let's stop wasting time

["Jon Campbell" <jon@cqs.com>]

  Hi, folks,
  
  
  I think many of us are agreeing violently, even to
  
  some extent Sam M.
  
  
  Yes, there are MANY good people in the
  
  agencies. Yes, the good people work very
  
  hard at trying to help communities, or fixing
  
  the regs, or trying to make sense out of the
  
  madness.
  
  
  But please read REHW 553 and 554. For those
  
  who haven't seen it, it is available at
  
  http://www.monitor.net/rachel
  
  
  The many good people in the agencies are
  
  hamstrung by the very nature of the
  
  agency's mission, which is to PROMOTE
  
  corporate interests within the confines
  
  of the laws and regulations of the land.
  
  
  Sam, you are precisely right, the agency
  
  people are not "wild-eyed" environmental
  
  activists. They act according to the confines
  
  of the agency in which they work.
  
  
  Sometimes they do wonderful work, and sometimes
  
  they do nasty, evil work, depending on what their
  
  boss tells them to do. But they will NEVER accomplish
  any dramatic progressive changes!
  
  
    The NESWC incinerator in North Andover, Mass
  
  runs within the confines of the current Massachusetts
  
  regulations most of the time. Massachusetts has not
  
  assimilated the 1990 USEPA regs yet on
  
  incinerators. Thus it is perfectly legal for this
  
  incinerator to emit 20-30 TEQs (200-300 mass PCDD/PCDF)
  
  which is 4-5 times the EPA allowance. It is
  
  perfectly legal for them to dump 2000 POUNDS
  
  OF MERCURY VAPOR onto the town each year.
  
  (Those figures are from the stack tests that the
  
  incinerator operators PROVIDED to the Mass DEP).
  
  
  Do you see what I am getting at?
  
  
  The "new EPA" is rapidly finding erroneous zones in
  
  environmental regulations, and telling companies to
  
  use them. The good people working in the agencies
  
  can't do a g-d thing about it.
  
  
  The EPA is telling companies to package up
  
  hazwaste and sell it as fertilizer. The EPA just
  
  gave a low-level radioactive waste dump the
  
  OK to connect to a sewage treatment plant
  
  which will undoubtedly sell the LLRW to some
  
  unsuspecting farmer. BECAUSE THERE ARE
  
  NO REGS FOR FERTILIZER!!! So something that
  
  would be patently illegal by NRC regulations -
  unlined land distribution of LLRW, is suddenly
  
  legalized because it is called FERTILIZER and
  
  comes under the jurisdiction of the new EPA.
  
  
  When Carol Browner gave away the store
  
  to the incinerator operators - changing the ash
  
  test from E.P. Toxicity to TCLP, and then allowing
  
  them to throw the alkaline lime-saturated fly-ash
  
  in with the bottom-ash - the good agency people
  
  had their hands tied, as they do now. They
  
  cannot say to you "I think Ms. Browner made
  
  a big mistake - that ash is really still toxic" or
  
  they'll get fired (unless they have some political
  
  protection or tenure).
  
  
  Anyhow, that's enough . Yes, some of the people
  
  in the agencies are OK. But that doesn't do any
  
  good, because the function of the agencies is
  
  to maintain the status quo with a few tweaks
  
  here and there, not to make massive changes.
  
  
  Here's a puzzle I'll leave with people: why do you
  
  think the 1994 Dioxin Reassessment has not
  
  been released as a public document yet?
  
  If you apply what I have said above, you'll have
  
  the answer...
  
  
  Thanks, and let's stops wasting time
  
  Jon Campbell