EPA May Drop Lead Air Pollution Limits

[Jcrowley]

Published on Thursday, December 7, 2006 by the Associated Press
EPA May Drop Lead Air Pollution Limits
by John Heilprin
 
The Bush administration is considering doing away with health standards that cut lead from gasoline, widely regarded as one of the nation's biggest clean-air accomplishments. Battery makers, lead smelters, refiners all have lobbied the administration to do away with the Clean Air Act limits.

A preliminary staff review released by the Environmental Protection Agency this week acknowledged the possibility of dropping the health standards for lead air pollution. The agency says revoking those standards might be justified "given the significantly changed circumstances since lead was listed in 1976" as an air pollutant.

The EPA says concentrations of lead in the air have dropped more than 90 percent in the past 2 1/2 decades.

But Rep. Henry Waxman (news, bio, voting record), D-Calif., the incoming chairman of the House Committee on Government Reform, called on the agency to "renounce this dangerous proposal immediately," because lead, a highly toxic element, can cause severe nerve damage, especially in children.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines06/1207-01.htm

[LARED]

1. This last line caught my attention

"That is not to say that air emissions of lead should be uncontrolled, or that no steps should be taken to address public health concerns arising from lead use," the Battery Council International said. "But many other regulatory vehicles exist for meeting these concerns."

I wonder if the guy is blowing smoke or is on to a real problem? I work in the chemical industry and the number of environmental rules and regulations are mind boggling at times. There are many regulations the overlap each other (often contradicting each other in the process) that create redundant and wasteful programs for companies to comply with.

Sometimes even a broken clock is right.

[drm604]

4. But the regs seem to be working.

The EPA says concentrations of lead in the air have dropped more than 90 percent in the past 2 1/2 decades.

[LARED]

5. I'm all for reg's on lead

I was merely pointing out that sometimes these regulations overlap each other in weird ways that make compliance a nightmare. This might be a case where that happens.

It's sort of works like this. One part of a state or federal agency has a set of rules for a process or chemical, and another state or fed agency has another set of rules that for the same process or chemical. A manufacturer must comply with both. Sometimes one reg has a manufacturer doing something the other reg does not allow or is a burden to implement for no reason. Neither side want to change so the manufacturer gets stuck in the middle. You can get rid of one set of regs and still operate in an environmentally safe way.

Is this the case here? I'm guessing not, but you never know.

[BadgerKid]

2. self-delete

[Redstone]

3. This is just SO fucking disgraceful. I read it in the paper today, and could not believe

what I was seeing.

Redstone

[Octafish]

6. Somebody tell me they're not NAZIs.

If you would, please put "Mengele" in the GOOGLE and see there's NO difference.