Articles started appearing in mid August about the halting of dredging in the Hudson River to clean up PCBs because the dredging was stirring up the sediment, causing the PCBs to float downstream and contaminate the river. You can read it here (Feds halt dredging as PCB levels rise: Action taken after federal drinking water safety standards exceeded Times Union (MCT), 8 August 2009,) or in the Wall Street Journal on August 10, 2009.
Why does this matter? Well it links to something I read in 2001. If you aren’t aware, PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls) were used prior to 1977 as an insulating fluid in electrical devices such as transformers. While PCBs were regulated, it was very possible in the 70’s to have a permit to discharge limited amounts into waterways. General Electric had such a permit and was discharging PCBs into the Hudson River. A study in 1975 reflected that the fish in the Hudson River had negligible levels in their systems.
In 1975, in response to a New York State’s Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) investigation into PCBs, a settlement was reached between the state and GE that resulted in the payment to a river clean-up fund, research on PCBs, and GE’s agreement to stop using them. All very proper and legal. The agreement also required the state, if it needed additional funds for any cleanup, to get them from someplace other than GE.
Subsequent studies funded by GE and others, including the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) itself demonstrated that PCBs do not cause cancer. Their use was actually dictated by fire and building codes. To not use them was to break the law. They were safe and did not catch fire or explode as prior insulating materials had done.
For further background, a few words about the Superfund Law. This was a law passed by Congress that essentially attributes guilt and levies fines unilaterally, and many years later allows the parties to challenge those penalties – if the entities still exist. The policy behind it suggests that getting contaminated sites cleaned up is paramount to anything else. So the fact that people who only contributed less than one percent to the contamination can be tagged for 100% of the clean-up; the fact that many of the participants in the contamination are mom-and-pops who do not have the resources or wherewithal to fight their massive government; and the fact that many of the declared cleanup sites are not really that big of a threat in the first place all become irrelevant. It’s the law! Some argue today that health care costs are adversely impacting small businesses, which is true. No one ever wants to look at the statistics that suggest that Superfund has put far more small businesses out of business and their employees out of work than all the health insurance issues combined. And that is also true. The Superfund law penalizes the good citizens who come forward, and if it catches the scofflaws who do not come forward (again, if they even still exist) the EPA can issue orders of unlimited scope and duration coupled with treble damages (meaning you take the actual damages and multiply that arbitrarily by three) and daily fines. The EPA holds god-like powers since it can dictate the life or death of businesses and sources of livelihood for millions of people.
And the clean-up standards that tell you when the work is “done?” That is whatever EPA decides it should be and they reserve their right to change their mind even after the initial clean-up is done.
So back to the Hudson River. In 2000 the EPA said that the Hudson was safe for swimming, boating, wading, and a source of drinking water. And it was. Wildlife was flourishing and several species that had dwindled in population were seeing a resurgence. Fishing was still banned, but that didn’t seem to bother the wildlife that ate the fish. No surprise I’m sure, but the EPA didn’t stop there. Based on its own calculations, if a person ate a half pound of Hudson River fish every week for 40 years, there was a 1 in 1000 chance that they would experience an increase in cancer. Think about that. One fish meal a week for four decades, and you “might” increase your risk of cancer by .001%. There is greater risk in getting behind the wheel of your car in NY city traffic, or breathing the NY city air. Eating canned tuna can put more harmful mercury into your system than all the fish in the Hudson River. And there was still no evidence that the increase in cancer rate had anything whatsoever to do with PCBs. The best studies actually showed a lower incidence of cancer among those who worked directly and daily with PCBs. Between 1977 and 2000 the PCB levels in the fish and the water fell 90%.
Nonetheless the EPA said that GE had to move 8 billion pounds (yes that’s with a “b”) of sediment to get at what is about 100,000 pounds of non-cancer-causing PCB’s. The operation would require dredging 24/6 (Sunday off!) for six months of the year, involve about 50 boats and barges, and require miles and miles of pipeline to carry the PCB-laden sediment to shore. The EPA proposed building drying plants along the river to dry this mud and haul it away using tens of thousands of trucks for further processing and disposal, (thus creating a NEW environmental problem that would have to be solved) but only after further destroying the riverbank and surrounding community to build roads to handle these trucks. Some 2 billion pounds of sand and gravel would be put back in its place, and over 1 million aquatic plants (destroyed in the dredging process) would then have to be replanted by divers. And all of this completely ignores the down-stream effect of disturbing the encased sediment and the loss of the oxygen-producing plants during the process.
As one writer pointed out, imagine a commercial company proposing to dredge the Hudson for something that was actually useful by tearing up the banks, destroying the ecosystem, knocking down trees and widening roads for access, and disrupting the idyllic lifestyle of those who live and work along that part of the river. There would be a huge outcry and the EPA itself would never approve such an environmental impact statement. It is so ludicrous on its face that such an environmental disaster would be considered plausible.
Yet, that is exactly what the EPA ordered GE to do. And guess what? This month the dredging was halted because it is creating an environmental nightmare. The sediment is flowing downstream, the PCB levels are on the rise, the drinking water has become unsafe, and millions of dollars are being spent to create this disaster. Millions more will be spent in fixing the damage that never should have been allowed to occur in the first place. To the EPA, however, this is of no consequence because it is not their money. It is easy to be ridiculous spendthrifts when you are spending someone else’s money. Sound familiar? Yeah, it’s the wealth transfer mode the rest of the government has joined, healthcare being only the tip of that iceberg.
If the remaining PCB sources were better controlled and capped, the levels in the fish and water would continue to drop naturally without any ecological disruption. When you play the role of God, however, as the EPA does relentlessly, you are not held responsible for your bad decisions. Your desire to punish the successful knows no bounds.
There are some bells we just can’t un-ring. The fact that PCBs legally got into the water is unfortunate, but of really little consequence. The solution essentially kills the baby to cure the cold. It is ridiculous. It is downright stupid. And it is your tax dollars at work senselessly draining valuable corporate resources.
