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The Toxic Home Part 4November 06, 2006  | |  | Protecting Your Community
Toxics Right-to-Know Campaigns
We’re kept in the dark.
Americans remain largely in the dark about millions of
pounds of toxic chemicals being used, shipped, discharged
and spilled in our communities.
Too many poisonous chemicals
are threatening our health.
One in four Americans, including 10 million children under
the age of 12, lives within four miles of a toxic waste dump.
Corporations continue to manufacture and use about 1,000
new synthetic chemicals every year—adding to the roughly
85,000 already on the market. In 2001, industries reported
releasing more than 6.16 billion pounds of toxins into the
environment, many of which cause cancer, reproductive and
developmental disorders, endocrine disruption, organ and
nervous system damage, and more.
We have a right to know.
The Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know
Act, enacted in 1986, is the best source for public information
about toxic pollution. The law requires manufacturing
companies to publicly report releases of 667 chemicals and
chemical categories, but even so not all industries have to file
these reports, and the number of chemicals for which
reporting is required represents less than 1% of the full
picture. What about the other 99% of the chemicals being
used, entering the environment, and putting our health at
risk? We have a right to know about these and, indeed, about
everything that goes into our air, our water, our soil, our food,
our household products, and our bodies.
Industry opposition
Despite their feel-good ads on TV, chemical, food, and
consumer products companies have consistently denied our
right to know the truth about these things and have fought
Right-to-Know laws at every turn and at every governmental
level from town halls to the halls of Congress. Since 1989,
anti-Right-to-Know industries have contributed over $68
million to political candidates. Nearly 50% of this money
came from the chemical industry.
The chemical industry has not restricted its activities to
campaign contributions. It’s also backed legislation that
would scrap existing requirements for up to 90% of the toxic
chemicals now reported under the Community Right-to-
Know Act. These same polluters have also sought to weaken
existing Right-to-Know programs by consistently fighting to
cut EPA funding for them from federal budgets. In recent
years, the EPA has collected public documents for use in
the preparation of congressional bills that would seek to
add significant new sources of toxic pollution to existing
Right-to-Know laws, including hazardous waster incinerators,
the mining industries, and utilities. Polluters have worked
overtime to block such expansions. The Chemical
Manufacturers’ Association even sued the EPA in an attempt
to prevent efforts to increase the number of toxic chemicals
that are reported to the public.
Industry Claims
“This information serves no useful purpose.”
Guy D. Tenini,
DuPont Dow Elastomers
“[T]he addition of materials accounting information
to the Toxic Releases Inventory will result in
substantial costs to our facility...”
Franklin R. Wheeler,
Texaco Refining & Marketing, Inc.
“Confidential business information
can be seriously jeopardized.”
Craig R. Doolittle & Susan E. Taylor,
The Dow Chemical Company
“Our experience is that the current TRI data is not
well understood and more data would only
further confuse the public.”
Geoffrey L. Oberhause, Colorite Polymers
Turning the tide
We disagree and believe that the existing Community Rightto-
Know laws should not only be protected from these and
other attacks but expanded to include:
Full Disclosure Polluters must inform the public about all
of the chemicals they use and release into the environment.
No Loopholes Polluting industries like mining, incinerators
and utilities should not be exempt from Right-to-Know rules.
Toxics Use Reporting Industries should be required to report
all their chemical use and any possible exposure to chemicals
in the workplace, in transport through communities, in
consumer products and via disposal into our environment.
Warning Labels Food and other products containing
potentially toxic and/or genetically modified ingredients
should have clear warning labels so consumers can make
informed choices about the things to which they expose
their families.
What you can do
Nearly 20 years after the passage of the original Right-to-
Know Act, the public still only has access to information
about less than 1% of the chemicals being used today, and
many industries remain exempt from reporting their releases
of even this limited number of chemicals. In addition, labels
on food, personal care, cleaners, and other consumer products
remain incomplete and inadequate.
In an attempt to remedy these problems, Right-to-Know
legislation of various types is continually being introduced in
both the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives that
addresses our inherent right to know what’s being put in our
environment, and our food and other products. These bills are
invariably sent to committee where industry lobbying succeeds
in killing them for the session.
What’s needed to counter these influences is some lobbying of
our own. To ensure that polluters don’t continue to block
Right-to-Know expansions:
• Please send letters to your congressional delegation
asking them to support or sponsor legislation that would
expand current Right-to-Know regulations to encompass
all toxic substances regardless of their type or production
amounts, and all industries that use or release them. Ask
them to require complete and accurate labeling of foods
and other products.
• Send a letter to the editor of your local paper
encouraging the same.
Sample Letter
Dear (Senator or Representative) ________________________
I am writing to ask you to support broad expansion of the existing toxics release Right-to-Know law and better labeling of
consumer products.
Current laws require the reporting of less than 1% of the estimated 85,000 chemicals in use today. We need to protect
and expand the public’s right to know about any and all hazardous materials that are being released into the environment
regardless of their type or the quantities involved. To that end, I ask that you sponsor or support new Right-to-Know
legislation that would require:
• Full reporting about all toxic chemicals and materials transported through our neighborhoods; produced, used
and stored in the workplace; contained in consumer products; and released into the environment.
• Full reporting by all industries engaged in the production, transportation, handling or use of toxic materials
of both the specific materials and substances themselves and the quantities used.
• Industries to inform parents if foods or products contain chemicals that may cause cancer, reproductive,
endocrinological, or neurological harm, or contain genetically modified ingredients.
I also ask you support labeling laws for all consumer products, including cleaning and personal care products, that would
require companies to clearly list all ingredients they contain. I have a fundamental right to know about all the potentially
toxic materials in my community, my workplace, my home, and my body. I hope you will work to protect this right by
making expanded Right-to-Know legislation a high priority in the current session of Congress.
Sincerely,
YOUR NAME
Right-to-Know lessons learned from success
in New Jersey & Massachusetts
Pollution prevention
In 1986, a forward reaching New Jersey state law was enacted
requiring companies to collect and publicly report how toxic
chemicals are used within manufacturing facilities. In 1989,
Massachusetts enacted its own Toxics Use Reduction Law
with expanded Right-to-Know reporting. The results of these
state laws are remarkable:
•The Massachusetts Department of Environmental
Protection’s analysis found that, from 1990 to 1995,
toxic chemical use has been reduced by 20% and
hazardous waste generation decreased by 30%.
•Over the same five-year period, national data shows
that for the country, as a whole, similar categories of
hazardous wastes increased by 6%.
•The New Jersey Department of Environmental
Protection’s December 30, 1996 study, Industrial
Pollution Prevention Trends in New Jersey, found that
between 1987 and 1994 hazardous wastes decreased as
a result of pollution prevention by approximately 50%.
Reduced costs
In addition to the environmental benefits, the economic
benefits are also impressive. Two different analyses of the New
Jersey program have found that for every $1 spent on this
additional reporting and planning, companies are saving
between $5 and $8 on pollution reduction activities. Both
states have found that the industry sectors that have shown
the greatest pollution reductions are also among the most
economically healthy.
Industries in Massachusetts saved $14 million between 1990
and 1997, according to the Massachusetts Department of
Environmental Protection. By collecting and reporting how
chemicals are used within each facility, companies discover
efficient ways to do business. They streamline processes and
minimize excess chemical use, creating less waste. The cost of
waste treatment is then dramatically reduced. The value of
human health and the ecological benefits of the Act were not
tallied into this figure.
Case Studies
Companies that prevent pollution save money
• Lockheed Martin Defense Systems, of Pittsfield, MA,
reduced the use of ozone-depleting solvents from 125
tons per year to less than 2 tons per year. Lockheed
Martin saves $497,000 in solvent purchasing costs;
$17,500 in waste disposal costs; and $65,000 in record
keeping costs annually.
• Fisher Scientific, Inc., of Fair Lawn, NJ, saves an
average $529,000 per year by reducing chemical use
and waste by 48%.
• Cranston Print Works, of Webster, MA, adjusted its
wastewater process to eliminate 2.66 million pounds
of sulfuric acid annually. Cranston saves $60,000 due
to chemical reductions and $20,000 due to lowered
maintenance costs each year.
• Frigidaire, of Edison, NJ, saves approximately
$1 million each year by reducing the use of
lubrication oil by 50% and by reducing the use
of trichloroethylene from 720,000 pounds per
year to zero.
Protection of trade secrets
Massachusetts and New Jersey’s expanded Right-to-Know
laws protect trade secrets. Fewer than 10 companies a year
present a trade secret request claim. In every instance, the
trade secret claim has been granted.
**With a few exceptions, the information on these pages has been
excerpted with permission from documents published by U.S. PIRG.
We encourage you to support their excellent work, as well as the
efforts by the State PIRGs. You can contact U.S. PIRG at:
218 D Street, SE, Washington, DC 20003 for additional information.
phone: 202-546-9707 e-mail:uspirg@pirg.org web site: www.uspirg.org
Infinite Health Resources does not at any point, for any circumstances suggest that you do not follow or stop medical advice of your physician. We do not advocate any drugs that has not been prescribed by your physician, nor suggest that we are medical doctors nor are we giving medical advice. Infinite Health Resources is here purely as a resource. |  | |  |
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