONS
WHEN CONSIDERED IN A WEIGHT-OF-THE-EVIDENCE CONTEXT. AT SOME
POINT THE EMERGING MASS OF DATA AND INFORMATION MUST BE ACCEPTED
AS SUFFICIENT TO PROMPT… ACTION AGAINST ENVIRONMENTAL
CONTAMINANTS.
There is abundant evidence that wildlife in the Great Lakes are
being harmed by persistent chemicals, the IJC says. But “Most
troubling of all is the experts’ conclusion that humans are being
affected as well. Indeed, they estimate that levels of some of
these chemicals measured in the human population are in the same
range, and in some cases even greater, than those found in
adversely affected wildlife populations.”
The IJC report points to evidence that fish, birds, and mammals
around the Great Lakes are suffering from thyroid dysfunction,
decreased fertility, decreased hatching success, gross birth
defects, metabolic abnormalities, behavioral abnormalities,
demasculinization/feminization, defeminization/masculinization,
and compromised immune systems. (See RHWN #146, #263, #264.)
The report attributes these diseases and abnormal conditions to
persistent toxic substances like lead, mercury, DDT, PCBs, PAHs
[polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons] and a broad spectrum of
persistent chlorinated hydrocarbons such as hexachlorobenzene,
pentachlorophenol, furans, and dioxins.
The 1978 Water Quality Agreement adopted “zero discharge”
language as a philosophy, but now the IJC seems bent on turning
it into a workable program. The Commission says “Zero discharge
does not mean less than detectable. It also does not mean the use
of controls based on best available technology, best management
practices, or similar means of treatment that continue to allow
the release of residual chemicals.” Zero means zero, and ZERO
DISCHARGE means ELIMINATION.
–Peter Montague, Ph.D.
Descriptor terms: ijc; great lakes; canada; persistant toxic
substances; regulations; sunsetting; water quality agreement;
bans; zero discharge; us; health; epa; environment canada;