From: "Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER)"
Date: Tue, 10 Jun 2008 10:28:25 -0400 (EDT)
info@peer.org
http://www.peer.org/news/news_id.php?row_id=1061
For Immediate Release: Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Contact: Kyla Bennett (508) 230-9933; Carol Goldberg (202) 265-7337
Industrial Polluters Escape Monitoring, Enforcement and Ongoing Safeguards
Washington, DC – Massachusetts’ plan to streamline permits to allow
continuing industrial discharge of pollutants into groundwater is seriously
flawed and risks contaminating drinking water supplies, according to formal
public comments filed today by Public Employees for Environmental
Responsibility (PEER). While intended to encourage reuse of wastewater,
the state plan sacrifices protection of both surface and ground waters
quality in order to maximize underground disposal of wastes.
The major failures of the plan unveiled by the state Department of
Environmental Protection concern the secondary status assigned to public
health safeguards, including
Current industrial water polluters will be allowed to continue
discharging into groundwater influencing drinking water wells, called "Zone
II."
The plan lacks any coherent enforcement provisions, despite that fact
nearly half of the sewage treatment plants with groundwater permits are
already in significant noncompliance; and
Pharmaceuticals and other chemicals which do not yet carry toxic health
advisories are completely ignored, meaning that water supplies can be
contaminated with ever greater concentrations of medications, hormones,
dietary supplements, and cleaning agents.
"Under this plan, there must practically be a public health emergency
before the state could step in," stated New England PEER Director Kyla
Bennett, a lawyer and former EPA biologist. "Governor Patrick’s
‘permitting at the speed of business’ mantra seems to place industrial
convenience above public health."
Compounding the risks posed by water reuse plan are planks that make it
more difficult for the public to track industrial discharges and water
quality, most notably
Elimination of existing monitoring requirements for both industrial
wastewater producers and for the sewage plants receiving those wastes;
Absence of any meaningful public notice provisions so that people can
find out about major changes in both pollution discharge permits and
treatment conditions; and
Imposition of fees on public requests for fact sheets and permit
submissions. By contrast, industry would not be charged for this same
information.
"Citizens’ right to know what is going into their taps is treated as an
annoyance," Bennett added. "Common sense dictates that liberalizing
pollution recharge rules should trigger stronger not weaker monitoring of
what is in the water."
Tomorrow marks the close of the public comment period on the plan, which
was first announced on March 28th.
Read the PEER comments
http://www.peer.org/docs/ma/08_10_6_dep_gw_reg_comments.pdf
See the public notice for the proposed regulations
http://www.mass.gov/dep/public/hearings/gwgrp.htm
View the proposed regulations
http://www.mass.gov/dep/service/regulations/proposed/3145rls.pdf
Look at the growing pharmaceutical water pollution footprint in
Massachusetts
http://www.peer.org/news/news_id.php?row_id=1042
