Leak Surveys Inc.

Supplying the world with state of the art video leak surveys for Processing
plants, Petro
Chemical plants, Transmission lines, Gathering lines, and Off Shore platforms.

            Leak Surveys Inc. is proud to announce a breakthrough in infrared
technology.  The
Hawk is leading the world in hydrocarbon leak detection using infrared
technology for a
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possible ?
A new type of infrared camera that we call the HAWK. With the HAWK we are able
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majority of
gas leaks were not visible to the naked eye. The HAWK has solved that problem
permanently. With this revolutionary breakthrough, we are now able to perform
leak
surveys by flying transmission lines.

THE NEW ANSWER
We use helicopters that fly at approximately 500 feet above the existing
transmission
lines. Our trained technicians can see and identify natural gas leaks in
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altitude. The survey is recorded to a digital data bank as it is being
performed. This data
bank can then be stored in a company's safety file for review at any time if the
need arises.
If a leak is discovered during the survey process, GPS coordinates are given so
that the
leak can be located by the ground operator and can quickly be repaired. This
cutting edge
technology can be done for less cost than conventional methods.


OTHER POSSIBILITIES
The HAWK is a versatile camera and can perform an array of assignments. For
instance,
the HAWK can be used for leak detection on valves and fittings at gas plants,
refineries,
and other manufacturing facilities. The ability of the technician to visually
see the leak
allows him or her to prioritize the different leaks for repair. This is vital
for company's
wanting to save both time and money. Conventional leak detection equipment takes
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hours and cuts into profits. Old methods are obsolete. What made them obsolete?
The
HAWK. In this example sequence below, a hose was connected to a five gallon
propane
bottle and the valve was opened to allow the gas to escape. The HAWK was set up
300 feet
away using a 50mm lens. The gas released from the bottle was approximately 10mcf
per
day. As you can see, the HAWK makes this small leak visible to the eye and the
motion
makes it easily distinguishable.




REAL TIME
On this web site you can view more real-time sequences for yourself. Click on
the Real-
Time button on the top or bottom of the page. These real-time sequences are also
available on a CD upon request. Just click on the questions button or e-mail us
at
dfurry@...
http://www.leaksurveysinc.com/
                                                                          Bill
Heavens,Hope4Kids2

By KENDAL KELLY
Associated Press Writer
Posted August 8 2005, 10:58 PM
OKLAHOMA CITY -- A study by researchers at the University of Oklahoma Health
Sciences
Center indicates environmental arsenic in drinking water can stimulate the
growth of
cancerous tumors and cause them to spread faster.

The study is significant for residents of central Oklahoma, which has some of
the highest
arsenic levels in drinking water in the nation.

Michael Ihnat, an assistant professor of cell biology who headed the research
team, said
researchers still do not know whether arsenic in drinking water increases the
overall
incidence of tumors.

"What we can say pretty definitely is that if you have a pre-existing tumor, and
you're
drinking water with arsenic in it, it could very well increase the growth of
that tumor,"
Ihnat said.

The study shows that arsenic levels as low as four parts per billion stimulated
blood vessel
growth, while levels as low as 10 ppb caused tumors to expand.

The current federal arsenic standard is 50 parts per billion, but that standard
is being
lowered to 10 parts per billion on Jan. 23.

The Environmental Protection Agency will present the study to a congressional
subcommittee in November "to really drive home that they need to reduce the
standard to
10 ppb," Ihnat said.

"Between that ten and 50, a lot goes on that's not good," he said.

When environmental arsenic is ingested, it reacts with oxygen to create free
radicals --
very reactive forms of normal molecules -- which then stimulate blood vessel
growth,
Ihnat said. An expansion in blood vessels means an increase in blood supply to
the
tumors, which then grow larger, he said.

Ihnat and his team used mice to conduct the study. For five weeks, they fed the
mice water
with arsenic levels between 10 ppb and 200 ppb, and then implanted cancerous
tumors on
the animals.

The researchers continued to give them the arsenic water and monitored the
tumors'
growth for six more weeks. At the conclusion, Ihnat's team found that the
arsenic
increased the growth rate of the tumors, as well as causing the tumors to spread
to the
lungs.

Ihnat's study did not conclusively link arsenic ingestion and the development of
cancer,
although many studies have tied the two together_ particularly arsenic to the
development
of skin and bladder cancer -- said Monty Elder, spokeswoman for Oklahoma
Department
of Environmental Quality.

However, the Oklahoma State Department of Health, which tracks cancer cases, has
not
found clusters of either skin or bladder cancer anywhere in Oklahoma, said Anne
Bliss,
epidemiologist at the health department.

Arsenic in Oklahoma's water occurs naturally and is generally found only in
groundwater
systems, Elder said.

There are 1,290 groundwater systems in Oklahoma that serve 700,000 people,
mostly in
rural areas, Elder said. DEQ predicts 25 of those systems -- including Norman,
Yukon,
Mustang, Weatherford and Nichols Hills -- will have problems meeting the new
federal
standard of drinking water, she said.

Elder said it will cost between $55 billion and $163 billion to replace or
upgrade the 25
systems.

The majority of the state's population -- 2.8 million people, or 79 percent --
are served
by 233 surface water systems, which do not have problems with arsenic levels,
she said.

Ihnat said there is little central Oklahoma residents can do to avoid
arsenic-tainted water
other than buying bottled water.

"None of the standard filters filter arsenic to any great degree because it's an
element, an
ion," Ihnat said. "It's very hard to get out."

High dollar filtration systems, such as the reverse-osmosis filter, can rid
water of arsenic,
but Elder said the expense outweighs the cost of digging a new well or importing
water
from another area.

Ihnat said his next step is to discover if arsenic levels increase the risk of
developing
tumors, and if the process can be interrupted or reversed. He predicted it will
take another
year before he has answers.

"If we can do that, then I think we're helping out," Ihnat said.

Cancer-causing agent lurks in groundwater; are you at risk?
Danger beneath our feet
State fails to tell residents of benzene contamination

By Eric Fleischauer
DAILY Staff Writer
eric@... · 340-2435

Peggy Dykes lives above a slow-moving mass of water tainted with
benzene, a carcinogen. So does Tameka Harris. David Sengstacke and his
pregnant daughter lived above one as well.

Haley Terry, who has leukemia, played in cool water on a recent hot day.
DAILY Photo by Emily Saunders
Haley Terry, who has leukemia, played in cool water on a recent hot day.
The four have something else in common. The state Department of
Environmental Management has known about the contamination for years,
expending thousands of dollars to reduce contamination levels.

What angers Dykes, Harris and Sengstacke is something else they have
in common. ADEM never told them the benzene was encroaching on their
property.

That fact also angers Harry Terry.

His 5-year-old daughter, Haley, has leukemia, which is among the
cancers linked to benzene exposure. ADEM first told him in late 2004,
after his daughter was diagnoses, that the chemical had seeped into
his underground soil. ADEM discovered the leak in 1999, the year Haley
Terry was born.

No one knows whether benzene caused Haley Terry's leukemia. Scientists
do know that benzene is so toxic that even the small amounts that rise
from groundwater into the air and surface soil can be deadly. Gaps in
foundations and above crawl spaces permit benzene gas to accumulate in
buildings.

Also known: Despite its knowledge of the risk posed by benzene-tainted
groundwater, ADEM's practice is to notify only those nearby residents
who obtain their drinking water from a well.

"We don't want to unduly alarm people," said Sonja Massey, chief of
the groundwater branch of ADEM's water division.

That explanation does not satisfy Harry Terry.

"They don't have to put up yellow tape around a house saying 'Caution:
Benzene.' I understand that," he said. "Just send me a letter or put a
note on my door."

ADEM is actively monitoring or cleaning 42 sites contaminated by
leaking underground storage tanks sites in Morgan County. Limestone
County has 34 active sites and Lawrence has 12. Nearly all include
benzene contamination. Alabama has 1,600 such sites.

No funds to notify residents

Massey said notifying nearby residents requires money that ADEM does
not have.

"We understand that there is a desire on the part of the citizens to
be better informed," Massey said. "Resources is no excuse, but it is
an issue as far as the time and resources it takes to do all that."

The notification issue is a symptom of evolving regulatory awareness
of the toxicity of benzene and other components of gasoline.

"Vapor intrusion is kind of new science," said Dr. Gina Solomon, a
researcher at the Natural Resource Defense Council and a faculty
member at the University of California in San Francisco.

"For many years people thought that if it wasn't in the (drinking)
water, it wasn't a terrible problem," Solomon said. "Houses act like
chimneys. The warm air inside the house, and the fact that there is
not a wind blowing through, draws vapors out of the soil directly
under the house. Benzene percolates up through the cracks and then
accumulates under the roof."

Since THE DAILY reported on Haley Terry's illness in April, dozens of
ADEM-supervised tests of the air, soil and groundwater show she was
exposed to benzene at levels higher than originally thought, but lower
than the maximum safe limit established by the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency.

And as ADEM scrambles to determine whether the child's cancer is
linked to the underground gasoline tank leak discovered in 1999, costs
mount.

Since THE DAILY first interviewed Massey, she has authorized the
expenditure of $121,000 in her effort to monitor and clean the plume
that groundwater has carried from the Bud's Chevron at Sixth Avenue
and Seventh Street Southeast to several residential properties.

"We've hurried up the process on this site," Massey said. "We've
expedited the process to its maximum extent."

Frightening health risk

The health risks benzene poses are frightening. The cost of cleanup is
daunting. ADEM estimates the total cleanup costs of the underground
storage tank sites in Morgan and Limestone counties alone will exceed
$15 million, and that omits the sites where the agency has not
compiled enough data to make an estimate.

Benzene is not the only gasoline component ADEM is targeting, but it
is toxic at such low levels that, as Massey explained, it drives the
cleanup of other chemical contaminants.

The extent of benzene's toxicity is reflected in drinking water
standards set by the EPA. Above the level of five parts benzene to a
billion parts water, benzene poses a health risk.

Imagine an Olympic-size swimming pool filled with drinking water. Five
teaspoons of benzene would make the entire pool toxic.

Benzene that makes its way to groundwater is not always content to
stay underground. Some of it enters the surface soil. Some enters the
air. Because skin and lung tissue absorb benzene, small amounts can be
deadly.

ADEM uses a risk-based analysis to peg the maximum safe indoor-air
level for children at .83 ppb. At 1.3 ppb, adults are at risk.

Five years after ADEM learned of the Bud's Chevron leak, tests of
benzene levels in the air beneath the Terry house showed levels of up
to 0.60 ppb, below the 0.83 limit set by EPA. The house north of the
Terrys tested at 0.70 ppb. The Terry house is 200 feet from the
underground storage tank.

The next house north, directly in the path of the main groundwater
flow, showed readings of 1.70 and 8.00 ppb, both over the maximum
level for adults.

Massey said she thinks a lawn mower and gas can outside the house
affected the latter results.

Normally ADEM's groundwater branch does not test air directly, instead
relying upon statistical models that estimate indoor-air levels based
upon known groundwater concentrations, a far less expensive method.

"Given the fact that we have a sick child there," Massey said, "I
wanted to know whether our models are giving us an accurate
representation. I wanted to see the actual air concentrations."

Background testing revealed spikes in benzene levels on days that
Bud's received gasoline shipments. Massey said the test results on
these days were slightly over the risk level for the child. She said
traffic on Sixth Avenue could also contribute to background benzene
levels.

Solomon said a better method of testing indoor benzene levels is to
sample air inside the house, not in the crawl space.

"Keep the windows closed a few days and then take an air sample in the
child's bedroom. It would be very easy to do. If I were them, I would
be trying to do that," Solomon said.

Massey said this method could produce unreliable readings because some
substances used in households, such as cigarettes and
fingernail-polish remover, release benzene.

Outdoor air levels of benzene, tested in the Terry's back yard in late
May, showed levels of 1.20 ppb and 1.00 ppb.

For those living or working near benzene leaks, the anger at ADEM's
failure to provide notice of potentially toxic exposure accompanies
the scientific uncertainty about the extent of benzene's danger.

Wendy Keenum discovered she works in a building that sits on a benzene
plume when THE DAILY contacted her. She believes ADEM should notify
residents and businesses located near an underground leak.

"If they are not sure whether or not it is dangerous, why hide it from
us?" Keenum said. "They should tell us what they know and let us
decide for ourselves whether the risk is worth it."

Keenum works near a closed Raceway station at Carridale Street and
Danville Road Southwest.

While scientists agree that benzene causes leukemia, exactly how it
does so is not well understood.

"There's always some risk from exposure to a carcinogen like benzene,"
said Solomon. "It's a lot of mathematical extrapolation, and every
step of the way there is uncertainty. EPA did the best they could do,
and I think (EPA's benzene data) is better than most of these kinds of
risk assessments. In this case, at least, they were not relying on
laboratory rats. We have human data."

Unlike some toxins, benzene leaves no fingerprint. No test will prove
whether benzene absorption caused a particular case of leukemia.

Solomon said EPA studies on the effect of benzene on adults is solid,
but the information on children is too sparse to accurately measure
the risk.

"Children are much more susceptible to a lot of toxic agents in the
environment," Solomon said. "Toxins hit them harder. Nobody has ever
figured out how much more susceptible children are to benzene."

Thomas M. Milby, M.D., a toxicologist and former senior scientist at
Stanford Research Institute, agreed.

Whether the uncertainties about benzene's effects should trigger more
aggressive notification is an issue Massey has not resolved.

Well-intentioned failures

She said past notification failures were well-intentioned.

"We felt like we were looking out for their interests as best we could
in controlling the movement of the plumes, but we've got too much,"
Massey said in May. "I'm planning a wholesale change in the way we're
communicating this information."

Asked this month if she had implemented the change, she said she had not.

"I haven't gotten that in place yet. Right now I've lost my
(underground storage tank) compliance chief to retirement. I've lost
my secretary to a promotion," Massey said. "I'm limping along right
now, but (notification) is my definite objective."

Massey said ADEM uses a ranking system to prioritize groundwater
sites. The system, however, does not factor in how close residences
are to the site.

"I think we need to change that," Massey said. "That should be one of
the items reflected."

She said much of her time since April has been spent monitoring and
trying to clean up the plume under the Terry property.

"I've been working on it at home," Massey said. "That's about the only
time I've ever had to do that."

Massey said the pace of the cleanup was slower than she would have
liked. "Sometimes," she said, "the system moves like a slug."

Residents near Bud's Chevron are worried. They discovered they were
living above gasoline-contaminated groundwater after Haley Terry was
diagnosed with leukemia, five years after ADEM discovered the leak.

The agency told area residents that benzene had seeped under their
homes and yards after THE DAILY reported the story in April.

Massey, in her 17th year as ADEM's groundwater chief, said ADEM did
not notify residents because most of the levels on their properties
were below EPA-set levels.

"I'm sure there are a lot of questions in the homeowners' minds. They
have a right to know what's on their property," Massey said. "We've
just got to do something about notification. That can't wait."

It has waited, though. ADEM has no procedure for notifying people that
they live or work in areas near contaminated groundwater.

Haley Terry's father said notification came too late for his daughter.
The girl's doctors, however, have no way of knowing whether it was
benzene or merely life's roulette that caused her leukemia.

Tameka Harris is particularly concerned because, she learned from THE
DAILY, she both lives and works above a gasoline plume in Southwest
Decatur.

Massey said she is considering imposing a requirement on contractors
hired to monitor and clean gasoline leaks that they notify residents
within 300 feet of the leak.

The agency posted a Web site listing all contaminated sites in the
state shortly after THE DAILY ran an article about the Bud's Chevron leak.

Occasionally nearby residents discover the existence of a plume when
ADEM-hired contractors drill monitoring wells in their lawns. Even
then the exchange of information is sometimes minimal.

ADEM records document that a 5,000-gallon leak from a service station
on U.S. 31, just south of Beltline Road, contaminated the groundwater
of Norma Jean Creel's property in 2004. The site is now home to a BP
station. Creel said she did not understand that gasoline had seeped
into her property.

"They looked under my house a bunch of times, but never told me
nothing," said Creel.

Harry Terry said ADEM should quit talking about notification and just
do it.

"They could have come up here and said, 'We had a leak. The results
show it is not hazardous, but we had a leak. We want you all to know
about it,' " Terry said. "Instead of saying to me, 'Sorry, but
information on the contamination was open to the public.' Now how was
I supposed to know they even had a leak there? If they don't tell me,
how am I supposed to know?"

Gasoline greatest threat

The underground tanks that present the greatest threat to Decatur and
the state contain gasoline. Because they are underground, leaks from
the tanks are not immediately obvious to their owners. Also because
they are underground, leaking contaminants quickly find their way to
groundwater.

Modern underground storage tanks are much more durable than those
installed in the early 1990s and before. Most of ADEM's efforts
involve older, corroded tanks.

Massey said people living near gas stations should protect themselves
by being quick to contact ADEM if they notice significant fumes or
other signs of a leak.

Asked if she would raise her children next to a gas station, she pauses.

"I'd be looking for other options," she said.

Cleaning the mess

ADEM manages an underground-tank trust fund that acts as an insurer
for the owners of leaking tanks. Owners must meet a $5,000 deductible,
but beyond that amount the fund will cover all cleanup costs up to $1
million per site. The fund also acts as a liability insurance policy,
protecting owners from injury or property-damage claims up to $1 million.

Upon discovering a leak, fund-eligible tank owners must enter a
contract with certified engineers and geologists. ADEM must
pre-approve all tasks undertaken in order for the trust fund to cover
the expense.

ADEM imposes a 1-cent-per-gallon tax on those who buy gasoline from
bulk storage to finance the fund. The ADEM-managed fund has a balance
of $4.4 million. Its revenue is $30 million a year. That sounds like a
lot until one recalls that Morgan and Limestone counties alone have
contamination problems that will cost $15 million to clean.

Cleaning up groundwater contamination is an expensive and inexact
science. The average cost per cleanup is $66,520. Installation of
corrective action systems, necessary in most significant spills,
usually costs $250,000 and up. Monitoring requires years of ongoing
expenses.

ADEM estimates the cleanup at Bud's, already under way, will cost at
least $1 million.

By the time ADEM gets involved, usually as a result of an inspection
or the legally required report of a leak by the tank owner, numerous
unknown variables directly impact the health risk posed by the leak.
ADEM or the owner typically stops the leak promptly, but the product
saturating the soil begins a groundwater journey that can take years.

One variable is the volume of the leaked product. Most gas stations
use leak-detection devices, but a draft report by the EPA concluded
such devices work only 25 percent of the time. This means a tank owner
may not know whether there is a leak or how much product escaped.

Other variables involve subsurface geology.

Water down under

The depth of groundwater, for example, affects the extent to which
contaminants are released in the air and surface soil. That variable
loomed large in ADEM's evaluation of the leak near the Terry property.
Haley Terry has lived her life within 200 feet of the Bud's Chevron
gasoline leak. Her pregnant mother lived above the same leak. ADEM and
the tank owner, Decatur-based Petroleum Services Inc., discovered the
leak in February 1999. There is no way to determine when the leak
started, so whether the leak began with Bud's or with some previous
owner of the underground tanks is a mystery.

In February 2000, ADEM received a report confirming gasoline had
entered the groundwater on the service
station's property. Some monitoring wells extracted pure gasoline. In
other wells, benzene readings were as high as 23,800 ppb.

An incorrect estimate on the groundwater depth in the area of the leak
delayed ADEM's concerns about the health hazard. Initially thought to
be about 12 feet deep, recent tests indicate the top of the
groundwater, also called the water table, is only about seven feet
below the surface. This meant more benzene could be reaching the air
and surface soil than previously estimated.

What ADEM thought was low exposure turned out to be closer to
EPA-established toxic levels.

"We still have a factor of safety, but not as much as we would like,"
Massey said.

The leak also demonstrated another variable. Groundwater usually flows
downhill along the impermeable layer, usually bedrock and called the
aquitard, that serves as its floor. Because initial testing suggested
the bedrock at Bud's descended in a northeasterly direction, ADEM
assumed the contaminants would follow a path below the Terrys' back
yard and below the two houses to the north.

Pinnacle bedrock

ADEM contractors later discovered that monitoring wells west of the
gas station showed contamination. It was then that they discovered the
bedrock underlying the groundwater near the leak is pinnacle bedrock.
Pinnacle bedrock looks like a manual juice squeezer, with pointed
columns separated by depressions.

"You have an unusual groundwater flow situation," Massey explained.
"It actually flows in all directions to some extent."

That means people living or working west and south of the leak may
have greater levels of benzene exposure than previously estimated.

To track the perimeter of the contamination, ADEM has 14 monitoring
wells on or near Bud's property. The highest benzene levels remain in
a path heading northeast from the storage tank.

Another geological variable affecting the health risk posed by
groundwater contamination is the type of aquifer through which the
groundwater flows.

Most groundwater does not look like an underground stream. A more
accurate image is a saturated sponge. Like a sponge, the water flows,
but at a much slower speed than water on the surface. Groundwater is
pulled by gravity and pushed by the force of the water above and behind it

The aquifer sponge is the material — soil or rock — through which the
groundwater moves. Different types of aquifer cause water and the
contaminants it contains to travel faster or slower.

Most of the Tennessee Valley's aquifer, called the Highland Rim,
consists of limestone or chert.

This aquifer is unpredictable. Water flows through the rock by carving
out channels, or conduits. Pour a gallon of gas over a conduit and it
may funnel the gas straight to the groundwater in minutes. Pour it 10
feet away and it may never reach the groundwater.

Dorothy Malaier, head of ADEM's underground storage tank corrective
action section, said limestone aquifers decrease the reliability of
monitoring wells.

"Wells may be installed and screened across one conduit which shows no
contamination. Another well may be installed across another conduit
and it shows impacts," Malaier said.

Speed variable

It is not just the location of contaminants that is sometimes elusive.
The speed of its groundwater vehicle also upsets the most careful
analysis. Sometimes the underground geology facilitates a benzene flow
that outruns the quickest ADEM response. Other times, however, the
speed is so slow that it first encroaches on nearby properties years
after the leak. An initial analysis showing no contamination may be
proved wrong months or even years later.

For example, a monitoring well on the northeast corner of the Bud's
Chevron property showed benzene levels of 3,500 ppb last year. The
groundwater beneath some of the properties northeast of that well has
no benzene at all.

Does that mean the leak dissipated before reaching that point, or does
it mean the groundwater flow will not get that far for another year?

Those are the sorts of question marks that overwhelm Harry Terry. The
greater ADEM's uncertainty, he argues, the more compelling the need
for prompt notification.

Haley Terry's favorite activities were in the back yard, where benzene
concentrations are highest.

Peggy Dykes, like Terry, said ADEM should notify those close to a leak
even if they do not believe the leak is toxic.

"Until we read it in the paper and saw a picture of our garage in the
paper, we didn't know anything was going on," Dykes said. "It's not
right."

Her son, Jim Dykes, agreed.

"I have a lot of concern over the fact that they have seen fit not to
let us know there was a potential for contamination," he said,
"regardless of how insignificant they may feel it to be."

David Sengstacke said he understands ADEM's concern about causing
undue alarm, but a little alarm, he said, might be appropriate. In
2003 he bought a house that, unknown to him, sat near
benzene-contaminated groundwater. He discovered the contamination
during an interview with THE DAILY.

"I wouldn't have bought the place knowing that it has a possibility of
contamination," he said. "That was something people have been hiding."

Finances work to bind those worried about contamination to their property.

"Who would want to buy our property if we put it up for sale, knowing
all this has transpired?" asked Peggy Dykes.

Harry Terry feels the same economic tether.

"How am I supposed to sell my house?" Terry said. "Do I say, 'This is
a pretty nice neighborhood, but Bud's had a leak and my little girl's
got leukemia, so I don't know if you want to buy it or not?' I don't
know what to do."

Staring toward his back yard last week, Terry glared at the gas station.

"I just want us out of here. I want us to go and never come back."

Massey said in a few instances ADEM has temporarily relocated families
exposed to groundwater contamination. No such offer was made to any of
the residents near Bud's.

"The numbers don't show that to be necessary," Massey said. "The
readings were higher — closer to our risk-based numbers — than I had
expected, but I really don't think they are high enough to cause
problems. ... If I thought in any way that the residents needed to be
relocated, they would be."

Because ADEM's underground storage tank section has minimal funding
beyond the trust fund, it is taking no action to clean or monitor the
14 Morgan County sites in which the owner is ineligible to receive
financial assistance from that fund. ADEM is taking no action on seven
ineligible sites in Limestone County.

Stratton Orr, head of Bud's Chevron owner Petroleum Sales Inc.,
deferred questions to contractors working with ADEM to monitor the
site. One contractor, Lindsey Hill, declined comment because of the
ongoing ADEM cleanup. Another contractor, William Cooch, was out of town.

Decatur General Hospital

Even Decatur General Hospital deals with benzene-contaminated
groundwater. Several years ago, hospital employees smelled a gas odor
inside the facility. ADEM ultimately concluded the smell resulted from
an underground gasoline tank at the site where Snicker's BP is now
located.

Carried by groundwater, benzene flowed under the north side of the
hospital.

Vanessa Walls, vice president of marketing at the hospital, said ADEM
contractors periodically check monitoring wells outside the hospital.
Workers sniffing for gasoline smells are the only monitors inside the
hospital, she said.

According to ADEM maps, the same chemical mix also goes under the
Hardee's restaurant on Seventh Street Southeast and under the
LifeSouth building north of the BP station.

Decatur High School

Low levels also encroach on Decatur High School's athletic field and
the property at Decatur Foot Clinic.

Monitoring wells at the gas station revealed benzene levels of more
than 15,000 ppb. Monitoring wells on the north side of the hospital
show concentration levels of about 2,000 ppb and lower.

The hospital uses city water, so the issue is whether
benzene-contaminated vapor is entering the hospital at levels that
would adversely affect health.

ADEM records do not indicate that any air samples have been taken in
the hospital.

"We're in compliance with what the federal law requires," Massey said,
"but we understand that there is a desire on the part of the citizens
to be better informed."

Publicity spurs ADEM changes

Since THE DAILY first interviewed groundwater officials with the state
Department of Environmental Management earlier this year, the division
has:
# Posted a list of all 4,069 contaminated sites, both open and closed,
on the Internet at adem.state.al.us/Water
Division/Ground/UST%20GW/UST
Release72105.xls.
# Performed its first-ever significant quantitative monitoring of
benzene levels in the air. Previously such levels were estimated based
upon groundwater concentrations.
# Begun accumulating data regarding the names and addresses of all
property owners within 300 feet of groundwater contamination sites.
ADEM's Sonja Massey said this will assist ADEM in notifying those
potentially at risk if the department eventually sets a policy
requiring notification.
# Installed liners in the crawl space beneath houses in the path of a
1999 underground leak of the Bud's Chevron at 1102 Sixth Ave. S.E.
# Begun informal notification of new leaks to surrounding neighbors.
The head of ADEM's underground storage tank division went door-to-door
notifying landowners near a newly discovered leak near Birmingham last
month.
# Spent thousands of dollars performing tests and using cleanup
methods not included in the cleanup proposal filed by the contractor
responsible for the Bud's Chevron contamination cleanup.

ADEM's underground agenda

The state Department of Environmental Management's underground storage
tank division has a significant workload across the state:
# There have been 10,000 releases from underground storage tanks since
1985.
# Of that number, 4,000 releases were of such severity that ADEM
opened an investigation. The other 6,000 required excavation and
disposal of contaminated soil.
# ADEM has completed cleanup at 2,400 of those 4,000 sites, leaving
1,600 sites still being monitored or cleaned.
# There are 5,477 regulated underground storage tank sites statewide.
# There are 15,071 regulated tanks, down from 47,000 tanks in 1987.
Most sites have several underground tanks.
# 1,119 contaminated sites are eligible for trust-fund money.
# ADEM's 11 underground storage tank inspectors inspect 3,000 sites
per year.
# ADEM receives reports of about 115 underground storage tank leaks
every year.

Active sites in Morgan County

According to its records, the Alabama Department of Environmental
Management is actively monitoring or cleaning leaks from the following
underground storage tank sites in Morgan County:
# Conoco 01007, Star Route Box 401, Clay Bridge
# Danville Grocery, Route 2, Alabama 36, Danville
# Danville BP, 5667 Alabama 36 W., Danville
# Raceway No. 719, 1510 Carridale St., Decatur
# Bud's Convenience Store No. 9, 1002 Alabama 20 W., Decatur
# Pepsi Cola of Decatur, Ipsco Road, Ratliff Industrial Park, Decatur
# Handy Food No. 4, U.S. 31 Amoco, 2901 U.S. 31 S. at Cedar Lake Road,
Decatur
# E-Z Serve No. 7185, 2142 Sixth Ave. S.E., Decatur
# Neighborhood Food Mart, 1024 Somerville Road S.E., Decatur
# Circle K No. 1711, 3531 Sixth Ave., Decatur
# Polysar Inc. (East Basin No. 1 — Novacor), Alabama 20, Decatur
# McCurry Chevron, Route 1, Box 5, Decatur
# Former J&R Gulf (Sumerals Gulf), 2430 U.S. 31 S., Decatur
# Bud's Convenience Store No. 7 (904 Sixth Ave. N.E., Decatur)
# Tractor and Equipment Co., 800 Church St. at Eighth Ave. N.E., Decatur
# USA Petroleum No. 173, 1801 Beltline Road, Decatur
# Racetrac No. 345, Route 4, Box 113, Decatur
# Bud's No. 1, 1102 Sixth Ave. S.E., Decatur
# Campbell & Sons Texaco Food Mart No. 15, 1801 Sixth Ave., Decatur
# WallyWorld, 2604 Spring Ave. S.W., Decatur
# Russell's Body Shop, 3529 Old Moulton at Chapel Hill Road, Decatur
# Birmingham-Nashville Express Inc., 102 Ipsco St., Decatur
# State of Alabama Highway Department, Alabama 20 West, Decatur
# Classic Cars (Tidy Cars), 138 14th St. S.W.
# 3M Decatur Chemical Manufacturing, State Docks Road, Decatur
# 3M Decatur Fire Testing Facility, State Docks Road, Decatur
# Alabama Department of Transportation, Alabama 20 West
# 3M Decatur (Tank No. 157) film plant, State Docks Road, Decatur
# Chuck's Mini Mart, 916 Sixth Ave. N.E., Decatur
# Jack Hopper Grocery, 5564 Morgan County 55 E., Eva
# Town of Falkville, West Third Street, Falkville
# Lacon Grocery, Route 3 Box 10, Falkville
# Vulcan Mr. Quick, 4696 U.S. 31 at East Pike, Falk-ville
# K&K Service Station, U.S. 31, Main Street, Falkville
# Parker's Chevron, 800 U.S. 31 N., Hartselle
# Copeland Corp. (Emerson Electric), Thompson Road at I-65, Hartselle
# Copeland Corp. (Emerson Electric), Thompson Road at I-65, Hartselle
# Conoco 01014, 5520 U.S. 31, Hartselle
# Putt's Pantry, 1402 S. Sparkman St., Hartselle
# Steve's Grocery, 2920 Ironman Road, Hartselle
# Oates Oil, U.S. 231, Lacey's Spring
# Wavaho, Alabama 67, Priceville

Active sites in Limestone County

The Alabama Department of Environmental Management is actively
monitoring or cleaning underground storage tanks that leaked in
Limestone County:
# Fastway Market, Alabama 53, Main Street, Ardmore
# Fastway Market, Alabama 53, Main Street, Ardmore
# Daly & Sons, Alabama 53, Ardmore
# Log Cabin Grocery, U.S. 72 at Log Cabin Road, Athens
# Athens Country Store, Elm Street, Athens
# Athens Country Store, Elm Street, Athens
# Former Ike Robinson Service Station, Plato Jones at Browns Ferry
Road, Athens
# S&Z Grocery, U.S. 72 at Shaw Road, Athens
# Poole's Grocery, Elm Street at North Jefferson, Athens
# Conagra Poultry Co., 1004 E. Pryor St., Athens
# Kerr-McGee, Britton 7083), U.S. 72 West, Athens
# Kerr-McGee, Britton 7085), U.S. 72 East at mile marker 82.7, Athens
# Shaw Street Grocery, Shaw Street, Athens
# San Ann Station No. 65, U.S. 31, Athens
# Delta 1107, Mapco),, 801 S. Jefferson St., Athens
# Tommy Russell Grocery, U.S. 72 West at Hines Street, Athens
# Limestone County Water Authority, 17218 U.S. 72 W., Athens
# Bud's No. 3, 1001 Hobbes St., Athens
# East Limestone High School, 15641 E. Limestone St., Athens
# B&K Grocery, 14988 Huntsville-Browns Ferry Road, Athens
# Copeland Quick Stop, 19230 E. Limestone Road, Athens
# George's Country Store, 14959 New Cut Road, Athens
# Athens Wavaho, U.S. 31 North near Hobbes Road, Athens
# D&M Minimart, 17785 U.S. 72, Athens
# D&L Quick Stop, 17930 Alabama 251, Athens
# U Pump It Gas Co., 1301 N. Jefferson St., Athens
# U.S. 72 Mobile, 910 U.S. 72 E., Athens
# City of Athens Utilities, 1600 W. Elm St., Athens
# Express 99, 18020 Alabama 99, Buck Island Road, Athens
# Lowe Hereford Farm, Powell Road, Belle Mina
# Elkmont High School, 25630 Evans Ave., Elkmont
# Eaves Grocery, 20420 Upper Fort Hampton Road, Elkmont
# Craig's Grocery, U.S. 31 and Tanner Road, Tanner
# Gary's One Stop, 5980 U.S. 31 N., Tanner

SEE ALSO:

Print  Email
For Immediate Release: August 1, 2005
Contact: Chas Offutt (202) 265-7337

EPA SCIENTISTS CRITICAL OF LEADERSHIP — Agency Survey Shows Declining Trust and
Deteriorating Communication

Washington, DC — There is a growing disconnect between scientists and managers
within
the research arm of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, according to
internal
surveys released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility
(PEER). Lack
of trust, communication and shared vision is beginning to threaten the nation's
largest
scientific organization dedicated to studying human health and the environment.

EPA's Office of Research and Development consists of three national
laboratories, four
national centers, and two offices located in 14 facilities around the country
employing
approximately 2,000 scientists. Internal surveys taken in 1999, 2001 and 2003
gauge
"organizational climate." The latest survey had a 66% response rate.

While overall morale remains high, survey results show increasing doubts about
the
"competence" and trustworthiness of ORD leadership. In the 2003 survey –

Scientists' trust in leadership declines markedly at each step higher up in the
chain-of-
command, with 38% of staff scientists reporting distrust of laboratory managers
versus
only 23% who expressed trust. The survey did not assess scientist attitudes
toward overall
EPA leadership;
Less than one in three respondents (30%) felt that lab managers "address
challenging
situations competently;" and
Barely half (56%) were optimistic about ORD's future.
In essays accompanying the survey, one scientist wrote "Despite email and the
like, there
is no real communication in the organization and no consistent mechanism to
share
knowledge." Another added, "A complete lack of communication exists leading to
the
strong distrust that is present today."

This past March, PEER filed suit under the Freedom of Information Act to obtain
the
surveys after EPA refused to release them. In July, EPA surrendered the surveys
and paid
PEER's attorneys fees and costs.

"These survey results are the early warning signs of a scientific organization
drifting
toward dysfunction," stated PEER Program Director Rebecca Roose, noting that
during the
Bush administration, EPA has been plagued by reports of political suppression of
scientific
results on issues ranging from global warming to asbestos to mercury regulation.
"Thus
far, ORD has chosen to mask problems by initiating an aggressive PR campaign."

The survey results also echo the findings from EPA's Science Advisory Board,
which warned
in a draft report this April that the agency is no longer funding a credible
public health
research program. For example, EPA is falling behind on emerging issues such as
intercontinental pollution transport and nanotechnology.

###

Read the EPA Office of Research and Development 2003 Organizational Climate
Survey Preliminary Results Briefing
(Available upon request)

Look at selected essays from ORD scientists

See the recent draft paper on research shortfalls by EPA's Science Advisory
Board
(Available upon request)

PEER lawsuit to force disclosure of polls of agency scientists
For Immediate Release: March 31, 2005
Contact: Chas Offutt (202) 265-7337

EPA REFUSES TO RELEASE RESULTS OF SCIENTIST SURVEYS — Group Sues to Force
Disclosure of Polls of Agency Scientists

Washington, DC — The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is illegally blocking
the
release of internal surveys of its own scientific staff, according to a federal
lawsuit filed
today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).

PEER had requested copies of extensive employee surveys conducted in 1999, 2001
and
2003 within the EPA Office of Research and Development. ORD consists of a
network of
laboratories and research centers comprised of approximately 2000 scientists in
which
much of the agency's basic and applied science concerning pollution monitoring,
toxicological effects and other public health issues is conducted.

According to agency scientists, the surveys covered a range of topics concerning
how EPA
conducts its science, including questions on scientific integrity and quality,
the adequacy
of resources and the effects of management practices on employee morale. The
three sets
of surveys taken over six years would also allow comparison of scientist
perceptions
during both the Clinton and Bush Administrations.

The PEER suit, filed under the Freedom of Information Act, contends that EPA has
no legal
basis for withholding survey results. EPA is even refusing to disclose copies of
the
questions posed to agency scientists. The agency contends that the survey
materials are
predecisional and thus exempt from release.

"The agency claims that the surveys are part of EPA's `deliberative process'
without
offering any justification as to how or why," stated PEER General Counsel
Richard Condit,
who filed the suit in federal district court in Washington, D.C. "It is
difficult to imagine
what groundbreaking policies the agency might be contemplating based on
six-year-old
survey data."

During the Bush Administration, EPA has been plagued by reports of political
suppression
of scientific results on issues ranging from global warming and mercury
regulation to the
health effects of the toxic fallout from the September 11, 2001 attacks on the
World Trade
Center in New York City.

In February, the Union of Concerned Scientists and PEER released a survey the
two groups
conducted among scientists within the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service. That survey
revealed
high reported levels of political intervention to change scientific conclusions
as well fear of
retaliation for expressing scientific concerns at variance with perceived agency
positions.

"These scientists work within an agency but they work for the public," commented
PEER
Program Director Rebecca Roose who filed the Freedom of Information Act requests
with
EPA. "The public has a right to know if public agency scientists are being
prevented from
doing their jobs by politics."

Next week, Senate confirmation hearings for Stephen Johnson are slated to begin.
President Bush nominated Johnson, a long-time agency official and currently the
Deputy
Administrator, to serve as EPA Administrator. If confirmed Johnson would be the
third EPA
Administrator in the Bush Administration, succeeding former Governors Christie
Whitman
and Mike Leavitt. Several senators have vowed to make political manipulation of
EPA
science an issue in Johnson's hearings.

###
Learn about ORD's tax supported PR campaign

PUBLIC CITIZEN PRESS RELEASE, Aug. 2, 2005

Citizens' Groups Expose Seriously Flawed LES Radioactive Waste Disposal Plan

Public Interest Groups Continue to Press Legal Challenge as Nuclear Agency Hosts
Public
Meeting on Its Environmental and Safety Evaluations of Uranium Enrichment
Facility

As the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) hosts a public meeting this
evening in
Eunice, New Mexico, on its environmental and safety evaluations of a proposed
uranium
enrichment plant near there, the legal challenge being pursued by citizens
groups Public
Citizen (PC) and the Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS) is bringing
to light
the flawed radioactive waste disposal strategy of the company that is seeking a
license to
build and operate the plant.

PC and NIRS are engaged in an intervention against the license application of
Louisiana
Energy Services (LES), a European-led consortium, which they contend lacks a
plausible
strategy for the disposition and disposal of the very large quantities of
depleted uranium
(DU)—a long-lived radioactive and hazardous waste—that would be produced by the
plant.  The issue has become the most contentious concern in the licensing case.

"There remain serious unresolved questions about the ultimate destination of the
extremely harmful radioactive waste that would be produced by the LES plant,"
said
Wenonah Hauter, director of Public Citizen's Critical Mass energy program. 
"Each option
presented by LES and the NRC is flawed, and there is a great likelihood that the
agreement
between LES and the State of New Mexico to remove the plant's waste from the
State will
not be enforced."

Evaluations performed by Public Citizen and NIRS and their expert consultants at
the
Institute for Energy and Environmental Research have shown that the waste
disposal
options presented by LES are not reasonable strategies to handle the massive
amount of
uranium waste that would be produced by the plant:
	 •  WCS option.  LES has identified the Waste Control Specialists (WCS) site in
West
Texas—less than two miles from the site of its proposed National Enrichment
Facility (NEF)
—as a probable disposal destination for its DU waste. But an investigation
performed by
Public Citizen and NIRS experts reveals serious flaws in WCS's application for a
license to
establish a long-term low-level radioactive waste (LLRW) dump at its Andrew
County,
Texas site. Gross inaccuracies and misrepresentations in the application
demonstrate this
company's lack of fitness to accept waste from LES.  Indeed, the Texas
Commission on
Environmental Quality (TCEQ), the licensing authority in Texas, severely
criticized WCS's
license application and site in a July 20 letter to the company, warning WCS
that its facility
design "appears inadequate to appropriately stabilize certain wastes for
disposal,
segregate different classes of radioactive waste, [and] verify by testing the
accurate
classification of waste received for disposal," among other problems, such as an
"inadequate" decommissioning plan, security plan, and emergency plan.

	 •  Envirocare option.  Envirocare of Utah, LLC, a LLRW dump licensed by Utah to
accept "Class A" waste for disposal, is cited in the NRC's final Environmental
Impact
Statement (EIS) as a disposal option for LES.  The NRC notes that Envirocare's
operating
license authorizes it to accept DU in oxide form in such quantities as are
expected to be
produced by LES.  However, recent changes in Envirocare's operating license
bring into
question whether the company may legally accept waste from LES.  In February
2005,
Envirocare withdrew its application to accept "Class B" and "Class C" LLRW—more
highly-
radioactive forms—for disposal.  Though the NRC has termed depleted uranium as
low-
level waste, it has not specified a subcategory, and Public Citizen and NIRS
believe that its
proper classification would be "Greater Than Class C" waste, which would
preclude
Envirocare as a disposal option.  Moreover, it appears that an amendment  to
Envirocare's
operating license, formally adopted on June 13, 2005, would effectively prohibit
the
company from accepting depleted uranium waste in the great quantities that would
be
generated by LES, eliminating it as a disposal option.

	 •  DOE option.  The final EIS cites the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE)
Nevada
Test Site as a possible long-term disposal site for LES's depleted uranium if
ownership of
the waste is transferred to the DOE.  However, the DOE has an abysmal record of
radioactive waste management, exemplified by the massive stockpiles of DU waste
sitting
idle at sites in Kentucky, Ohio, and Tennessee as well as the department's
failure to
properly manage the country's high-level radioactive waste, which continues to
accumulate at nuclear power plants across the country.

	 •  Flawed deal with the State of New Mexico.  Having had most of its
contentions
excluded from hearing in the LES licensing case, the State of New Mexico has
engaged in
an effort to establish licensing conditions for LES that would require it to
ultimately
remove its DU waste from the State.  However, the enforceability of the
conditions that the
parties agreed on is unclear, and the NRC rejected the initial agreement on
those
grounds.  The parties have since offered a new Settlement Agreement that no
longer
includes as a licensing requirement the stipulation that the DOE not operate a
DU
processing plant or dispose of DU waste produced by LES within New Mexico.  The
DOE is
required to accept the plant's DU waste by law, and it is cited in the final EIS
as a disposal
option for LES.  However, the NRC has made it clear that it does not have
jurisdiction over
DU waste once it is transferred to the DOE and could not possibly enforce a
condition that
DOE remove such waste from New Mexico.

	 •  Unrealistic cost estimates.  The cost estimates offered by LES for DU
processing
and disposal are extremely low because they are based on these flawed and
implausible
disposal options.  Proper disposal of LES's DU waste—in a deep geologic
repository—
would raise LES's waste disposal estimates exponentially.

"There is no established site in this country for the safe, long-term disposal
of depleted
uranium, and LES's half-baked plans for disposal do not hold water," said
Michael
Mariotte, executive director of NIRS.  "It would not be prudent to move forward
with this
new facility in the absence of a reasonable strategy for properly disposing of
this waste."

"The net result of LES's flawed waste disposal plans is likely to be a legacy of
long-lived
radioactive waste contamination in New Mexico," said Hauter. 

Public Citizen and NIRS will continue to challenge the license application and
waste
disposal plans of LES in hearings set for this fall.

Contact: Joseph Malherek, PC (202) 454-5109; Michael Mariotte, NIRS (202)
328-0002

I urge all of you parents on my multilists To Please send this information to
your Local
Newspapers and Television Media, The whole world needs to have this
information,This
information, really hits the nail on the head,on the wrong doings,of the EPA,I
strongly urge
you to step up to the plate and furnish the facts contained here to every
newsource ,We
can not tolerate,these Governmental organizations, the EPA and the Bush
Administration,with the willful distruction,of innocent childrends lives,
Bill Heavens, Hope4Kids2.  Please read this factual information provided by my
good friend
Jill In Athens Georgia. Thanks..

Micahsmission@... wrote:


      WHITE COLLAR CRIME AGAINST CHILDREN OF ATHENS IS AN AFFRONT TO CREATOR

The Government Accountability Office, an investigative arm of Congress, 
recently released
an alarming report documenting the failure of the Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA)
to protect the public from chemicals.  On the heals of that report, the Centers
for Disease
Control & Prevention released its most extensive findings ever on our exposures
to
chemicals in the environment revealing the highest concentration of toxic
chemicals are in
our children.   Even unborn babies have tested for hundreds of unsafe pollutants
and
compounds that industry has and continues to emit into our environment.

Those of us who turned out last week to hear what our children will be required
to breathe
when CertainTeed expands, feel our state Environmental Protection Division (EPD)
and
local government have failed to do their #1 job:   to protect the health,
welfare and safety
of its youngest citizens.    I have not given consent to EPD for my children to
breathe
CertainTeed's air toxic emissions increase as has none of the eight hundred
(800) people
who signed a petition.

Weeks before this EPD/ CertainTeed Q&A, I requested to share the formal agenda
with
them to present critical information to the public.  I appealed up the chain of
command
ultimately asking permission from Dr. Carol Couch the head of EPD.      As an
advocate to
improve childhood and adolescent health,  I had hoped to share scientific
evidence
regarding CertainTeed's combustion atmospheric pollutants.    To double these
dangerous
emissions will not only make children sick, it will kill them.

Having been denied to be on the agenda, I suggested EPD inform the public with
an
understandable chemical by chemical analysis of the health effects that
CertainTeed's air
toxins have on fetuses and children.   I also asked that EPD present studies
available on
the combined effects of these chemicals on growing bodies.    Apparently, EPD
didn't think
such information to the public was worthy of their time although children will
be breathing
CertainTeed's migrating cancerous pollutants.

Permitting pollution increases that are unsafe for children which perpetuate
dirty and
dangerous industry appear to be the bottom line for EPD and CertainTeed.    To
degradate
the air and prosper at the expense of human life is appalling.   White collar
crime against
children should not be tolerated.    Local government is sitting on the
sidelines falsely
claiming they are without any power to defend our children.    When the next
election rolls
around, remind them they missed out on the political opportunity of a lifetime: 
shielding
innocent children from corporate abuse of the environment.

CertainTeed is a multi-billion dollar fiberglass insulation manufacturing plant
that has
been irresponsibly dumping their air toxics in our community for over 30 years.
In
operation 24/7/365 days a year,  their smoking stacks can be seen emitting what
CertainTeed wants us to believe is little more than water and air.   That little
more is a lot
of trouble to children.

Combustion atmospheric pollutants were found in 2005 to have a role in the cause
of
childhood cancer.    Childhood cancer experts have discovered that industrial
hotspots like
CertainTeed that emit tons a day of carbon monoxide, VOCs and respirable
particulate
matter pose a health hazard to the community children within 1 kilometer of the
facility.
Inhaled by pregnant women, these carcinogenic atmospheric emissions can cause
chromosomal damage in utero to their unborn offspring which begins the process
that
leads to childhood cancer.      Childhood cancer is the #1 cause of disease
related deaths
in children, and we have our share of it in Athens.     The children in Athens
have one
thing in common:  the air they breathe.

MICAH's Mission will not allow children to become collateral damage of
industries who
could afford to do much better with their pollution control and safer
alternatives.    If GA
EPD, local government and CertainTeed want proof that they are killing kids,
that is exactly
what they will get.

MICAH's Mission has already begun a childhood cancer registry of the area's
children who
have been diagnosed with leukemias, lymphomas, brain and solid tumors.   When
CertainTeed starts their new expansion, we will start monitoring the air and
children.   In
due time, we will have our proof that children are the most effected from
CertainTeed's
greed.  The lack of prevention and precautionary action from our elected
officials will be
embarrassing.

Once the crimes against children have been documented, we will seek out who is
liable.   I
suggest people move away from CertainTeed if possible, but for those that can't,
we will
be here to help reduce the environmental hazards in the lives of your children.

Children are divine gifts from the Creator.    Be assured, God is not mocked. 
The bottom
line that ultimately matters is HIS.


Jill McElheney
MICAH's Mission
P.O. Box 275
Winterville, GA  30683
706.742.7826
Micahsmission@...

http://home.earthlink.net/~avolinch/emfguru-blog/

PBS' "NOW" Program Transcript - Aired on 7/22/2005

http://www.pbs.org/now/transcript/transcriptNOW129_full.html

www.mothballmillstone.org <------- Browser story of Millstone,


THYROID CANCER VICTIM TO DISCUSS
‘CHILDREN AND CANCER IN EAST LYME’

For Immediate Release: July 28, 2005
Contact: Nancy Burton Tel. 203.938.3952

      NIANTIC - The Connecticut Coalition Against Millstone will present a
discussion on
“Children and Cancer in East Lyme� on Monday, August 1, 2005 at the East
Lyme
Library from 6 to 8 P.M.

      The featured speaker will be Rachel Heaton, 27, who spent part of her
childhood in
East Lyme and was diagnosed with a rare form of thyroid cancer at age 25. The
cancer is
believed induced by radiation exposure.

      Rachel has undergone three surgeries to remove the cancerous growth which
her
physicians say is unknown in the medical literature apart from studies of
victims of the
1986 Chernobyl nuclear reactor explosion. The cancer is still active.

      When she was ten years old, Rachel lived in the Attawan Beach area of
Niantic where
she frequently swam and sunbathed.

      Rachel is conducting a health survey among residents of the Niantic area
and filming a
documentary exploring the link between cancer incidences and exposure to
Millstone
radiological and chemical releases.

      The presentation is part of the Coalition’s “Clean Beaches - Close
Millstone�
campaign jointly sponsored by the Connecticut chapter of the Sierra Club.

      The Coalition is campaigning to alert residents of the shoreline
communities
surrounding Millstone to the health risks of exposure to the dozens of nuclear
waste
byproducts - including cesium-137, strontium-90 and iodine-131 - which Millstone
routinely releases to the air and water.
  Thanks Agnes, All Parents need to see this,   Bill  Hope4Kids2

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Wednesday, July 27, 2005
Home > Progressive Community > NewsWire > For Immediate Release

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
JULY 26, 2005
4:08 PM
CONTACT: Union of Concerned Scientists
Eric Young 202-331-5439
Alden Meyer 202-223-6133


National Energy Bill a Dirty and Dangerous Failure
House and Senate Should Reject Legislation

WASHINGTON - July 26 - The Union of Concerned Scientists today urged Congress to
reject an energy bill that ignores our oil dependence, fails to promote
renewable energy,
disregards global warming, and even raises the risk of nuclear terrorism.

"For the third time in four years, Congress is on the brink of passing an energy
bill that
will pollute our air and water while costing the average consumer more money,"
said Alden
Meyer, Director of Strategy and Policy for the Union of Concerned Scientists.
"This bill does
virtually nothing to relieve the twin energy burdens on energy consumers -- high
gasoline
prices and high home energy costs - and adds insult to injury by jeopardizing
the security
of every American."

The House conferees ignored overwhelming evidence that renewable energy will
save
consumers money and stripped the renewable electricity standard (also known as a
renewable portfolio standard) from the final bill. The renewable standard, which
passed
the Senate with bi-partisan support, would have required major electric
companies to
gradually increase sales of electricity from wind, solar, and other renewable
sources from
two percent today to about 10 percent by 2020.

"The energy bill funnels billions of dollars in taxpayer money to polluting
industries while
ignoring practical solutions to global warming such as a renewable electricity
standard,
which would create jobs, spur economic development and save consumers money,"
said
Meyer. "The legislation also includes a provision that will harm U.S. energy
security by
increasing our oil dependence. The proposed extension of the "dual-fuel vehicle"
loophole
in the energy bill will increase our gasoline consumption by 10 billion gallons
through
2015, increasing oil demand in 2014 alone by nearly 130,000 barrels per day.* At
the
same time, the energy bill ignores conventional technology that could increase
fuel
economy, generate hundreds of thousands of new jobs, and save consumers billions
at the
pump."

The small bright spot for vehicles policy is a radically pared down tax credit
package for
hybrids and other advanced technology vehicles.

One of the most startling aspects of the bill is a provision that would severely
weaken
export controls on highly enriched uranium, the key ingredient in the most basic
nuclear
weapons. If terrorists were to acquire about 100 pounds of this material they
could
fashion a crude but devastating nuclear explosive in short order.

"At a time when the threat of nuclear terrorism is growing, Congress should not
make it
easier for highly enriched uranium to fall into the wrong hands," said Dr. Ed
Lyman, a
senior scientist in UCS's Global Security Program. "This reckless provision is
reason
enough to reject the energy bill."


* This loophole allows automakers to receive credit toward meeting fuel economy
standards by selling vehicles that have the capability of running on alternative
fuel but
almost always run on gasoline.

From:
"Public Citizen" <publiccitizen@...>  Add to Address Book
To:
Hope4Kids2@...
Subject:
  Stop the Bush Energy Policy: TODAY!

 
 http://action.citizen.org/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=998
 
 

July 27, 2005

Dear Public Citizen Activist:

The Bush energy policy is finally coming to a vote in Congress.  NOW is the time
to let your
elected officials know that you don't support this regressive legislation, which
grew from
the infamous energy 'task force' headed by Vice President Dick Cheney. Tell your
elected
officials to oppose the energy bill because:
	 •  It gives massive, unjustified subsidies to the mature and lucrative nuclear
and
fossil fuel energy industries
	 •  It repeals vital consumer protections contained in the Public Utility
Holding
Company Act (PUHCA)
	 •  It keeps the U.S. dependent on foreign energy sources and fails to mandate
improvements in automobile fuel economy.

TAKE ACTION!
What can you do? Intense pressure from concerned citizens will help defeat this
anti-
consumer legislation. KEEP IT GOING and do it NOW (lawmakers could vote as soon
as
today).  Please CALL your senators and representative and urge them to oppose
this
regressive legislation! Connect TOLL-FREE via the U.S. Capitol Switchboard at
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CLICK HERE to send an e-mail to your elected officials. Need more info? CLICK
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Sincerely,

Joseph Malherek
Public Citizen's Critical Mass Energy and Environment Program

Would you like to sign
-->http://action.citizen.org/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=998

White County seeking funds for cleaner water
By JANE GRILLO
For The Times

Andy Allen brushes her teeth in the morning with water out of a container.

She uses tap water only to flush toilets and wash her clothes since she was
diagnosed with
sarcoidosis, a chronic illness affecting the lungs, from her exposure to the
toxins in her
water.

"We've had many people who got cancer and the children have been sick, too," she
said.
"We had people from Emory (University) come out and look at our community's
health
situation. You just never realize how sick bad water can make you."

Allen and her 34 neighbors in the Bean Creek Community of White County have had
to use
containers of water for more than a year now because the wells in their
community tested
positive for extremely high levels of coliform, E. coli and lead.

Well water testing was recently performed by Paul Vendrell of the UGA
Agricultural and
Environmental Lab.

On Wednesday, White County Commissioners conducted a public hearing as part of
the
application process for a $200,000 no-interest Georgia Environmental Facilities
Authority
loan to help pay for a community well and water system.

The county has also applied for an additional $500,000 grant from GEFA.

The cost for the entire project is $1.2 million. Additional help came from a
donation of
land by Sautee-Nacoochee resident Walter Lumsden for a possible well site.

The remaining $700,000 will have to come from GEFA.

The effort is being led by the Friends of Bean Creek, an organization formed to
find a way
to get a new water system for this historic community.

Allen currently serves as president of the organization.

Cathy Harpe, a member of Friends of Bean Creek, got involved when she purchased
a
home in the Bean Creek area.

She has her own well, which was considered safe after tests, and works as office
manager
of the Sautee-Nacoochee Community Center.

Harpe's involvement stems from her worries about the health of her neighbors.
She works
with local and state agencies to help dig up resources to save this community.

Friends of Bean Creek was awarded a $500,000 Community Development Bloc Grant
from
the Georgia Department of Community Health last September. That grant is not
enough to
pay for the whole project, which includes fire protection and pipe system,
holding tank,
well testing and drilling and connection to homes.

While funding is being sought, the White County Water Authority transports water
into
Bean Creek every week in a 500-gallon "Buffalo" tank.

"The Water Authority must be sick of doing this by now," said Caroline
Crittenden, project
coordinator for the Bean Creek History Project and active Friends of Bean Creek
member,
said after Wednesday's hearing.

"They have to take the truck back to the water plant, sanitize it, then refill
and test the
water every week," she said. "This has been going on for a year."

Harpe told commissioners at the hearing that the tank is "extremely
inconvenient" for
residents who have to go back and forth with containers to collect water every
day.

The residents indeed are tired. Sabrina Dorsey said after the meeting, "If these
were
$300,000 homes the county would have already fixed this by now."

Harpe said that the application for the GEFA loan will go before that board in
late August.
She added that it is "not common for a community to begin work without a
commitment
from the grant agency."

"This is our top priority," said Bob Hirschi, chairman of the White County Water
Authority.
"If we could be sure we could get our money back, we'd start working now."

The project engineer said once it begins, the work could be completed in nine to
12
months.

So, while Bean Creek residents thirst for work to begin, Allen said her
neighbors will still
have to "pour Clorox in the bath for their children."

E-mail: news@...

Originally published Sunday, July 24, 2005

July 24, 2005
Dioxin fuels Nitro fears
Chemical residue found in some homes; Monsanto lawsuit prompts EPA
inquiry

By Ken Ward Jr.
Staff writer
Behind a chain-link fence in a far corner of Nitro, workers continue
to tear down and clean
up what is left of the former Monsanto Co. chemical plant.

A month ago, rusted old chemical tanks littered the site along the
Kanawha River. Today, it
is mostly piles of concrete and other rubble.

Across town, other remnants of Monsanto's 50-year history remain
hidden in the dust
inside residents' homes and in the dirt of their backyards.


Dozens of homes in this community are polluted with what residents
fear are dangerous
levels of the toxic chemical dioxin, according to records filed in
court and with
government agencies.

Tests also show that some longtime residents have measurable amounts
of dioxin in their
blood.

"The town of Nitro is contaminated," said Charleston lawyer
Stuart Calwell.

In December, Calwell sued Monsanto and several related companies to
try to force a
cleanup.

Calwell also is trying to get medical testing and compensation for
people like Jimmy Agee,
a 69-year-old former Union Carbide worker and lifelong Nitro resident.

"My house is basically worthless," Agee said. "It's
full of dioxin. This place is eaten up with
it. Who wants to buy a house with this stuff in it?"

Nobody knows what this dioxin contamination is doing to residents.
Nobody has really
tried to find out.

In Minnesota, federal regulators found much lower levels of dioxin in
household dust near
a former wood-treatment plant. Two months ago, the U.S. Environmental
Protection
Agency ordered the company to clean up the homes.

But in Nitro, nobody has done anything — until now.

Last week, the EPA asked another federal agency, the Agency for Toxic
Substances and
Disease Registry, to study the matter.

EPA officials also said their staff scientists will examine dioxin
samples that Calwell
provided after collecting them as part of his lawsuit against
Monsanto.

"We're concerned about people's health," said David
Sternberg, a spokesman for the EPA's
regional office in Philadelphia.

"If data comes in, we would evaluate it to determine if we have
to take action or perform
more evaluation," Sternberg said.

A new molecule is born

On Dec. 23, 1917, Nitro was born as a literal World War I boomtown.

That day, the federal government broke ground on the first of 27,
200-bed barracks at the
site of the present Nitro city park, according to a history of the
town by William D. Wintz.

The site, about 15 miles from Charleston, became home to one of the
War Department's
large gunpowder plants. The name "Nitro" came from the
chemical term Nitro-Cellulose,
which was the type of gunpowder to be produced.

When the war ended, private companies took over the government
buildings, and
converted them into chemical plants.

Monsanto Co. acquired its Nitro site from Rubber Services Industries.
The company made
rubber chemicals for the tire industry.

In about 1947, Monsanto's agricultural division designed a new
molecule. In its pure form,
this molecule was called 2,4,5-trichlorophenoxyacidic acid, or
2,4,5-T.

This new substances killed plants. It made their roots outgrow their
leaves. Plants
destroyed themselves through defoliation.

In 1949, Monsanto started making this powerful herbicide ingredient
in Nitro.

Workers cooked batches of it in large pots, called autoclaves, rather
than making it
through a continuing production stream.
  Ken Ward Jr.
Staff writer
(Page 2 of 3)

Dioxin has been linked to cancer, birth defects, learning
disabilities, endometriosis,
infertility and suppressed immune functions. The chemical builds up
in tissue over time,
meaning that even small exposures can accumulate to dangerous levels.

In the December lawsuit, filed in Putnam Circuit Court, Calwell
explained that much of the
dioxin waste from the Monsanto plant made its way into the Kanawha
River. Residents are
urged not to eat certain fish because they contain unsafe levels of
the chemical.

But, the lawsuit alleged, Monsanto also was the source of
dioxin-contaminated dust. Once
airborne, the dust "was carried by prevailing winds over the town
of Nitro, surrounding
communities and the plaintiffs' homes and businesses," the
lawsuit alleged.


Residents have sought to have their case declared a class action on
behalf of more than
25,000 current or former Nitro residents.

No `big alarm'

In May 2004, Calwell hired a contractor to collect dust samples from
Nitro homes. He
hired a lab to test those samples for dioxin. The contractors tested
more than a dozen
homes. They found levels of dioxin that ranged from 16 parts per
trillion to 1,210 parts
per trillion.

There are no regulatory standards for dioxin in indoor dust. But the
EPA's recommended
cancer guideline is 4.3 parts per trillion. The state's cleanup
trigger for residential soils is
3.9 parts per trillion.

In February, Calwell sent the EPA and the West Virginia Department of
Environmental
Protection letters about the test results.

Randy Sturgeon, an EPA chemical engineer and project manager, said
the data did not
"raise a big alarm" inside his agency.

"We came to the conclusion that it was not a health threat that
warranted further
investigation on our part," Sturgeon said in mid-June.

At the DEP, officials have decided to let federal regulators handle
the situation.

"I feel more comfortable with EPA in the lead," said Ken
Ellison, director of the DEP's
Division of Land Restoration. "I believe that EPA has more
resources and more levels of
support than we do."

The latest in the dioxin battle

The December lawsuit is far from Calwell's first battle with
Monsanto over dioxin.

In the mid-1980s, Calwell spent more than 10 months in trial trying
to prove that seven
Monsanto workers were made sick by handling dioxin-contaminated
2,4,5-T.

A federal court jury returned a verdict against the workers. After
the trial, Calwell and his
clients blamed rulings by U.S. District Judge John T. Copenhaver to
not allow some of the
workers' key evidence, according to press reports from the time.
Among other things,
Copenhaver would not let Calwell use an EPA map showing dioxin
contamination at the
Nitro plant in 1983 — more than a decade after Monsanto stopped
making its
contaminated herbicide.

In 1983 and again in 1985, the EPA and Monsanto agreed to deals under
which the
company was to clean up the Nitro site.

Today, though, the area remains polluted.

In a July 2000 report, the EPA said the Kanawha River contains unsafe
and illegal levels of
dioxin. The EPA said it should be cleaned up, but the agency proposed
no specific steps
and has not ordered any action.

In August 2000, Calwell sued Monsanto on behalf of a group of
residents along Heizer and
Manila creeks near Nitro. The residents allege that the dumping of
dioxin wastes by the
company polluted their properties.

The residents sought to expand the Supreme Court's 1999
"medical monitoring" ruling to
also allow lawsuits to force polluters to pay for property
monitoring. In December 2002,
the court declined to do so. That lawsuit continues, though, as
residents seek other
damages for Monsanto's pollution.

Meanwhile, Monsanto lawyers have cited the 1983 and 1985 EPA orders
as reason for the
Heizer/Manila lawsuit and the more recent Nitro case to be dismissed.

Charles Love, one of Monsanto's lawyers, argued that the EPA
orders pre-empt any effort
by the residents to sue. If the EPA has or is taking action, Love
argued, then residents
cannot file their own lawsuit.

In Putnam Circuit Court, Judge O.C. Spaulding rejected Love's
argument.

Last week, Love sought to move the case to U.S. District Court in
Charleston.

In an interview last month, he said he had not examined Calwell's
dioxin test results.

"We're too early in the litigation to have reached that
point," Love said.

Glynn Young, a Monsanto corporate media spokesman, said the company
did not take
Calwell's test results too seriously.

"Yes, these kinds of things need to be looked into, and if this
information had come from
anybody but a plaintiffs' attorney, it might have been handled
differently," Young said.
Monsanto made 2,4,5-T in Nitro for more than 30 years.

In its best-known use, the federal government bought 2,4,5-T to make
Agent Orange, the
defoliant deployed widely in the Vietnam War. About 11 million
gallons of Agent Orange
was sprayed on the jungles of Vietnam, Vietnamese citizens and U.S.
soldiers.

But 2,4,5-T was contaminated. Every batch of it contained 2,3,7,8
tetrachlorodibenzo-
para-dioxin. This chemical is also known as 2,3,7,8 TCCD — or,
more commonly, as
dioxin.
(Page 3 of 3)

"Lawsuits of this nature are not uncommon," Young said.
"This is what a lot of people do
for a living. We have been down this road before with Mr. Calwell 20
years ago."

Two cases, different result

In north-central Minnesota, St. Regis Paper Co. operated a
wood-treatment plant for more
than 30 years. The 125-acre site northeast of Duluth is on the Leech
Lake Indian
Reservation between Pike Bay and Cass Lake.

- advertisement -

Starting in the 1950s, lumber was pressure treated with creosote and
chemicals called
pentachlorphenol and copper chromium arsenate. This process generated
various types of
pollution, including dioxin and arsenic.

In 1984, the EPA added the site to its Superfund program, putting it
on the priority list for
toxic waste cleanups.

In October 2004, contractors tested homes in the area for dioxin
dust. They found
concentrations ranging from 0.234 parts per trillion to 240 parts per
trillion.

The EPA said in a report that, "the amount of indoor dust
concentration from the site
exceeded what the EPA considers to be acceptable for six of the 10
homes sampled."

As a result, the EPA proposed to order International Paper, which now
owns the site, to
clean up the homes.

The science behind such an action is fairly new. The EPA based it on
work done to study
and clean up the former World Trade Center site in lower Manhattan.

"We're taking a conservative approach to what we've
found," said Tim Drexler, the EPA's
project manager for the cleanup.

In Nitro, the median dioxin dust concentration for the 33 homes
Calwell tested was 238
parts per trillion — roughly the same as the highest
concentration the EPA found at the
Minnesota homes.

EPA officials say they are not convinced the numbers can be
accurately compared.

In Minnesota, the dust samples were taken from living areas inside
the homes. In Nitro,
Calwell's firm collected dust from attics and crawl spaces.

Sturgeon, the EPA project manager in Nitro, said the living-area
samples more accurately
reflect ongoing exposure. But Sturgeon agreed with Calwell that attic
samples give a better
estimate of how much dioxin has been in the home over a longer period
of time — say,
since the Monsanto plant last made 2,4,5-T in the early 1970s.

"If you want to know, over history, what accumulation of dioxin
you had in a home, attic
dust is one of the few places you could look," Sturgeon said.

`Wouldn't you be concerned?'

Since he filed the lawsuit, Calwell has collected more dust samples
in Nitro.

In court, he also is trying to halt the efforts of Monsanto to shed
itself of any liability for
pollution of the Nitro area. He hopes to avoid having that liability
wiped out as part of a
bankruptcy proceeding for one of Monsanto's successor companies.

At the EPA's regional office in Philadelphia, officials have
agreed to re-examine the Nitro
situation based on the additional dust samples.

In Charleston, officials from the state Bureau for Public
Health's ATSDR program are
reviewing that data at the EPA's request.

Barbara Smith, an epidemiologist with that program, said she is not
sure yet if the data
Calwell collected will give her agency enough to do a complete study.

"Just getting numbers is not going to be enough," Smith said.
"We've got numbers, but
we're not sure we have enough data."

If that's the case, Smith said, her agency might ask the EPA to
do its own sampling to
provide adequate data for a study.

Eric Carlson, an EPA liaison officer in Wheeling, said it would not
be fair to say his agency
is not doing anything about the dioxin problem in Nitro.

Carlson cited a March 2004 EPA deal in which Monsanto agreed to do a
new study of
dioxin contamination in the Kanawha River. As a result of that deal,
contractors for
Monsanto performed new fish sampling in the Kanawha.

"I wouldn't say nobody is doing anything," Carlson said.
"There is a significant amount of
work being done about the river."

Residents say more studies of the river are small consolation for
them.

"I'm concerned about the damage that has been done," said
Ross Stone, who has lived in
Nitro for 55 years and in the same house for 52 years. "I'm
interested to find out just
exactly what the outcome is going to be, how it affects people."

Joan Dixon, a 45-year Nitro resident, said, "There's dioxin
in my attic, and in my yard, too.
Wouldn't you be concerned?"

To contact staff writer Ken Ward Jr., use e-mail or call 348-1702.

Date: Tue, 19 Jul 2005 16:13:00 -0400
    From: "Susan Hammond" <shammond@...>
Subject: Depleted Uranium: States Take Action to Protect Their Soldiers
and Veterans

Articles : Iraq


Depleted Uranium: States Take Action to Protect Their Soldiers and
Veterans


Tue, 19 Jul 2005 06:17:50 -0700

_NEWS IMAGE_

  DU rounds

By Kevin Zeese

Louisiana passes law giving returning veterans the right to get tested

Louisiana recently passed legislation giving all returning veterans the
right to get a best practices health screening test for exposure to
depleted
uranium. Interviewed here is Bob Smith, one of the activists that
helped
make this bill possible. He is with the Louisiana Activist Network. He
is
also I am a member of Veterans for Peace and the Viet Nam Veterans
Against
the War. Born a Texan and raised in a Navy family with three siblings,
moved
to Louisiana in 1977 a few years after returning from Viet Nam. He
worked
with adolescents in a psychiatric hospital where he met his wife, a
co-worker, returning to the military and retired eight years ago as a
Command Sergeant Major. He became actively involved the day Congress
gave
the President unconstitutional, power to make war on Iraq and has been
active ever since in the peace movement and with the Presbyterian
Church.

Zeese: What made you pursue legislation regarding depleted uranium in
Louisiana?

Smith: As a twenty year veteran I have been concerned about veterans
health
since I returned from Viet Nam. From first hand experience I knew the
treatment of veterans by our country was highly inadequate after their
service. Each year after Gulf War I, more and more veterans were being
diagnosed with a mysterious illness, Gulf War Syndrome (GWS) without
significant research for cause and effect much like what happened with
Agent
Orange contamination.

I learned about how the government dealt with Agent Orange
contamination
during the eighties as an outreach counselor at the VA's Viet Nam
Veterans
Outreach Center or Vet Center here in New Orleans. We were actively
involved
in trying to alert the VA to the effects of Agent Orange contamination.
For
twenty five years a government study done by the Rand Corporation
denied any
cause and effect between Agent Orange and health problems experienced
by
veterans and their offspring. Just this week the VA has finally
recognized
the connection between Agent Orange and diabetes. Remember the last
troops
returned from Viet Nam over thirty years ago. Worth mentioning is that
the
same Rand Corporation now denies any cause and effect between depleted
uranium contamination and health.

Late last year after a lot of reading I found out about depleted
uranium. In
January at the Jazz Funeral for Democracy, a peace march in New Orleans
organized by the Louisiana Activist Network, I met a young Gulf War I
veteran, Dennis Kyne. He talked with me about what he knew first hand
as a
combat medic about illnesses of our veterans even before they returned
home
and what he has found out about DU since returning home. I then did
more
research and studying. In March I met Leuren Moret, a geoscientist, who
reaffirmed everything that Dennis Kyne had told me and reaffirmed what
I had
been reading. I then did more research and studying including
conversation
with Doug Rokke. Doug was the overall supervisor in charge of the
clean-up
after Gulf War I and is an expert in depleted uranium. Thirty to forty
percent of his team are now dead.

I then became concerned about what could be done to bring this issue
out
into the public conversation. Leuren told me about a young lady in
Connecticut, Melissa Sterry, who was doing something about it. Working
with
Rep Patricia Dillon of Connecticut they were introducing a bill to have
all
of their state's veterans tested. The always unselfish Melissa
willingly
shared a copy of the Connecticut bill with me. Melissa had been a
member of
a depleted uranium clean-up team after Gulf War I. She herself was very
sick
and had six of her eight team members die since returning home. All six
were
less than thirty-five years old.

Taking the Connecticut bill, changing the name to a Louisiana bill, and
making a few minor amendments preceded a call to my Louisiana
congressperson, Rep. Jalila Jefferson-Bullock. The submission deadline
was
less than twenty-four hours after our meeting. Rep. Juan LaFonta
sponsored
and Rep. Jefferson-Bullock co-sponsored the bill. The deadline was
made.

Zeese: What does the legislation accomplish?

Smith: The legislation will allow all returning veterans to have the
right
to get a best practices health screening test for exposure to depleted
uranium. The test will use a bioassay procedure involving sensitive
methods
capable of detecting depleted uranium at low levels and the use of
equipment
with the capacity to discriminate between different radioisotopes in
naturally occurring levels of uranium and the characteristic ratio and
marker for depleted uranium.

This test will determine if a soldier has been contaminated. It will
prevent
mis-diagnosis so soldiers are not given the wrong medications that
usually
make them sicker. It will allow the contaminated soldier to decide
about
parenting further offspring who have an increased chance of serious
birth
illnesses or defects.

The bill also prescribes a reporting mechanism from the Louisiana's
Attorney
General to the legislature that requires that awareness sessions and
training have been done as required by Army regulations.

Zeese: What tips do you have for activists in other states interested
in
pursuing this in their state?

Smith: Stay focused. Depleted uranium testing is for discovery of
contamination of a very hazardous material made from radioactive
nuclear
waste. This is something that truly supports the troops. Remind your
elected
representatives of that often. Read, study, and discuss with the
experts and
others experienced in this type of legislation. Other advocates should
remember that the weapons manufacturers do not want this in the public.
They
make a lot of money off this death bringing material. Likewise the
military
does not want to give up these very effective offensive weapons
regardless
of how it effects our soldiers or civilians, enemy soldiers, or the
environment. Although we did not encounter resistance from those two
potential adversaries, weapons manufacturers or the military, others
might
and they should be prepared to bring in experts. Having veterans
testify
helps. Another veteran, Ward Reilly, from Baton Rouge was instrumental
in
helping get the bill through committee.

Zeese: What were some of the challenges you faced with this legislation
and
how did you overcome them?

Smith: The only real obstacle we encountered was educating our
representative. We knew we would have to educate her and do it quickly
but
fortunately she agreed to a minimum one-hour meeting. We were lucky as
both
representatives cared deeply about our troops and taking care of them
after
they come home. There were no other obstacles.

Zeese: What are your next steps?

Smith: We have been having awareness sessions at coffeehouses and
public
events to educate the public, either by passing out literature, making
educational speeches, posting literature on the internet, or showing
documentaries. We are also communicating with advocates in other states
by
sharing information, resources, networking, and offering tips to help.
And
if that doesn't work I may just stand on top of the roof and scream out
the
truth.

Note: I retired after 20 years in the Army and National Guard as a
Command
Sergeant Major, serving three tours in Viet Nam as a Special Forces
Green
Beret and was mobilized for Desert Storm. Education includes a Bachelor
of
Arts in Sociology and a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering.
Currently employed as an engineer living in New Orleans with Julie my
wife
and life partner for over twenty-six years and our dog, Maggie. Member
of
Veterans for Peace, Viet Nam Veterans Against the War, and the
Louisiana
Activist Network.

Kevin Zeese is a director of Democracy Rising. You can comment on this
column on his blog spot at DemocracyRising.US
<http://democracyrising.us/> .

For more on DU, see GNN's book  <http://gnn.tv/articles/717/True_Lies>
True
Lies. Authors Lappé and Marshall travel to Iraq to conduct their own
radiation tests.





Susan Hammond

Deputy Director

Fund for Reconciliation and Development

355 West 39th Street

New York, NY 10018

Tel: 212-760-9903

Fax: 212-760-9906

Email: shammond@...

http://www.ffrd.org

Date: Thu, 21 Jul 2005 13:37:12 -0400
    From: Tara Thornton <Tara@...>
Subject: DOD REJECTS EPA PLAN FOR FEDERAL CONSENSUS ON RISK, CLEANUP
LEVELS

*As part of interagency dispute*

*DOD REJECTS EPA PLAN FOR FEDERAL CONSENSUS ON RISK, CLEANUP LEVELS*

*_______________________________________________*

*Date: July 22, 2005 - *



As part of a heated interagency dispute over the way EPA reviews the
toxicity of major industrial chemicals, the Defense Department (DOD) is
urging the agency to fundamentally rework a controversial plan for
building consensus among federal agencies on chemical risk and
regulatory determinations.



DOD's criticisms come even though the agency drafted the plan to
address
concerns raised by the department and other agencies that EPA's
assessments were overly conservative and did not reflect their input,
federal sources say. The sources also say the criticisms could
undermine
EPA's control of the program.



In closely held DOD comments obtained by /Inside EPA/, DOD blasts the
plan, saying the proposal's three opportunities for incorporating the
views of other agencies do not ensure adequate input. The comments also
call for stricter scientific standards for revising EPA risk estimates
and claim the plan allows review by members of the public, such as
environmental groups, too early in the process. /Relevant documents are
available on InsideEPA.com./



A DOD source says officials from the departments of Transportation and
Energy and the National Aeronautics & Space Administration filed
"similar comments" earlier this month on the plan, increasing the
pressure on EPA to revamp the approach. EPA officials who lead the
program declined to comment on the other agencies' responses to the
plan, saying they are still under review.



The DOD comments/ /come in the wake of concerns Senate Democrats raised
during EPA confirmation hearings and in a recent letter to EPA
Administrator Steve Johnson that other agencies and the White House
Office of Management & Budget (OMB) may be granted too broad a role in
EPA toxic reviews under the agency's proposal.



The comments attack EPA's plan to reform a key agency database of
chemical risk values known as the Integrated Risk Information System
(IRIS) used by state and federal regulators in setting environmental
standards and cleanup levels at contaminated sites.



EPA's plan would broaden outside parties' ability to weigh in on agency
risk reviews of toxics and allow other federal agencies up to three
chances to get involved with EPA chemical reviews. It includes a
"technical correction" step early in the process during which industry,
environmental groups, other agencies and the public would be able to
submit initial feedback on the scientific approach taken by EPA before
firm risk estimates are generated. It also incorporates internal
reviews
by EPA program offices, external peer review, and the resolution of
disputes among agencies by White House science and regulatory
officials.



But in June 29 comments, DOD rejects the plan, saying it "outlines an
unnecessarily cumbersome process with little meaningful interagency
involvement" and offers a new six-step plan that would formalize
oversight of EPA toxics reviews by other agencies.



DOD's comments say the six-step plan would "ensure interagency and peer
review in accordance with EPA and OMB Guidance" by expanding the role
other agencies play in selecting which chemicals will be updated in
IRIS
each year, ensuring a comprehensive toxicological review, and
solidifying DOD and other agency input into reviews.



DOD claims EPA needs stricter scientific criteria to ensure IRIS
updates
meet a basic threshold for scientific data and cites recent agency
reviews of the widespread toxics perchlorate and trichloroethylene as
examples of reviews that may not meet strict scientific standards.



"The lack of defensible, data-driven scientific evidence to define
fundamental questions, such as the mode of action, forces the use of
less defensible and controversial uncertainty factors and other
policy-driven calculations in IRIS updates," according to the comments.
Such factors are frequently contested by responsible parties in debates
over agency approaches to chemical risk assessments and are part of a
broader, separate review of agency risk practices and principles
currently underway.



But an EPA scientist says this recommendation strains credulity. "Are
they really saying that unless we have a complete understanding of how
a
chemical functions in the body, we can't do anything to update our
knowledge about it? If DOD has their way on this, EPA will be waiting a
long time to complete a long backlog of regulations and the department
may move to put their own standards in place in the interim." The
source
adds that, "Because DOD and other agencies are responsible parties,
this
would be like industry selecting its own cleanup standards."



Another EPA source says that if the DOD comments are adopted, "IRIS
would be a process we no longer run."



DOD also rejects an agency plan to release IRIS drafts to the public
for
a first round of review. "'Trying the case in the public' . . .
increases the potential for a politicized debate before the scientific
issues are developed and appropriately vetted," according to the
comments. Instead, DOD recommends that the public be allowed to comment
during the final step of their proposed substitute plan, "following
approvals from external peer review and the Interagency Working Group."



According to the DOD source, this would prevent preliminary draft
numbers from "creating chaos" with standard-setting processes in states
like California and Massachusetts before the science is settled. "We
don't want to have to cleanup more than is necessary because it
ultimately costs the taxpayer more money," the source says.



Finally, DOD calls for more defined roles and responsibilities in the
IRIS process in which the Department of Health & Human Services would
review EPA assessments to "ensure that public health technical findings
accurately reflect the weight-of-evidence in the literature."
Similarly,
the Occupational Safety & Health Administration would review EPA
assessments to ensure their consistency in the area of occupational
health under DOD's recommendation.



The DOD source says this is to ensure that EPA stops ignoring studies
that show no health effects while linking risk and regulatory
determinations to studies that show slight effects at very low levels.



The issue of IRIS reforms also came up during the confirmation hearing
of EPA's nominee for deputy administrator, Marcus Peacock, on July 14.
Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) said he was "very concerned" about EPA's
new IRIS plan and Peacock said the proposed changes were to identify
and
resolve issues early in the process and to increase transparency.



In addition, in a July 6 letter to Johnson, Sens. Jim Jeffords (I-VT),
Barbara Boxer (D-CA) and Lautenberg say the new plan may reduce the
credibility of and slow down EPA scientific decisions on "issues
ranging
from chemical safety to Superfund cleanup levels." The letter says that
according to recent reports, the proposed changes were in "response to
pressure from the departments of Defense and Energy. If correct, this
heightens our concern that these changes would create potential
conflicts of interest and could compromise the Agency's ability to
protect the environment and public health."



EPA officials say they have been taken aback by DODs response, with one
source noting, "We need an honest process that incorporates outside
comments and ensures we don't have a thumb on the scale. But we also
need one that does not throw out the existing policy framework for risk
assessment." -- /Steve Gibb/









*Source: Inside EPA via InsideEPA.com*

*Date: July 22, 2005 *

*Issue: Vol. 26, No. 29 *

*© Inside Washington Publishers*

Lawsuits filed in S. Florida allege Teflon is linked to cancer

By Ann W. O'Neill
Staff Writer
Posted July 20 2005

For 20 years, one of the nation's biggest chemical companies covered up findings
that
superheated Teflon, the nonstick cookware coating dubbed "the housewife's best
friend,"
can make people sick, a series of federal lawsuits charged Tuesday.

Suits filed in eight states, including Florida, claim Teflon's maker, E.I.
DuPont de Nemours
Co., told the public the product was safe "for conventional kitchen use" when it
knew
Teflon heated above 680 degrees emits toxic chemicals and gases linked to birth
defects,
tumors and cancer in lab animals.


A chemical known as PFOA, or C-8, is responsible for Teflon's nonstick quality.
When
exposed to high heat, it breaks down into toxins, the lawsuit states. The toxins
have been
linked to such ailments as "Polymer Fume Flu" and intestinal and testicular
cancer.

DuPont maintained Tuesday that Teflon is safe. The company "will vigorously
defend itself
against the allegations raised in this lawsuit," spokesman R. Clifton Webb said
in an e-
mailed statement. He noted that anything cooked at such high heat would be
inedible.

Although questions about the safety of Teflon have lingered for years, a
scientific review
panel last month advised the federal Environmental Protection Agency in a draft
report
that the chemical is "likely" to cause cancer in humans.

DuPont is disputing the finding. Nonetheless, it provided the impetus for the
spate of civil
suits, attorneys said. They added that lawsuits would be filed in nearly all 50
states within
a few weeks.

DuPont also faces a criminal inquiry. A federal grand jury in Washington, D. C.,
subpoenaed company records this month. The inquiry is being conducted by the
U.S.
Justice Department's economic crimes section, the suits state.

The lawsuits accuse DuPont of deceptive and unfair trade practices and seek
class action
status as well as warning labels and a large fund to notify consumers, replace
their
cookware, monitor their health and conduct research.

"We're simply telling them to do the right thing," said Fort Lauderdale lawyer
Roy
Oppenheim, who represents 11 people from Broward County. "I grew up with Teflon
being
a revered name. Everybody who bought these pots and pans should be given a
choice to
buy others."

The first of the suits was filed in Miami early Tuesday and has been assigned to
U.S.
District Court Judge Shelby Highsmith. Others followed in California, New York,
Texas,
Illinois, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan.

Teflon, DuPont's trademark for the chemical polytetrafluoroethylene, was
invented in
1938. First sold in 1946, Teflon is now a $2 billion-a-year industry.

According to the suit, DuPont may have suspected PFOA's toxic effect as early as
1961.
And, the company has known about widespread PFOA blood contamination since a
1981
worker study -- a link the lawsuits claim was not passed on to the EPA.

If the plaintiffs prevail, the impact would be immense. As DuPont boasts on its
Web site,
"Teflon is really everywhere."

But the plaintiffs' lawyers see it as a matter of corporate accountability.

"I believe the American consumer has the right to be notified," said Miami
lawyer Alan
Kluger.

"I don't have to prove that it causes cancer. I only have to prove that DuPont
lied in a
massive attempt to continue selling their product."

Meanwhile, the scientific review panel is expected to submit its report to the
EPA by the
end of the month.

EPA already has concluded that DuPont failed to meet federal reporting
requirements on
PFOA between 1981 and 2001, but the company disputes that in court. No agreement
has
been reached yet.

Earlier this year, DuPont settled a 2001 class-action suit workers filed over
PFOA.

DuPont set aside $70 million in February to pay for medical screenings for many
of the
80,000 Ohio and West Virginia residents who live near one of the company's
plants. PFOA
was found in the water supply

Ann W. O'Neill can be reached at awoneill@... or 954-356-4531.

CDC results are in: We're full of contaminants
Study offers tool to assess threat of synthetic chemicals
By Douglas Fischer, STAFF WRITER

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released its third
assessment of the
nation's chemical body burden Thursday, and as expected it shows we're all
contaminated
with a stew of pesticides, solvents, plastics and metals that we pick up daily
from our
material world.
The release, called a "watershed event" by various public health officials and
scientists,
offers regulators and researchers alike a powerful tool to assess the threat
posed by
environmental contaminants and to guide public health decisions in the future.

"If you compare this to space exploration, we're now putting together the Hubble
telescope," said Thomas Burke, chairman of the National Academy of Science's
Committee
on Human Biomonitoring for Environmental Toxicants.

"We're on the threshold of great progress."

The assessment, the CDC's Third National Report on Human Exposure to
Environmental
Chemicals, details the U.S. population's exposure to 148 different compounds
that are
either found in consumer goods and manufacturing byproducts or have been banned
from
the market.

The findings offer both good and bad news:

-Children in many instances have higher concentrations of pollutants than
adults, a
finding particularly true for many heavy metals, pesticides and a family of
chemicals called
"phthalates" used to increase plastic's flexibility and resiliency.

-The most common insect-killer used in homes today — a third-generation family
of
insecticides known as "pyrethroids" and touted for its ability to rapidly
decompose —
contaminates virtually all of us.

-Traces of secondhand tobacco smoke in nonsmokers have dropped almost 70 percent
since the late 1980s, suggesting public health laws against smoking are paying
rich
dividends. Still, levels in children remain twice as high as adults, and
nonsmoking African
Americans — for reasons unknown — have concentrations twice as high as white or
Latino
nonsmokers.

-Exposure to mercury, a potent developmental neurotoxin, continues to be a
concern for
women of childbearing age. Two years ago, the CDC reported roughly 8 percent of
such
women had levels approaching what the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
considered
harmful to the fetus. This year's report finds almost 6 percent near that
threshold.

"Whether it's 6 percent or 8 percent, that's not real progress," Burke said.
"What's
important is that there's still a vulnerable higher tier of the population
that's exposed."

-Lead continues to be the poster child for what happens when regulators attempt
to rid a
hazardous compound from commerce. Ten years ago, nearly 1 in 25 children had
elevated
blood lead levels. By 2002, just 1 in 60 did.

The report offered almost no sense of what this chemical "body burden" means for
our
health. Health officials said Thursday they need to know what is in us before
they can
begin to understand its effect.

"This is a giant step forward to understanding the relationship between exposure




Advertisement


to chemicals and their potential health effects," said Dr. Julie Gerberding,
CDC's director.
"Knowing levels present in the population has a very important use in defining
research.
"It's our responsibility to take this to the next step," she added, and "assess
what, if any,
health effects are associated with this."

Still, for all their impact, the CDC's findings barely scratch the surface of
what's known
about environmental exposure to synthetic chemicals.

Nearly 80,000 chemicals are registered for use in commerce today, with 3,000
used in
large volumes. The CDC looked at 148 — a step up from the 27 examined in the
first
report, released in 1999.

"We're only looking at 43 (pesticides), and there are more than 1,200," said
Margaret
Reeves, senior scientist with the San Francisco-based Pesticide Action Network.
"We're
looking at the tip of the iceberg."

Industry groups cautioned Thursday that few conclusions can be drawn between
exposure
at current levels and potential harm.

"Public health officials and manufacturers need to go back and make sure those
low levels
of exposure are safe, as was previously assumed," said Chris VandenHuevel,
spokesman
for the American Chemistry Council, representing every major chemical
manufacturer in
the United States.

To do that, the nation needs more biomonitoring, say many health experts. The
CDC is the
sole source for such information. Efforts to create a similar program in
California have
drawn consistent opposition from industry.

With better information would come better public health decisions, said Dr.
Jerome
Paulson, associate professor of pediatrics and public health at George
Washington
University in Washington, D.C.

"Without this kind of information, we don't know where we are, we don't know
what risks
we're exposed to, we don't know if those risks are significant and whether we
have to
intervene."

But what's obvious, he and others added Thursday, is that these compounds are
everywhere.

"It's not clear that having these things in (our) bodies is necessarily bad for
you," Paulson
said.

"It is very clear that as a global society we have not been careful and that we
have really
fouled our nest."


The Oakland Tribune's investigation of our chemical "body burden" can be found
online at
http://www.insidebayarea.com/bodyburden.

Dozens of Chemicals Found in Most Americans' Bodies
The concentration is especially high in children, a national study says. But
experts aren't
sure what the health effects are.

By Marla Cone, Times Staff Writer

In the largest study of chemical exposure ever conducted on human beings, the
U.S.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported Thursday that most American
children and adults were carrying in their bodies dozens of pesticides and toxic
compounds used in consumer products, many of them linked to potential health
threats.

The report documented bigger doses in children than in adults of many chemicals,
including some pyrethroids, which are in virtually every household pesticide,
and
phthalates, which are found in nail polish and other beauty products as well as
in soft
plastics.


The CDC's director, Dr. Julie L. Gerberding, called the national exposure report
— the third
in an assessment that is released biennially — a breakthrough that would help
public
health officials home in on the most important compounds to which Americans are
routinely exposed.

The latest installment, which looked for 148 toxic compounds in the urine and
blood of
about 2,400 people age 6 and older in 2000 and 2001, is "the largest and most
comprehensive report of its kind ever released anywhere by anyone," Gerberding
said.
Findings were broken down by age group and race.

At Thursday's news conference, CDC officials emphasized the good news: Steep
declines
were found in children's exposure to lead and secondhand cigarette smoke.

Lead levels in children have dropped significantly over several years, which
Gerberding
called an "astonishing public health achievement" attributable largely to its
removal from
gasoline and paint.

About 1.6% of young children tested from 1999 to 2002 had elevated levels of
lead, which
could lower their intelligence and damage their brains, compared with 88.2% in
the late
1970s and 4.4% in the early 1990s.

But the discovery of more than 100 other substances in humans, particularly
children,
distressed environmental health experts.

"The report in general shows that people — kids and adults — are exposed to
things that
aren't intended to be in their body," said Dr. Jerome A. Paulson, an associate
professor of
pediatrics at the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health
Sciences
who specializes in children's environmental health. "In and of itself, that is a
concern.
Whether it's harmful or not we can't tell from this particular study."

The new data in the 475-page report reveal how "we have fouled our own nest,"
Paulson
said. "We contaminated the environment sufficiently that there are measurable
amounts of
potentially toxic substances in people — kids and adults."

The CDC did not try to gauge the health threat the chemicals might pose. A
measurable
amount of a compound in a person's body does not mean it causes disease or other
damage, the agency noted.

For many compounds in the report, experts have little information on what
amounts may
be harmful or what they may do in combination.

"We are really at the beginning of a very complicated journey to understand the
thousands
of substances we are exposed to," said Thomas Burke, associate professor at the
Johns
Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

The discovery of pyrethroids in most people is especially important, as no one
had looked
for them in the human body before. Pyrethroids are synthetic versions of natural
compounds found in flowers, and they have been considered safer than older
pesticides,
such as DDT and chlordane, that build up in the environment and have been banned
in the
United States.

But in high doses, pyrethroids are toxic to the nervous system. They are the
second most
common class of pesticides that result in poisoning. At low doses, they might
alter
hormones. The compounds are used in large volumes in farm and household
pesticides
and are sprayed by public agencies to kill mosquitoes.

Pyrethroids "were a step forward [from DDT and other banned pesticides], but now
we're
beginning to understand that while they don't persist in the environment, many
of us are
exposed," Burke said. "We don't quite know what those levels mean."

Eleven of 12 phthalates tested were higher in children than adults. All of the
phthalates
but one are used in fragrances. In animal tests, and in one recent study of
human babies,
some of the compounds have been shown to alter male reproductive organs or to
feminize
hormones.

Representatives of the chemical and pesticide industries praised the study,
saying that
human biomonitoring is the best available tool to measure exposure. They echoed
the
CDC in saying that discovery of the chemicals in the human body did not
automatically
mean they posed a threat.

The report demonstrates "that exposure to these man-made and natural substances
is
extremely low," said American Chemistry Council spokesman Chris VandenHeuvel.

The CDC's Gerberding said that "for the vast majority" of the 148 chemicals in
the report,
"we have no evidence of health effects."

Many toxicologists and environmental scientists disagree.

Studies of animals, and in some cases people, suggest that most of the compounds
can
affect the brain, hormones, reproductive system or the immune system, or that
they are
linked to cancer. "These are some bad actors," Burke said.

Many of the compounds have not been studied sufficiently to know what happens
with
chronic exposure to low doses. "No evidence of health effects does not imply
that they are
not harmful," Paulson said. "It just means we don't know one way or another."

Environmental groups have called for U.S. law to require chemical companies to
test
industrial compounds more comprehensively, a proposal similar to one that the
European
Parliament is to debate in the fall.

The evidence that many contaminants amass in children more than in adults could
mean
that they are exposed to larger amounts — perhaps from crawling, breathing more
rapidly
or putting items in their mouths — or that their bodies are less able to cope
with or
metabolize them.

In the womb and in the first two years after birth, children undergo
extraordinary cell
growth, from brain neurons to immune cells, so there are more opportunities for
toxic
compounds to disrupt the cells, Paulson said. Animal tests show that fetuses and
newborns are the most susceptible to harm from many chemicals.

In the CDC study, one of every 18 women of childbearing age, or 5.7%, had
mercury that
exceeded the level that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency deemed safe to
a
developing fetus.

Tests on schoolchildren show that mercury exposure in the womb can lower IQs,
with
memory and vocabulary particularly impaired.

The CDC plans to expand the national chemical report to more than 300 compounds
in
two years and about 500 in four years. An estimated 80,000 chemicals are in
commercial
use today.

Our 5i-Team is staying on top of an investigation. An Arizona cancer
patient and his wife are waging an up-hill battle against the city,
state and federal governments, the water company and two Nevada
Corporations over a chemical they say seeped into the water supply. At
10:00 tonight, we'll have new developments in this investigation.
Remember you can always catch up with our 5i-Team's latest
investigations on our website.
       THIS CAME FROM AN ARIZONA MOM WITH SICK KIDS...Thanks Carla
      Bill

Remember you can always catch up with our 5i-Team's latest
investigations on our website.

http://www.kpho.com/Global/category.asp?C=12334&nav=DIH7


(CBS 5 NEWS) - An Arizona man claims Rocket Fuel contamination of the
Colorado River is to blame for his cancer, and now he and his wife are
waging an uphill battle against a long list of agencies and companies
that have come in contact with their tap water.

"I'm still kinda in shock that we're here," says Linda Curtis.

Linda and Alan Curtis have come to Phoenix for the first time in 12
years, ready for the fight of their lives.

"We're going against Kerr-McGee, Ampac, the federal government, State
of Arizona, State of Nevada," says Alan Curtis. The Bullhead City
residents are representing themselves in Federal Court. "There's not
going to be one attorney in there, they're bringing twenty of them,"

Long-odds for a blue collar couple lacking law degrees, yet armed with
research and conviction.

"It's not about money, it's about getting the water clean," explains
Linda.

Linda is talking about Colorado River water. It is contaminated with
Perchlorate, Rocket Fuel and other chemicals Alan Curtis claims have
seeped in to the Bullhead City water supply. The water the Curtis' and
their neighbors have drunk for years comes from a well less than 1000
feet away from their home. Curtis believes it caused his cancer, and
that of 11 of his neighbors.

"It affects the thyroid, and stops bone marrow production... I didn't
have any bone marrow. And then the nitrate levels that are in it
affect the spleen and I lost the spleen," says Alan.

The 59-year -old former construction worker suffers from stage four
Hodgkin's disease.

"The only common denominator is the water.. nothing else makes any
sense," says Alan.

So the couple set up shop in a small room.

"This is Curtis and Curtis..."

And have turned to federal court to get some answers. They are suing
nine defendants: The city, state and federal governments, the water
company and the two Nevada Corporations that produced the chemicals.

"The city has an allocation for Colorado river water..." says Steve
Johnson of Bullhead City.

Johnson says it's a private company that distributes it to residents,
and the state that sets the health standards.

"It's not passing the buck, what we're doing is relying on the experts
to advise us on what needs to be done for our water quality," says
Johnson.

In fact each of the nine defendants insist they have a good reason why
the finger of responsibility should be pointed somewhere else.

"We've been getting the runaround for four years," says Alan.

Reporter Mark Lodato: "But not one of the parties named in the lawsuit
is disputing the fact that perchlorate is evident in the water supply
- in fact our investigation found it has traveled hundreds of miles
from Nevada, south to the Yuma Valley.  In May the Five I-team showed
you while perchlorate levels are highest in drinking water, the
chemical also seeps into our food supply."

"We're really looking at protecting pregnant women, newborns, young
children, " says Kevin Mayer of EPA.

But state and federal regulators can't agree on how much rocket fuel
in your diet is too much.

Reporter Lodato: "At what point does it become a health risk?"

"Well, that's the 64-million dollar question," says Mayer.

A National Academy of Sciences study funded by the federal government
found we can consume 24-parts-per-billion of perchlorate day without
risk to sensitive populations, but some states prefer a much lower
standard. Arizona calls 14 parts-per-billion acceptable, California:
six, Massachusetts just one.

Lodato: "So the only recourse is to haul them down to court?" Curtis
replies, "Yeah, technically you poke them in the nose."

Alan says he using the suit to find out exactly how much rocket fuel
is in the water supply in hopes the court will appoint a federal
administrator to supervise a full clean-up.

Lodato asks, "This has become your life?" Curtis says, "Yeah, that's
it. That's the only reason it didn't kill me. And like I told 'em
before, I'm not going away... So they're going to have to deal with me
'til I die."


Note:  Linda and Alan Curtis survived their first hearing in federal
court. Meanwhile the judge has taken the defendants' motions to
dismiss the lawsuit under advisement. The couple is due back in court
next week. We'll keep you up to date.

07.06.05
Below,,,,,,,Rocket fuel found in Lettuce,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

About perchlorate
Alliance for Food and Farming
Arizona Dept. of Environmental Quality
Environmental Protection Agency/Perchlorate
Environmental Working Group
EPA report: known perchlorate relases in the U.S. (pdf)
National Academy of Sciences/Perchlorate

It is a staple of the produce isle ... a source of pride for growers
in the fertile Yuma valley ... one of Arizona's multi-million dollar
crops. Rich with vitamins and minerals, Arizonans also get a little
something extra in each bite of lettuce.

"Oh, it's totally shocking - rocket fuel in lettuce? How is that
possible?" asks Renee Sharp of the Environmental Working Group.

That's right - she said "rocket fuel in lettuce." Possible here in the
valley? The 5 i-Team put local supermarkets to the test - you'll see
our results in just a moment.

"We're really looking at protecting pregnant women, newborns, young
children..." says Kevin Mayer with EPA.

The U.S. Environmental Protection agency wants to protect them from
Perchlorate - the explosive component in rocket fuel. The chemical has
contaminated the Colorado River which serves as the lifeblood for
Arizona's agriculture industry in the Yuma valley. It is a short trip
from the river, to the crops and into our homes. The federal
government says too much perchlorate can have an adverse affect on the
thyroid.

"The thyroid hormones the gland produces actually controls brain
development and organ development," says Sharp.

Reporter Mark Lodato asks, "At what point does it become a health risk?"

"Well, that's the $64 million question," replies Mayer.

Despite more than a decade of research, scientists have yet to agree
on how much perchlorate is too much. We traveled to Oakland California
to pose the question to Renee Sharp, senior analyst for the
Environmental Working Group and co-author of `Suspect Salads.'

"We're concerned about perchlorate at levels of above one
part-per-billion," says Sharp.

So what's in your salad? The 5 i-Team went undercover - buying heads
of lettuce at eight different valley supermarkets and then we shipped
the samples to a lab in New York, and took the results to Sharp.

Reporter Lodato asks, "Are these the kind of result that would concern
you?" Sharp replies, "Oh, absolutely, absolutely."

Our samples, purchased right here in Valley, found perchlorate in
every head of lettuce. Levels as low as 3.9 ppb, as high as 12. Is
that too much? The federal government has yet to set an official
perchlorate standard, but the Environmental Working Group is already
convinced.

"I think it could definitely be a health issue," Sharp says.

Growers in the Yuma valley refused our requests to discuss the
contamination on camera and instead referred us to industry groups
like the Alliance for Food and Farming.

"We've done a significant amount of work on this issue in terms of the
science behind it and we're extremely confident in the safety of the
lettuce," says Teresa Thorne. She calls perchlorate levels in lettuce
insignificant, because we just don't eat that much each day. The
industry cites this recent National Academy of Science review
Commissioned by the Federal Government. THIS study found we can
consume about 24-parts-per billion of perchlorate a day.
"If there is a risk it would be insignificant to the population which
includes infants, children, pregnant women," says Thorne.

But advocates like Sharp say it all adds up.

Sharp says, "We know perchlorate is in milk, perchlorate is in other
types of vegetables and fruits, and we know perchlorate is in drinking
water."

Lodato says, "Although growers have been forced to address the issue,
the contamination certainly isn't their fault. The source of the
rocket fuel is actually hundreds of miles up the Colorado River, in
another state."

A rocket-fuel plant outside of Las Vegas began leaking perchlorate
into Lake Mead and the Colorado shortly after World War II. Today
cleanup operations have greatly reduced, but not eliminated rocket
fuel levels in the river that winds its way right into your home.

"And when we find it, we should be forcing the companies that create
it to clean it up quickly, so that people don't have to sit there and
when they have to go to the grocery store and have to wonder, I wonder
if this head of lettuce is safe," says Sharpe.

EPA report: known perchlorate relases in the U.S.

*State Challenging Tests For Depleted Uranium*



  By THOMAS D. WILLIAMS
  Courant Staff Writer

  July 6 2005

  Connecticut is now the second state in the nation to challenge the
  validity of the tests the federal government uses to check military
  personnel for ingested or inhaled depleted uranium dust from U.S.
  munitions explosions.

  The new law requires the state adjutant general and the veterans'
  affairs commissioner to assist Connecticut guardsmen and veterans in
  obtaining "a best practice health screening test for exposure to
  depleted uranium." Last month, Louisiana passed similar, less detailed
  legislation demanding better depleted uranium testing paid for by the
  federal government.

  Connecticut's bill, signed by Gov. Jodi Rell last week, requires the
  state adjutant general to train guardsmen so they can adequately
  determine whether they have been exposed to the dust. It sets up a task
  force to study the health effects of depleted uranium and other hazards
  wartime service members have been exposed to since August 1990. And it
  requires a registry of sick veterans, a plan to help them and a report
  on the task force's operations by the end of January.

  Before it became law, the Connecticut bill bounced around from committee
  to committee and its wording was changed several times, but it retained
  one of its central purposes. It challenges a Pentagon and U.S.
  Department of Veterans Affairs urine testing program that some health
  experts insist is insufficient to detect the effects of depleted
  uranium, and that advocates say has tested only a relative few of those
  exposed to the dust.

  One New Haven veteran, Melissa Sterry, 42, a former U.S. Army
  Specialist, who said she suffered multiple illnesses as a result of
  cleaning tanks and other vehicles during the first Persian Gulf War,
  lobbied the bill at every turn. On several occasions, Sterry thought the
  bill was dead.

  "I'm just stunned. I think it is great!" Sterry said Tuesday when she
  was told Rell had signed the bill. "I'm ecstatic that Connecticut has
  chosen to lead the nation in proactive caring for veterans."

  State Rep. Roger Michele, a Bristol Democrat and a veteran of the
  Vietnam War, who shepherded the bill through its final stages, said: "I
  remember Agent Orange and the problems our veterans had fighting to get
  health care through the federal bureaucracy. DU is the Agent Orange of
  the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. And our soldiers have made enough
  sacrifices while risking their lives over there. We need to support them
  here in saving their lives."

  Two legislators initially proposed separate portions of the bill. State
  Rep. Patricia Dillon, D-New Haven, called for scientific testing of
  those exposed to depleted uranium dust, while State Sen. Gayle
  Slossberg, D-West Haven, chair of the Veterans Committee, proposed the
  task force to supervise efforts at helping veterans.

  "I'm thrilled. I think it is a good step forward," said Slossberg, who
  added that the state has to increase its efforts to help veterans as
  federal health services are eliminated. Dillon could not be reached for
  comment Tuesday.

  Many veterans' advocates say thousands of service members in both Iraq
  wars and the war in Afghanistan have become seriously ill from the dust
  from the explosions of the DU munitions. The dust was created from tons
  of U.S. and British ammunition and bombs used during those conflicts and
  in the Balkan wars, as well as by the United States in Afghanistan. It
  can be blown for hundreds of miles. If inhaled or ingested, it can cause
  a host of maladies including cancers, kidney disease and birth defects.

  /Copyright 2005, //_Hartford Courant_/ <http://www.courant.com>//

Date: Tue, 05 Jul 2005 12:49:36 -0400
    From: Tara Thornton <Tara@...>
Subject: Camp Lejeune- from today's Greenwire

*Marine Corps must widen research on N.C. base contamination, panel
says *
The government should evaluate the health of everyone who lived or
worked at the Marine Corps base in Camp Lejeune, N.C., from 1968 to
1985
due to the threat of water contamination, according to an _Agency for
Toxic Substances and Disease Registry report_
<http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/sites/lejeune/panel_report.html> released
last
week.

An estimated 16,500 children born at Camp Lejeune between 1968 and
1985
may have consumed water contaminated with compounds that have been
linked to birth defects and childhood cancers, the Marine Corps has
said. In total, about 50,000 people lived in housing at the base from
1968 to 1985. Some critics have said the contamination may have begun
in
the 1950s; in which case, activists have said the number of possible
affected people could be closer to 200,000.

Camp Lejeune's base wells were contaminated by tetrachloroethylene
(PCE)
and trichloroethylene (TCE). Authorities, who believe some of the
contaminants came from a dry cleaning business that still operates,
discovered the problem in the early 1980s but did not cap the wells
until several years later. Testing of water samples has found 1,400
parts per billion of TCE, about 280 times the levels the U.S. EPA
calls
safe. But federal TCE standards did not exist when the Marine Corps
first discovered the problem (_/Greenwire/_
Jan. 28, 2004).

The report called on the Marine Corps to notify all people who may
have
been exposed to the contaminated water. "Community involvement must
take
place with full recognition of the uniqueness of the community of
exposed individuals who had lived at Camp Lejeune," the report
stated.
"In contrast with many other places where toxic contamination of the
environment has been a concern, the population at Camp Lejeune is
relatively transient" (Chris Mazzolini, _Jacksonvile [N.C.]/ Daily

_____________________

Message: 2
    Date: Tue, 5 Jul 2005 13:47:13 EDT
    From: dcatbird37@...
Subject: Fwd: Camp Lejeune- from today's Greenwire

Please read the attached.

      It's good to see the DODs deep pockets are in place there in
Lejeune,
where there alot of folks concerned with contamination and disease.
      We have a solvent plume here in South Weymouth amongst the many
remaining Superfund sites on the arir station, but Abington and
Rockland voters were
scared into believing the Navy was going to auction the property off
to
the
highest bidder, and they weren't offered up any other possible
scenarios like
Public Benefit Conveyance, as the DOD wants to pass this and every
other
contaminated base "hot potato" to very willing developers.

      It's a tragic moral crime, but it's all legal I'm sure.
      My local representatives didn't want to hear it, but they're not
taking
calls from ladies in Dallas who grew up next to the base. The elderly
mother
and all three daughters have thyroid conditions, and one has MS.
Health
care
skyrockets and the powers that be turn a blind eye, or laud "sound
science" that
fails to keep up with discoveries.

      I'm sure this gridlocking development will possibly stop a
couple
cul-de-sacs from being built in Norwell or Duxbury, but the few of us
here, who have
paid any attention to the Environmental Remediation at the base, and
who are
now being sacrificed to become the next delegated "Environmental
Justice"
communities of Urban Sprawl in the State, can't believe that money
and
politics is
winning such a clear cut victory over the true best interests of our
townspeople, or the thousands of planned for new residents that will
be
buying those
2,855 homes.

     It's tragic we've been steamrolled over and not many of us are
even
aware
it happened.

From News Slice

NEW YORK TIMES
Tainted Soil to Be Removed Next to Westchester School

By BARBARA WHITAKER
Published: July 4, 2005

In what state health officials call the first cleanup of its kind in the
state, a school district in Westchester County is planning to remove soil
next to an elementary school in Yorktown Heights because the soil is
contaminated by PCB's from caulking in the school's windows.

Dr. Daniel Lefkowitz requested tests on scraps of caulk left after
maintenance at French Hill Elementary School, where his son, Evan, is a
student. The tests found PCB's at 350 times above the federal limit.


The cleanup at French Hill Elementary School, which will cost the district
about $100,000, was prompted by a parent who had scraps of the caulking
tested and found PCB's at 350 times above the federal limit. Soil around the
school also showed evidence of PCB contamination, though at lower levels.
PCB's, or polychlorinated biphenyls, which were banned in 1977, have been
linked to developmental problems in children. School officials have fenced
off parts of the school outside near many of its windows and are seeking
bids from contractors to clean up the contaminated soil. They hope the work
can be completed by the time the children return in September.

A spokesman for the State Department of Health said the cleanup was the
first the agency was aware of involving PCB contamination from caulk. "We're
kind of at the forefront here," said Dennis Verboys, director of facilities
with the Yorktown Central School District. "Had we not had the overzealous
community member, we never would have tested."

Dr. Daniel Lefkowitz, whose 7-year-old son attends the school, raised
questions about possible contamination after reading a 2004 Harvard
University study, which found that PCB's from caulk had contaminated schools
and buildings in the Boston area. Knowing that the school's windows had been
removed and replaced in 2003, and that the building was constructed when
PCB's were used in caulk, Dr. Lefkowitz searched outside the building, found
scraps of caulk left behind and had them tested. Production of PCB's, which
are flame-resistant, was banned in the United States in 1977, but they had
been widely used in caulk and other building materials. Studies have shown
that PCB's can cause developmental problems in infants and in children born
to women exposed to the compounds during pregnancy. PCB's can also pose a
risk of cancer, health experts say.

Westchester County Health Department officials say the contamination at the
school does not present a health risk, but school officials say the
contamination is sufficient under state and federal guidelines to require
the cleanup. Dr. Lefkowitz, a podiatrist, is pressing for further testing at
the school.While there is growing concern among scientists about PCB's in
caulk, many questions remain unanswered. For example, how commonly were
PCB's used in caulk? Are PCB's migrating from the material and contaminating
areas inside and outside buildings where they were used? If so, is the
contamination at a level requiring removal? What are the health risks?

"This is something just coming on the radar screen," said Rich Cahill, a
spokesman for the United States Environmental Protection Agency in the New
York region. "There are efforts to quantify the risk associated with it, but
at this point it's unknown."Robert Herrick, who led the study by the Harvard
School of Public Health, compared the issue to that of lead paint, which was
used for many years, contaminating buildings and homes and causing health
problems in children."PCB's are really potent developmental toxins," he
said. "We want to minimize exposure for kids."

Of 24 buildings tested around Boston in the Harvard study, eight contained
caulking material with PCB's exceeding 50 parts per million, the highest
level allowable under federal guidelines. In addition, PCB levels in the
indoor air and dust taken from the buildings revealed varied levels of
contamination.Dr. Herrick noted that in Finland, studies had found a
correlation between PCB's in caulk and PCB's in the air as well as in the
blood of construction workers handling the materials during renovations. In
Germany, he said, a study found elevated blood levels of PCB's in teachers
working in schools with contaminated caulking. The study recommended random
testing in schools, hospitals and other masonry buildings constructed or
renovated during the time PCB's were used in caulk, commonly from 1960 to
1977.

The caulk was typically used in brick buildings."The E.P.A. requires you to
clean it up if you find it, but they don't require you to look for it," Dr.
Herrick said. "We need to pull together data to determine if there is a
health risk."Little is being done at the state level to address the issue.
The State Education Department has notified schools of the findings in Dr.
Herrick's study through a newsletter. Assemblyman Thomas P. DiNapoli, the
chairman of the Assembly's Committee on Environmental Conservation, said he
was considering sponsoring legislation that would finance a pilot program to
test for contaminated caulk in schools and perhaps other buildings.

But environmental groups expect that advancing such legislation will be
difficult. "What schools have a tendency to do is have a 'don't ask, don't
tell' approach - they're afraid if you find something, then you'll have to
do something about it," said Kathleen Curtis, executive director of the
Citizens' Environmental Coalition, an Albany-based advocacy group. "School
districts are tight on money. There's been a tremendous amount of difficulty
getting a bill passed to test for lead in school water fountains."

Children's Environmental Health Network Community Listserv
The content of listserv postings are the responsibility of individual authors
and
do not indicate the Children's Environmental Health Network's support or
endorsement.

Mercury concerns on the rise
By Jon Brodkin / Daily News Staff
Tuesday, July 5, 2005
Is eating fish really good for you?
      More than 20 percent of Americans tested for mercury in a nationwide study
have
levels of the toxic metal exceeding a government advisory level, a finding that
has led one
researcher to declare the country faces an "unprecedented public health
emergency."
      High mercury exposure most frequently occurs in people with diets heavy in
fish, a
food that's often touted as healthful.
      The study, which included several MetroWest residents and calculated
mercury
exposure using hair samples, found that about half of people who eat seven or
more
servings of fish per month have mercury levels exceeding the Environmental
Protection
Agency human health standard of 1 part per million. Having silver-colored dental
fillings
also increases mercury exposure, researchers found.
      The EPA health standard was devised for children and women of childbearing
age to
protect fetuses from neurological damage, but researchers said anyone, including
men,
should be concerned about mercury levels that exceed the advisory level.
      Researcher Richard Maas acknowledged the study's results may be skewed
because the
subjects volunteered themselves, so the findings were not based on a random
sample. But
a previous national survey found that 12 percent of women of childbearing age
have
mercury levels above the health standard, and Maas believes the two studies
together
show the country faces a large problem.
      "Somewhere between 12 and 20 percent of the U.S. public have a documented
exposure to a toxin above an official government standard," said Maas,
co-director of the
Environmental Quality Institute at the University of North Carolina-Asheville,
which is
conducting the mercury study. "If you look at it that way, this is an
unprecedented public
health emergency. Never before has there been a toxin to which the public was so
ubiquitously exposed."
      Maas' study, which includes more than 5,000 subjects so far, is the largest
ever to
document human exposure to mercury, he said.
      Testing for mercury
      Lisa Eck of Natick, a professor of English at Framingham State College who
participated
in the project, has decided to rethink her consumption of fish after receiving
results she
found disconcerting.
      "I am disappointed because it's hard not to conceive of fish as a healthy
food
alternative," Eck said. "I think the chief reversal I have to think about is
I've been proud of
the fact I've convinced toddlers -- my twins -- to eat fish. I thought that was
a great
triumph as a parent. Now I have to do more research."
      Eck's mercury level was .88 parts per million, just below the government
health
advisory. Maas said that's high enough to consider reducing fish consumption.
      "That's getting up there," he said. "If I had a .88, in a couple months I
would get
another test done to see if it's going up or down. You are flirting closer to a
level of
concern."
      Eck was one of three local residents who agreed to participate in the
mercury project
and be interviewed by the Daily News. The others -- Jacquie Kittler of Natick
and Maureen
Bligh of Millbury -- both had mercury levels well below Eck's. Kittler clocked
in at .23 parts
per million and Bligh, who is a paginator for Community Newspaper Co. (which
includes
the Daily News) in Framingham, had a level of .28.
      Bligh, who recently gave birth to her son, Jason, and frequently ate fish
while pregnant,
was relieved to learn she is well below the level of concern.
      "I actually thought they would be a little higher because I did eat kind of
a lot of fish,"
she said.
      Kittler, who has two young children, said she was careful to avoid fish
during
pregnancy.
      "I didn't eat fish at all during my pregnancy. I was told not to," she
said.
      Source of the problem
      Fish carry high levels of mercury largely because of emissions from
coal-fired power
plants. The biggest concern related to mercury exposure is neurologic damage it
can
cause developing fetuses. The EPA has said 1 in 6 women of childbearing age have
enough
mercury in their bodies to potentially impair an unborn child.
      The agency issued new rules regulating mercury emissions from coal-fired
power
plants in March, but at least 11 states, including Massachusetts, sued the
agency because
they believe the rules aren't stringent enough.
      The regulations are expected to cut emissions 70 percent by 2018, but
represent a
reversal from a Clinton-era decision that would have forced plants to install
the
"maximum achievable control technology" by 2008.
      Most debate over mercury's health effects focuses on neurological disorders
in
children, but the metal is toxic to nearly every organ in the body, including
those of
adults, Maas said. And women aren't the only ones at risk: some studies indicate
men with
elevated mercury levels have increased risk of heart disease.
      The EPA has advised women and young children to limit consumption of
certain types
of fish and to avoid ones with high levels of mercury, including shark,
swordfish and king
mackerel.
      But the effects of mercury on adults is a subject of debate. Local doctors
said they
rarely see incidents of mercury poisoning.
      "It's pretty rare. It's like lead poisoning. You've got to be looking for
it," said Dr. Mark
Lemons, head of Newton-Wellesley Hospital's emergency department.
      Dr. Michael Shannon, a Children's Hospital Boston physician who is a senior
toxicologist for the Massachusetts and Rhode Island poison control center, said
he treats
about one or two cases of mercury poisoning each year. Patients with high
mercury
exposures are treated with chelators, medication that binds to mercury and
ejects it from
the body in urine, he said.
      "It's a little unusual to have someone whose degree of exposure is so
astronomical that
they need medication to get it out," Shannon said.
      There is disagreement even among federal agencies about what level of
mercury
exposure is safe. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, for example,
thinks the
1 part per million level used by the EPA is too low to pose a threat to women
and unborn
children, said John Risher, a chemical manager for mercury at the Agency for
Toxic
Substances and Disease Registry, a sister agency of the CDC.
      "CDC would not consider it a level of concern, nor would the Department of
Health and
Human Services. It would just indicate there is some exposure," Risher said.
      But Maas said some people are so sensitive to mercury's effects they can
become sick
at levels below the EPA standard.
      "We're seeing more and more of those people because we have clinics all
over the
country filled with people who have been diagnosed with mercury poisoning," Maas
said.
      Maas also said the government uses economic feasibility studies to help
determine
acceptable risks to deadly toxins. But the typical person deciding what is
healthy and what
isn't shouldn't be concerned about the financial impact pollution controls would
have on
industry, he said.
      The Environmental Quality Institute study, which is being cosponsored by
Greenpeace
and the Sierra Club, released its preliminary results last October, based on
analyses of the
first 1,449 hair samples.
      Maas wasn't impressed by the government's response to the report.
      "You would think the response would be an all-out effort to lower the
sources of the
mercury," he said. "Yet right after we published our preliminary study...the
Bush
administration's response was to go and weaken the clean air standards and
actually roll
back the controls that were supposed to go on power plants for controlling
mercury."
      Testing continues
      Final results from the Environmental Quality Institute survey are expected
to be
released in September. People can still participate by logging onto
www.sierraclub.org/
mercury and ordering a testing kit for $25. The price is low compared to a
mercury test's
typical cost of $60 to $100, said Christina Kreitzer, a media coordinator for
the Sierra Club
in San Francisco.
      The Sierra Club's goal is to spur legislative action and raise awareness of
the dangers
of mercury exposure, she said. Researchers aim to test at least 10,000 people.
      "We wanted, first of all, to educate the public about the issue," she said.
"Coal-fired
power plants are releasing this toxin into our air, that rains down into the
water and it
starts accumulating in the fish we eat on the dinner table. A lot of people,
especially
women, aren't making the connection between eating the fish and polluting their
bodies."

Jon Brodkin can be reached at 508-626-4424 or jbrodkin@....

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
  June 30, 2005

CONTACT
Diane D'Arrigo, NIRS 202-328-0002
Cindy Folkers, NIRS 202-328-0002
All Levels of Radiation Confirmed to Cause Cancer.


Washington, DC July 30, 2005 The National Academies of Science
released an over 700-page report yesterday on the risks from ionizing
radiation. The BEIR VII or seventh Biological Effects of Ionizing
Radiation report on "Health Risks from Exposure to Low Levels of
Ionizing Radiation" reconfirmed the previous knowledge that there is
no safe level of exposure to radiation—that even very low doses
can
cause cancer. Risks from low dose radiation are equal or greater than
previously thought. The committee reviewed some additional ways that
radiation causes damage to cells.

Among the reports conclusions are:

There is no safe level or threshold of ionizing radiation exposure.

Even exposure to background radiation causes some cancers. Additional
exposures cause additional risks.

Radiation causes other health effects such as heart disease and
stroke, and further study is needed to predict the doses that result
in these non-cancer health effects.

It is possible that children born to parents that have been exposed to
radiation could be affected by those exposures.

The "bystander effect" is an additional, newly recognized method by
which radiation injures cells that were not directly hit but are in
the vicinity of those that were. "Genomic instability" can be caused
by exposure to low doses of radiation and according to the report
"might contribute significantly to radiation cancer risk." These new
mechanisms for radiation damage were not included in the risk
estimates reported by the BEIR VII report, but were recommended for
further study.

The Linear-No-Threshold model (LNT) for predicting health effects from
radiation (dose-response) is retained, meaning that every exposure
causes some risk and that risks are generally proportional to dose.
The Dose and Dose-Rate Effectiveness Factor or DDREF which had been
suggested in the 1990 BEIR V report to be applied at low doses, has
been reduced from 2 to 1.5. That means the projected number of health
effects at low doses are greater than previously thought. RADIATION
RISKIER THAN THOUGHT-- RISKS TO PUBLIC and NUCLEAR WORKERS

The BEIR VII risk numbers indicate that about 1 in 100 members of the
public would get cancer if exposed to 100 millirads (1milliGray) per
year for a 70-year lifetime. [1] This is essentially the US Nuclear
Regulatory Commission's allowable radiation dose for members of the
public.

In addition, 1 in about 5 workers [2] would get cancer if exposed to
the legally allowable occupational doses [3] over their 50 years in
the workforce. These risks are much higher than permitted for other
carcinogens.

Specifically, the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission allows members of
the public to get 100 millirems or mr (1 milliSievert or mSv) per year
of radiation in addition to background. The BEIR VII report (page 500,
Table 12-9) estimates that this level will result in approximately 1
(1.142) cancer in every 100 people exposed at 100 mr/yr which includes
1 fatal cancer in every 175 people so exposed (5.7 in 1000).[4]

The risk of getting cancer from radiation (in BEIR VII) is increased
by about a third from current government risk figures (FGR13): BEIR
VII estimates that 11.42 people will get cancer if 10,000 are each
exposed to a rem (1,000 millirems or 10 mSv). The US Environmental
Protection Agency Federal Guidance Report 13 estimates that 8.46
people will get cancer if 10,000 are each exposed to a rem.

The Nuclear Information and Resource Service interprets this as
further evidence that unnecessary radiation exposures should be
avoided.

"This means that the government is not justified in deregulating
nuclear power and weapons waste—releasing it to regular trash or
"recycling" it into everyday household items as proposed by 5 US
federal agencies at the behest of nuclear waste generators hoping to
save money," stated Diane D'Arrigo, Radioactive Waste Project Director
at Nuclear Information and Resource Service Radioactive (NIRS). "This
also means that remediation of radioactive sites should be done to
cleaner levels and that nuclear transport standards should be
strengthened."

Cindy Folkers, NIRS Energy and Health Project Director stated "These
findings confirm that all levels of radiation are harmful. Since
nuclear power routinely releases long-lasting radiation into the air,
water and soil, we must avoid a new generation of nuclear power to
prevent unnecessary exposures."
-30-

[1] NAS Report in Brief June 2005 BEIR VII: Health Effects from
Exposure to Low Levels of Ionizing Radiation pp 2-3 (for 1 cancer in
100 people exposed to 100mSv or 10 r ).


More detailed calculation: National Academies of Science,
Prepublication Copy, Health Risks from Exposure to Low Levels of
Ionizing Radiation BEIR VII Phase 2, June 29, 2005 page 500 Table
12-9. Table 12-9 indicates that average risk (cancer incidence for
males and females) of getting leukemia or solid cancers is 1142 out of
100,000 exposed to 10 r. Thus a member of the public who lives for 70
years and receives the permitted 100 mr (or 0.1 r)/year could receive
7 r or 7000 mr in his/her lifetime. [US Nuclear Regulatory Commission
permits 0.1 r or 100 mr per year above background to members of the
public.] Comparing to BEIR VII's risk estimate of 1142 in 100,000 at
10 r, to the 7 r lifetime dose permitted by NRC:(7r/10r= 0.7) we get
0.7 x 1142 = 799 cancers in 100,000 population at 7 r or
799cancers/100,000 exposed = 1 cancer in 125 exposed (to 7 r over
lifetime).

[2] At 0.1 Sv (100 mSv or 10 r) the risk is 1 in 100 getting cancer
(NAS Report in Brief Jun 2005 pp2-3) At 2.5 Sv (worker legal dose) the
dose and risk are 25x higher or 25 in 100 (or 1 in 4) exposed getting
cancer...but since workers are exposed later in life than the general
public, adjusting for age would correct the risk to about 1 in 5
exposed to the full legal amount for their working lives getting
cancer from those exposures.

[3] 10 CFR 20 subpart C, Occupational Dose Limits limit workers to
total effective dose equivalent of 5000 millirems or 50 milliSieverts
(5 rems or 0.05 Sv) per year. If it is low LET radiation, this is
comparable to 5000 millirads or 50 milliGray.

[4] National Academies of Science, Prepublication Copy, Health Risks
from Exposure to Low Levels of Ionizing Radiation BEIR VII Phase 2,
June 29, 2005 page 500 Table 12-9. There will be 570 fatal cancers in
100,000 exposed at 0.1Gy or 10 r. (100,000/570= 175) Approx 1 in 175
so exposed will get fatal cancer.

Science News –From The Envronmental Science & Technology

June 29, 2005
Chloramines again linked to lead in drinking water

High blood lead levels discovered in two boys this spring are being
linked to drinking
water in Greenville, N.C. Local public health authorities are
advising pregnant women,
infants, and young children to avoid tap water, and state officials
are evaluating drinking
water throughout the state.

Greenville Utilities
In the wake of high lead concentrations in its water, Greenville
Utilities sent flyers to
residents telling them how to respond to the risks.
The episode is being compared to Washington, D.C.'s recent
problems with lead in
drinking water (Environ. Sci. Technol. 2004, 38, 224A–227A).
Utilities in both cities had
switched from free chlorine disinfectant to chloramines in the past
few years to comply
with the U.S. EPA's 1998 disinfectants and disinfection
byproducts rule. However, unlike
Washington, Greenville lacks lead pipes, and the utility has used a
polyphosphate
corrosion inhibitor for years. The inhibitor should have created a
protective film on
plumbing.
Lead solder in the home is being blamed for the boy with the highest
blood lead levels of
20 milligrams per decaliter (mg/dL). His home's tap water
contained 400 parts per billion
(ppb) total lead, according to Ed Norman, an epidemiologist with the
North Carolina
Department of Environment and Natural Resources. The Centers for
Disease Control and
Prevention lists 10 mg/dL as the minimum blood lead level of concern;
20 mg/dL is
considered lead poisoning.
Corrosion expert Marc Edwards at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and
State University says
that the release of lead due to corrosion of solder and brass is
consistent with his
experimental results involving chloramines. "For certain brasses
and solders, the corrosion
can be extensive, although it is difficult to predict," he says.
Edwards's results were
recently published (J. Am. Water Works Assoc. 2004, 96, 69–81).
The effectiveness of
different corrosion inhibitors in the face of changing disinfection
practices is still not
resolved, he says.
But Richard Maas of the Environmental Quality Institute at the
University of North Carolina,
Asheville, says that the corrosion is due to a combination of
chloramines, excess
ammonia, and fluorosilicic acid, which is commonly used to fluoridate
water supplies. His
findings, yet to be peer-reviewed, are described in a technical
report released June 13 by
his institute.
The Greenville treatment plant began adding chloramines into its
distribution pipes in
December 2002 and switched from free chlorine to ozone as its primary
disinfectant in
August 2003. Under the reduced sampling requirements of EPA's
1991 lead and copper
rule, utilities must test household drinking water for lead in some
of the homes they serve
every three years, says Greenville water treatment plant manager
Barrett Lasater. A
problem emerged during the scheduled tap-water sampling in the summer
of 2004, when
about 25% of the samples exceeded EPA's 15 ppb total lead action
level. As a result, the
district switched to orthophosphate inhibitor in August 2004,
anticipating that the additive
would quickly reduce lead levels. Thus, the increased lead levels
puzzle Lasater, who says
that several bench-scale pilot studies did not find that chloramines
increased lead
corrosion.
The confusion may be frustrating, but it's understandable, says
Edwards. "We barely
understand the effects of chloramines on plumbing." —REBECCA
RENNER

Limits Sought on Testing for Pesticides
From the New York Times,6/30/05 For Immediate release


By MICHAEL JANOFSKY
Published: June 30, 2005
WASHINGTON, June 29 - The Senate on Wednesday passed two amendments to an
appropriations bill that would limit the Environmental Protection Agency's use
of pesticide
tests that involve humans.

By a 60-to-37 vote, a bipartisan measure introduced by Senator Barbara Boxer,
Democrat
of California, and a dozen others would place a one-year moratorium on any
government-
sponsored testing programs on humans.

By a 57-to-40 vote, a measure sponsored by three Republicans, Senators Conrad
Burns of
Montana, Saxby Chambliss of Georgia and James M. Inhofe of Oklahoma, would
require a
review by third-party groups of all human testing programs conducted for the
government, to identify and quantify their toxic effects. It also gives the
E.P.A. six months
to develop new regulations on pesticide testing.

Both measures were added to the appropriations bill for the Interior Department,
which
passed 94 to 0 on Wednesday. The House bill, passed earlier, has a section
similar to the
Boxer amendment but nothing comparable to the Burns measure. The differences in
the
bills will have to be resolved in conference.

The flurry of activity on pesticide testing comes as the E.P.A. is preparing to
issue new
rules that would establish standards and protocols for programs that, in some
cases,
would allow for testing of pregnant women, newborns and other children. The Bush
administration allowed tests to proceed after the Clinton administration ended
them in
1998.

The amendments also followed controversy directed at Stephen L. Johnson, who was
serving as acting director of the agency when he was nominated this year to be
its
permanent director. His Senate confirmation was delayed until he ordered an end
to a
pesticide testing program in Florida that would have paid parents for allowing
tests on
their children.

Only one amendment won backing from CropLife America, a trade group that
represents
pesticide manufacturers.

"We're supportive of Senator Burns's approach but very disappointed with Senator
Boxer's,"
said the group's executive vice president, Patrick J. Donnelly. "If Senator
Boxer's
amendment is adopted, it would cripple E.P.A. programs and jeopardize public
health."

But Ms. Boxer argued that no level of risk to human health was worth allowing
tests to
continue.

"The moral and ethical issues surrounding these pesticide experiments are
overwhelming,"
she said. "E.P.A. should never have been considering them to begin with."

In a related initiative, House and Senate members concerned about potential
adverse
health consequences of the agency's new rules on mercury emissions from power
plants
introduced resolutions that would scrap the rules and replace them with stronger
ones.

Both resolutions focus on the agency's cap-and-trade system of emission control
which
allows polluting sources to sell and trade credits. Critics of the system say it
still leaves
many parts of the country with excessive amounts of pollution.

From the OEM list, 6/30/05


Teflon cancer risks downplayed?

Review board seeks to pressure EPA to study effects on humans
<A HREF="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8404384/">htt
p://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/
8404384/</A>

[Please visit the original website to view the whole article. - Mod.]

Associated Press

Updated: 12:17 p.m. ET June 29, 2005

DOVER, Del. - A controversial chemical used by DuPont Co. to make the
nonstick substance Teflon poses more of a cancer risk than indicated
in a draft assessment by the Environmental Protection Agency, an
independent review board has found.

The EPA stated earlier this year that its draft risk assessment of
perfluorooctanoic acid and its salts found "suggestive evidence" of
potential human carcinogenicity, based on animal studies.

In a draft report released Monday, the majority of members on an EPA
scientific advisory board that reviewed the agency's report concluded
that PFOA, also known as C-8, is "likely" to be carcinogenic to
humans, and that the EPA should conduct cancer risk assessments for a
variety of tumors found in mice and rats.

Environmentalists hailed the report, which will be discussed by EPA
officials and SAB members in a public teleconference July 6, as an
important step in holding government regulators and the Delaware-based
chemical giant accountable.

The board's findings will increase pressure on the EPA to conduct
human health risk assessments for liver, breast, pancreatic and
testicular cancer, as well as PFOA's potentially toxic effects on the
immune system, said Richard Wiles, senior vice president for the
Environmental Working Group, an advocacy and research organization.

"This is contrary to the recommendation of the EPA staff and is a very
important conclusion," said Wiles, adding that it would be very
unlikely for the board to make any significant changes before issuing
its final report for review by the EPA.

...

DuPont officials would not comment on the report but said in a
prepared statement that human health and toxicology studies suggest
that PFOA exposure does not cause cancer in humans and does not pose a
health risk to the general public.

"To date, no human health effects are known to be caused by PFOA even
in workers who have significantly higher exposure levels than the
general population," the company said.

The company also said data from its employee health studies and those
conducted by 3M Co., which stopped manufacturing PFOA in 2000,
"deserve greater consideration in the EPA's final risk assessment
rather than relying solely on animal testing models."

DuPont's studies, which are still ongoing, have found elevated levels
of total cholesterol and fats called triglycerides among workers
exposed to PFOA, but no indication that PFOA was the cause of
increased serum cholesterol and triglycerides.

While PFOA is used to make Teflon, it is not present in Teflon
itself...

(c) 2005 The Associated Press.

= - = - = - = - = -

EPA perfluorooctanoic acid site:
<A HREF="http://www.epa.gov/opptintr/pfoa/index.ht
m">http://www.epa.gov/opptintr/
pfoa/index.htm</A>
and this panel:
<A HREF="http://www.epa.gov/sab/panels/pfoa_rev_pa
nel.htm">http://www.epa.gov/
sab/panels/pfoa_rev_panel.htm</A>
= - = - = - = - = -

<A HREF="http://www.ewg.org/issues/pfcs/20050628/i
ndex.php">http://www.ewg.org/
issues/pfcs/20050628/index.php</A>

For Immediate Release: June 28, 2005

Contact: EWG Public Affairs, 202/667-6982

Independent Science Panel to EPA: Teflon Chemical is 'Likely' Human
Carcinogen
Findings Create Pressure on Bush EPA to Stop Pollution of Americans'
Blood With Hyper-persistent Chemical, Level Maximum Fine

WASHINGTON, June 28 - A panel comprised mostly of independent
scientists advising the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has
found today that DuPont's Teflon chemical, PFOA, is a "likely human
carcinogen." The findings are part of a recommendation to EPA that
clashes with a go-slow approach Bush EPA officials have so far taken
in the face of evidence suggesting the chemical giant knew its
chemical would pollute Americans' bloodstreams, was toxic and
practically never broke down once released into the environment.

EPA is in the critical final stages of the largest-ever investigation
of its kind to determine how the chemical gets into consumers' blood -
and whether or not it is safe. The company could face the maximum fine
from EPA of $314 million for illegally suppressing birth defect and
safety studies. Agency officials, however, have hinted that they are
considering a much lower fine of $13 million.

DuPont is also the subject of a federal criminal probe into its
suppression of the studies.

"Scientists independent of chemical industry money looked at the
toxicity of this chemical, and the verdict is clear: This Teflon
chemical should be considered a likely human carcinogen. If EPA
officials needed a reason to level the maximum fine against this $24.6
billion company, they have it now," said EWG Senior Vice President
Richard Wiles. "DuPont might be politically connected with an army of
lobbyists, but it should still be held accountable."

On July 6, the scientific panel will discuss its recommendations that
the Agency strengthen its health precautions over the Teflon chemical.

     EWG staff Toxicologist Dr. Tim Kropp and Wiles are available to
brief reporters on the panel's findings.

     To set up an interview, please call Lauren Sucher at 202/667-6982.

Excerpts from the panel's report follow:

     "In considering the collective evidence the majority of panel
members concluded that the experimental weight of evidence with
respect to the carcinogenicity of PFOA was stronger than proposed in
the draft document, and suggested that PFOA is a 'likely' carcinogen
in humans." (p. 2)

     "In the evaluation of carcinogenicity, the Panel supports the
inclusion of multiple cancer endpoints" (p. 3)

     "Immunotoxicity has been reported, and derivations of MOEs for
such effects are encouraged. Given the prevalence of PPAR receptors,
including PPAR-alpha in brain, effects on nervous system structure and
function warrant attention." (pp. 3-4)

###

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Article published Jun 27, 2005
National study looks at leukemia cluster in Nevada

By Katie Worth
Pacific Daily News
kworth@...
If a handful of beans is tossed onto a checkerboard, it's only natural that some
checker
squares will have no beans and others will have a few.

This is one analogy scientists use to explain that cancer clusters happen
naturally.

But what's the explanation when all of the beans end up piled onto one square?

This is the question that scientists, government officials and grief-stricken
families have
been grappling with as they try to figure out what happened in one small town in
the
middle of America.

Fallon, Nev., is a quiet desert town, with a population of 8,300, located next
to a naval air
station. The town became famous when 15 of its children became sick with
leukemia in
just a few short years.

Statistically, a cluster of this magnitude will occur in the United States only
once every
22,000 years, according to a U.S. Department of Health and Human Services study.

Since the tragedy in Fallon was one of the largest leukemia clusters ever
recorded, the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention invested two years and millions of
dollars into
trying to discover what might have caused it.

In those two years, scientists took urine and blood samples from dozens of
people,
measured chemical levels in the environment, looked at family and medical
histories
across the county, vacuumed out houses looking for contaminants, and tested for
viruses.

In the end, however, the scientists did not find any smoking gun, just a handful
of clues
that seemed to point in different directions.

One theory held that jet fuel from the nearby naval air station could have
factored in to the
cluster. According to the federal report, jet fuel has been associated with
immune system
effects in several studies and benzene, a minor component of jet fuel, has been
associated
with increased rates of leukemia.

To flesh out this theory, the federal health department's National Institute of
Environmental Health Sciences did a study looking at leukemia rates in other
U.S. counties
with military aviation bases.

In the end, no general increase in childhood leukemia was found in the other
counties.

Now, scientists are beginning to look into what may be the next big leukemia
cluster. In
Sierra Vista, Ariz., 13 children have been diagnosed with leukemia since 1997.
The town is
near Fort Huachuca, an Army base, and Libby Army Airfield.

The county, state and federal health departments have been doing tests on
families in the
area to see if they may provide more clues to what caused the rates, but
officials from the
CDC have warned parents that answers to their questions may not be available
right away.