=======================Electronic Edition========================
RACHEL’S HAZARDOUS WASTE NEWS #319
—January 6, 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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THE YEAR IN REVIEW–TOXICS, PART 2:
THE YEAR THE WORLD TURNED THE CORNER?
The most important news of 1992 went largely unreported in the
U.S. At a Ministerial Meeting September 21-22 in Paris, 13
European nations agreed, in principle, to eliminate all
discharges and emissions of chemicals that are toxic, persistent
and likely to bioaccumulate (that is, to concentrate in food
chains). In short, these 13 nations made a binding commitment to
try to achieve “zero discharge” of persistent toxic substances.
Thus for the first time, a significant portion of the
industrialized world (Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France,
Germany, Iceland, Ireland, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal,
Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom) concretely rejected the
old philosophy of “prove harm” as a basis for pollution control.
A new era of environmental protection has truly begun.
Consider the difference. The old philosophy protection (which
still governs in the U.S.) says, “Everyone is free to dump toxic
materials into the environment until someone can prove harm to a
scientific certainty. After harm is proven beyond doubt, then we
can begin to consider taking action to stop the dumping.” This
approach REQUIRES harm to occur before control can begin. All
U.S. pollution-control laws are based on this old approach.
Three key assumptions underlie the old approach:
1) Assumption No. 1: humans can “manage” the environment by
deciding how much of any material the Earth (or any portion of
the Earth) can safely absorb without harm. Scientists call this
the “assimilative capacity” approach. According to this approach,
scientists can reliably decide how much of any material the
Earth, or any portion of the Earth (such as a the Mississippi
River or Chesapeake Bay), can assimilate or absorb without
causing harm. (This is what every “risk asssessment” claims to
do.)
2) Assumption No. 2: Once the Earth’s “assimilative capacity” for
a particular chemical has been decided, then we can and will see
to it that no greater amount is permitted to escape. We will set
limits, river by river, factory by factory, chemical by chemical,
everywhere on the planet, so that the total, cumulative releases
to not exceed the “assimilative capacity” of the Earth.
3) Assumption No. 3: We already know which substances are harmful
and which are not; or, in the case of substances that we never
suspected are harmful, we will be warned of their possible
dangers by traumatic but sub-lethal shocks that alert us to the
danger before it is too late.[1]
ALL THREE ASSUMPTIONS ARE DEAD WRONG. As a result, the well-being
of the planet, and of humans, are reeling from this approach now.
Think of ozone depletion (RHWN #285), global warming (RHWN #300, #301) and acid rain; lead poisoning in our
children (RHWN #213, #214, #294); mercury in fish (RHWN #291); PCBs in the
oceans (RHWN #295); rising cancer rates (RHWN #222, #265, #266); increases
in immune system disorders like asthma (RHWN #218); rising rates
of nervous system disorders like Parkinson’s and Lou Gehrig’s
disease (RHWN #318). Even government scientists are now
concluding that these are real evidence of real harm, caused by
our “innocent until proven guilty” approach toward chemicals
(RHWN #234).
The alternative approach, which was adopted at the Paris
Ministerial Meeting in September, says, in essence, “We don’t
know–and most likely we will never know–how much toxic material
the environment can stand, so we won’t chance it. We’ll assume
that all chemicals can cause harm. Therefore we’ll contain
everything and discharge nothing.” In sum, zero discharge.
The Paris meeting in September was formally called the
Ministerial Meeting of the Contracting Parties of the Oslo and
Paris Conventions. At the meeting, a new international Convention
(a kind of treaty)–called the Paris Convention–was adopted to
replace the Oslo Convention (on ocean dumping, 1972) and the
earlier Paris Convention (on land-based sources of pollution,
1974). The new Paris Convention will become effective when all
contracting parties ratify it–a process that should take roughly
two years.
The meeting in Paris in September adopted three key
documents–the new Paris Convention itself (including several
Annexes), a Ministerial Declaration, and an Action Plan. Without
going into detail, it is important to note that the new Paris
Convention specifically targets chlorinated (“organochlorine”)
compounds for control and phaseout. Article 3 of Annex I of the
new Paris Convention says,
FOR THE PURPOSES OF THIS ANNEX, IT SHALL, inter alia [among other
things], BE THE DUTY OF THE COMMISSION TO DRAW UP:
(A) PLANS FOR THE REDUCTION AND PHASING OUT OF SUBSTANCES THAT
ARE TOXIC, PERSISTENT, AND LIABLE TO BIOACCUMULATE ARISING FROM
LAND-BASED SOURCES;
In an Appendix containing criteria and a list of substances
targeted for action, we find “ORGANOHALOGEN COMPOUNDS (AND
SUBSTANCES WHICH MAY FORM SUCH COMPOUNDS IN THE MARINE
ENVIRONMENT).” Halogens are a class of chemicals that includes
chlorine, bromine, fluorine, and iodine. In the context of the
new Paris Convention, the important one is chlorine because many
solvents, many pesticides, and many other industrial chemicals
are chlorine-based.
The Ministerial Declaration from the September meeting says the
Ministers
AGREE THAT, AS A MATTER OF PRINCIPLE FOR THE WHOLE CONVENTION
AREA, DISCHARGES AND EMISSIONS OF SUBSTANCES WHICH ARE TOXIC,
PERSISTENT, AND LIABLE TO BIOACCUMULATE, IN PARTICULAR
ORGANOHALOGEN SUBSTANCES, AND WHICH COULD REACH THE MARINE
ENVIRONMENT SHOULD, REGARDLESS OF THEIR ANTHROPOGENIC [HUMAN]
SOURCE, BE REDUCED, BY THE YEAR 2000, TO LEVELS WHICH ARE NOT
HARMFUL TO MAN OR NATURE WITH THE AIM OF THEIR ELIMINATION; TO
THIS END TO IMPLEMENT SUBSTANTIAL REDUCTIONS IN THOSE DISCHARGES
AND EMISSIONS AND WHERE APPROPRIATE TO SUPPLEMENT REDUCTION
MEASURES WITH PROGRAMMES TO PHASE OUT THE USE OF SUCH SUBSTANCES;
AND INSTRUCT THE COMMISSION TO KEEP UNDER REVIEW WHAT TIMETABLES
THIS WOULD REQUIRE.
The Action Plan adopted in Paris in September says the Commission
will
–ESTABLISH PRIORITIES…, IN PARTICULAR GIVING PRIORITY TO THE
SUBSTANTIAL REDUCTION OF INPUTS TO THE MARITIME AREA OF
ORGANOHALOGEN SUBSTANCES WHICH ARE TOXIC, PERSISTENT AND LIABLE
TO BIOACCUMULATE, WITH THE AIM OF THEIR ELIMINATION;
The Paris Convention represents a sea change in the philosophy of
environmental control. A similar emphasis on zero discharge
appeared in an official report from the International Joint [U.S.
and Canada] Commission, or IJC, in April, 1992.2 The IJC was
established in 1909 by the U.S. and Canada to oversee water
quality in the Great Lakes under the Boundary Waters Treaty. As
we reported in RHWN #284, the IJC in April called for the U.S.
and Canada:
a) To define many chemicals as “persistent toxic substances” and
then ELIMINATE them because, as the IJC said, “We conclude that
persistent toxic substances are too dangerous to the biosphere
and to humans to permit their release in ANY quantity” (emphasis
in the original).
b) To 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.
The IJC recommended that “persistent” chemicals be defined as
those with a half-life in air, water, sediments, or living
things, of 8 weeks or longer. (The half-life of a substance is
the time it takes for half of it to disappear.)
Taken together, these recommendations and the new Paris
Convention (and the Bamako Convention in Africa–see RHWN #257)
constitute an entirely new approach to environmental protection,
one that offers real hope of saving the planet from destruction.
Historically in the U.S. we have been unable to adopt the zero
discharge philosophy mainly because the traditional environmental
movement has refused to endorse the idea. They say it “won’t fly”
in Congress. It isn’t “doable.” It’s “unrealistic.” They say zero
is scientifically unattainable, so we mustn’t ask for it.
Think of it this way: we’ll never eliminate all murders either,
but that hasn’t stopped us from making murder absolutely
illegal.[3] In some cases, we can achieve zero discharge by
eliminating the source (phasing out chlorine, for example). In
other cases, we can achieve close-to-zero by CHANGING OUR
PHILOSOPHY OF INDUSTRIAL DESIGN, ELIMINATING ALL INTENTIONAL
RELEASES. This won’t eliminate spills or leaks, but under a zero
discharge philosophy spills and leaks will be recognized as
aberrations and violations of policy intent, and, as such, they
would be punished by fines to provide constant incentive for
improvement.
Is it unfair to blame our friends in the environmental movement
for our national failure to adopt a zero discharge philosophy? If
the environmental movement won’t demand zero discharge, no one
will. And we’ll never get what we don’t demand. Our present
path–guided by the “prove harm” philosophy–is unmistakably
self-destructive. In 1992 a better way became politically
possible: zero discharge. Now it is up to US–all of us, WORKING
TOGETHER–to seize the day.
–Peter Montague, Ph.D.
Descriptor terms: zero discharge; hazardous materials; prove
harm; risk assessment; global warming; acid rain; global
environmental problems; lead; mercury; pcbs; cancer; carcinogens;
health; ijc; canada; us; great lakes; persistent toxic substances;