ENVIRONMENTAL LEGAL BLOGS

CALIF. GOV. SCHWARZENEGGER VETOES PERCHLORATE BILL

     Riverside Press-Enterprise this a.m.:

Schwarzenegger vetoed two Inland lawmakers' bills dealing with drinking-water contamination and advertising for Riverside Plaza.

The drinking-water legislation, by state Sen. Nell Soto, D-Pomona, is tied to state efforts to identify safe levels of perchlorate in Inland and other areas water supplies.

The bill would have required require the state Department of Health Services to consider the effects on human health when weighing whether to adopt a drinking-water standard that is higher than a public-health goal.

     The bill in question is SB 187, which actually would have applied to constituents going beyond perchlorate.  See bull text and analysis here.  In any event, as noted the bill was vetoed.

IN PERCHLORATE DEBATE, THE KEY LETTER IS "P" FOR POLITICS

     The Los Angeles Times never fails to disappoint in its mediocre coverage of just about any story.

     The most recent example of the paper's mediocrity regarding perchlorate coverage is seen in the Times' March 16, 2006 coverage of critics blasting the federal EPA's 24.5 ppb interim health goal for the chemical in drinking water.  The Times prominently implies that this is a lax standard (never mind it is only an interim guidance while EPA studies and formulates a permanent standard) promoted solely because those wicked people in the Bush Administration want to spare industry and the military from having to clean up their health-threatening menacing messes:

Warning that babies are especially vulnerable, a federal panel of scientists has lambasted the Environmental Protection Agency's health goal for a toxic chemical that has widely contaminated drinking water and foods, particularly in Southern California.

The EPA's new goal for perchlorate, an ingredient of solid rocket fuel, "is not supported by the underlying science and can result in exposures that pose neurodevelopmental risks in early life," wrote Melanie Marty of California's Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment, who chairs the EPA's Children's Health Protection Advisory Committee.

The letter from the committee of 26 scientists, sent to EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson on March 8, warned the agency that it is putting babies at unnecessary risk of neurological damage. The EPA's interim goal for perchlorate, announced in January, "does not protect infants and should be lowered," the scientists said in their letter.

It is the second time in less than two months that an EPA scientific advisory panel has criticized the Bush administration for proposing a standard or guideline for a pollutant that would not adequately protect public health.

     It is not until the 10th paragraph of the article that the Times grudgingly gives a one-sentence reference to the fact (previously reported on this Blog; see Post of February 18, 2005) that the 24.5 ppb interim guidance standard is not far off of a 20 ppb standard recommended by the National Academy of Sciences--a prestigious scientific organization in itself.  Moreover, the Times article conveniently fails to mention that the Academy has issued a study finding no adverse health effects from perchlorate in milk (see Post on this Blog of November 18, 2005).  Nor does the Times find it important to report there is reason to doubt that, at least in the United States (where iodine-abundant foods are consumed by almost everyone) and even in some foreign countries, the reduction in iodine caused by perchlorate likely has anything above a de minimis health effect at all (see Posts of March 9, 2005 and December 30, 2005).

     Most everyone knows that the Times has seen a decline in its fortunes over the past few years.  With reporting like the article discussed herein, it is easy to see why the decline continues.

SANTA SUSANA ROCKETDYNE LAB SETTLEMENT DOES NOT SATISFY EVERYONE

Somehow, I missed this report-- a classic example of disliked lawyers and unhappy Plaintiffs.

The Simi Valley Acorn reported in January that:

Aerospace giant Boeing Co. agreed to pay $30 million to settle an eight-year-old lawsuit brought by 133 plaintiffs who claim that pollution created by 50 years of nuclear and rocket engine testing at the Santa Susana Field Lab in the Santa Susana Hills caused a number of illnesses, according to one of those plaintiffs.

Although the settlement was reached in late September—the day after jury selection was set to begin—a confidentiality agreement between Boeing and the plaintiffs kept the terms of the agreement private.

Margaret Ann Galasso, a plaintiff in the case, made the settlement public in early January because she was upset that lawyer fees would cost plaintiffs more than 60 percent of their settlement awards.

“I don’t care about the entire settlement,” said Galasso, who now lives in Florida. “That’s not the reason I’m upset. The reason I’m upset is Barry Cappello got $20 million, and we, the plaintiffs, got stiffed.”

     The Simi Valley Acorn article did not make clear on what basis Plaintiffs' counsel had the authority to settle despite the objections of at least one of the clients.

UPDATE ON PROPOSED PERCHLORATE LEGISLATION (SEN. FEINSTEIN AND REP. POMBO)

     Last month, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Rep. Richard Pombo (D-11th Dist Calif.) introduced in their respective chambers the California Perchlorate Contamination Remediation Act, SR 2298 and HR4798, respectively (to read the text of the bills, go to The Library of Congress-Thomas and type in "perchlorate" under "Legislation in Current Congress"- "Search Bill text").  The two bills appear to track each other virtually word for word.  The legislation would, if enacted, among other things,

     1.  Establish a "California Perchlorate Cleanup Fund" and commit the federal government to paying 50% of the cost of cleanup of contaminated water sources and supplies in the State, up to a maximum of $50,000,000;

     2.  Direct federal EPA, in awarding federal grant money, to give priority to cleanup issues in, among other places, the Santa Clara Valley, the watershed of the Santa Ana River (including Riverside and San Bernardino Counties), the San Gabriel Valley and Sacramento County; and

     2.  Express the sense of the Congress that federal EPA should establish a national drinking water standard for perchlorate.

     As readers of this Blog know (see "PERCHLORATE" under 'CATERGORIES" on the right-hand side of this page), Sen. Feinstein has been trying for some time to move perchlorate legislation through Congress. In my very first Post (January 8, 2005) on this Blog, I reported that "Sen. Diane Feinstein (D.-Calif) has announced an intention to introduce legislation in this Congressional session requiring, among other things, EPA to set a national drinking water standard for perchlorate no later than 2007.  Sen. Feinstein's legislation would also award $200 million for the study of perchlorate clean-up technologies."

     Sen. Feinstein is back again in her efforts to move perchlorate legislation to the national stage.  We'll monitor and advise.

EXCELLENT SUMMARY OF PERCHLORATE REGULATION, HEALTH ISSUES AND SOURCES BY K2 ENVIRO, INC.

  

Pictured is an excellent summary of the present status of federal and California regulatory standards for perchlorate; of the health issues associated with the chemical; and of the man-made and natural sources of the chemical.  This summary was prepared by the consulting firm K2 Enviro, Inc. in which Dr. Jean Kulla is a principal.  A link to K2 Enviro's website is included on the right-hand side of this weblog.  In order to read the pictures, just click on them (at least, that's what Windows users should do;  if Mac users need to do something different, I'd appreciate it if a Mac user could post a comment with directions).                                                                                                                                    

MOTHER NATURE'S OWN REMEDIATION

     From a recent CBS CHANNEL 2/KCAL 9 report:

Heavy rains in Southern California have washed away a chemical that had contaminated a proposed luxury-home development in the San Fernando Valley.

Just days before an official cleanup project was to begin, state toxic officials have found that all the perchlorate is gone.

Last fall, inspectors found the chemical that is used in rocket fuel was in Dayton Canyon Creek at a concentration about 166 times higher than the state allows.

After the New Year's storms drenched the site with water, they found none.

     Reminds one of the old saying, "the solution to pollution is dilution".

PERCHLORATE SAFE-LEVEL DEBATE CONTINUES

  I missed the original Wall Street Journal article, but one gets the sense of that article from a Letter to the Editor from Blogger Pasadena Pundit:

MSM [mainstream media] Gets Perchlorate Story Mostly Wrong -- Rebuttal Letter to Peter Waldman of Wall Street Journal on Perchlorate

To: Editor, Wall Street Journal From: The Pasadena Pundit Re: Peter Waldman, "Inside Pentagon's Fight to Limit Regulation of Military Pollutant" (P.1 banner headline) Peter Waldman, "Campus, Industry set up a Confab" (P. 5). Wall Street Journal, December 29, 2005

Wall Street Journal environmental journalist Peter Waldman's use of the rhetorical device of casting aspersions on the motives of Pentagon contractors in establishing a safe dose for perchlorate in drinking water misinforms the public and is an infuriating diversion from serious policy debate.

*Public and private water suppliers have shut down about 350 water wells in California and are paying 5 to 10 times the price for imported water supplies from the Colorado River Aqueduct that has nearly the same concentration of perchlorate in it (6 parts per billion) as most of the so-called contaminated water wells (6 to 10 parts per billion). Vast areas of the Texas panhandle have perchlorate from 20 to 60 parts per billion in soils and groundwater where no rocket fuel or munitions plants are located. For decades the drinking water in Chile has contained natural perchlorate at higher levels than that found in our groundwater with no measurably higher rates of childhood mental retardation. Perchlorate has also been found in rain and snow. Lab tests indicate it may be naturally produced by the exposure of natural salts to sunlight.

     The full text of the letter is at Pasadena Pundit's weblog (link set out above).

NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES PUBLISHES POLITICALLY INCORRECT PERCHLORATE STUDY

  You probably won't read about this in mainstream media outlets such as The New York Times, the Washington Post or The Los Angeles Times, but lookey here:  on October 31, 2005 the prestigious National Academy of Sciences published on line a study concluding:

Perchlorate is a goitrogenic anion that competitively inhibits the sodium iodide transporter and has been detected in forages and in commercial milk throughout the U.S. The fate of perchlorate and its effect on animal health were studied in lactating cows, ruminally infused with perchlorate for 5 weeks. Milk perchlorate levels were highly correlated with perchlorate intake, but milk iodine was unaffected, and there were no demonstrable health effects. We provide evidence that up to 80% of dietary perchlorate was metabolized, most likely in the rumen, which would provide cattle with a degree of refractoriness to perchlorate. Data presented are important for assessing the environmental impact on perchlorate concentrations in milk and potential for relevance to human health. 

^***

^{A  60-kg pregnant woman could consume in excess of 3.7 liters of milk containing 11.3 ng of perchlorate per ml without exceeding the RfD, and this quantity of milk would be well in excess of average daily consumption.}

^{(emphases added).}

    ^{Don't hold your breath waiting to hear our legislators and regulators cite this study as at least some evidence that caution is needed in allocating scarce resources to perhaps more pressing problems.  In environmental politics, the keyword remains politics.}

CONTROVERSY CONTINUES OVER ALLEGED ROCKETDYNE PERCHLORATE CONTAMINATION

     The Simi Valley Acorn reports on Friday, October 28, 2005, that the Santa Susana Field Laboratory (SSFL) Workgroup will meet again on January 11, 2006, 6:30 p.m. Wed., Jan. 11 at the Simi Valley Cultural Arts Center.  The SSFL Workgroup is lead by the federal EPA

     According to the Acorn, this is a meeting originally scheduled to occur earlier but postponed because of a conflict in schedules on the part of California DTSC participants in the Workgroup.  The paper further reports that the delay has frustrated some environmentalists.

     The immediate controversy regarding the Santa Susana Rocketdyne facility, now owned by Boeing, concerns whether or not the facility is responsible for perchlorate contamination being found in Dayton Creek, a creek that runs through West Hills, California (part of the City of Los Angeles and about 1.5 miles to the east of Rocketdyne).  A developer (Centex) is planning a residential development surrounding the creek.  As the Acorn summarizes the controversy:

The origin of perchlorate has caused further disagreement between the two sides.

Centex, Boeing and the DTSC all say there is a lack of evidence connecting the perchlorate found in Dayton Creek to Rocketdyne’s test field.

Residents and environmentalists believe it’s unreasonable to think the perchlorate came from any source other than Rocketdyne.

Fitzpatrick [a spokesman for Centex] said that because of perchlorate’s high solubility, it should be found in soil and water samples taken at points between the test field and the Centex property. Tests of those samples, Fitzpatrick said, found no perchlorate.

Thus, Centex officials don’t believe the perchlorate found in Dayton Creek came from Rocketdyne.

The alternative explanation is that the perchlorate source in Dayton Creek is an area known, ironically enough, as "Happy Valley."  This is where Dayton Creek originates and perchlorate levels in the soil at that site have been found as high as 75,000 parts per million (that's high).  The paper reports:

Ali Tabidian, professor of hydrogeology at Cal State Northridge for more than 16 years, said he thinks that because of the faster water current typically found higher on a hill, it’s reasonable to assume the perchlorate was washed further downstream into areas—like Dayton Creek—where the water pools.

In any event, I'll report further when there is coverage of the SSFL Workgroup's scheduled January meeting.

FONTANA WATER COMPANY DENIED DRAMATIC RATE INCREASE

     This Blog has previously reported on clean-up efforts and lawsuits over perchlorate contamination in the Inland Empire area of California (east of Los Angeles).  See Posts of July 9 and 18, 2005, under the category "PERCHLORATE".  The latest round in this saga occurred when, on September 22, 2005, an administrative law judge of the California Public Utilities Commission denied Fontana Water Company a dramatic rate increase (23.6 to 77 per cent, depending on how one interprets press accounts of the administrative proceedings) which the water provider said was needed, among other things, to clean up perchlorate-contaminated drinking water wells.

     Apparently, however, the administrative law judge's ruling is not the final word on the matter. According to the Fontana Herald News of October 6, 2005, the judge ordered a "public participation hearing" to occur on November 17, 2005 for further discussion of the water rate issue.   Commenting on the upcoming hearing, Mayor Mark Nuaimi said:

"We urge residents to attend the community meeting, where they will have the possibility of making their voices heard, so that the judge sees that the increase is just wrong," said Nuaimi. "This is our chance to let the Water Company know we are not going to give up. We will win in court and there will be no rate increase."