Idaho Statesman
Our View: Let's keep monitoring imported mercury levels
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Date: 08-23-2006
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Just across the
Idaho-Oregon border — 100 miles upwind of Boise — a cement plant
emits up to 2,153 pounds of mercury a year.
That's more than a ton of a poisonous metal that threatens damage to the
kidneys and the nervous, digestive and respiratory systems. The risks are
particularly acute for young children, who can suffer brain damage and learning
disabilities with high doses to mercury.
And the threat sends a clear signal to the elected officials who are charged
with protecting the health of our children. Mercury's dangers come from many
sources — not just the targets that are easy to identify and easy to oppose.
On Aug. 9, Gov.
Jim Risch went after an easy target: coal-fired
electric plants. He rejected a federal program that would have encouraged
utilities to build mercury-emitting coal plants in Idaho — provided they
can show they've made progress reducing mercury emissions in other states.
Risch made the right call, but this one was
low-hanging political fruit. As one of only three states without a coal-fired
plant, Idaho stood to gain
nothing by joining a program that promised to clean up power plants in other
states. That point wasn't lost on 33 of Idaho's 35 senators,
who urged Risch to reject the feds' rule. In southern
Idaho's Magic Valley, community
leaders crossed ideological and political lines to fight California-based Sempra Energy's proposal to build a coal-fired plant.
Risch's decision carries
some impact. He has allowed the state to rewrite its energy plan and figure out
what kind of coal-fired plants it would allow, "to have Idaho's destiny be
Idaho's decision," as Risch Chief of Staff John
Sandy said.
But the decision doesn't remove the mercury threat. On Aug. 3, six days before Risch rejected the relaxed rules on coal-fired plants, Oregon's Department of
Environmental Quality revealed emissions from Ash Grove Cement's plant in Durkee, Ore. The 2,153-pound
emissions are 10 times higher than the pollution from a coal-fired plant such
as Sempra's proposal.
The state has tools at its disposal, namely the Idaho Department of
Environmental Quality's monitoring program. The state measures mercury in winds
that blow from gold mines in Nevada, in fish, in
sediment at reservoirs and in snowpack near the Pomerelle ski resort close to the Nevada border. The state
is doing a "remarkable job" tracking mercury's many sources, said
Justin Hayes of the Idaho Conservation League.
That's high praise
from an environmental group sometimes at odds with government agencies. But
then again, monitoring Idaho's imported
mercury problems should not be a partisan issue. Even in a Statehouse with a
pro-business, anti-regulatory mindset, the DEQ's
monitoring program deserves support from the same bipartisan legislative
coalition that successfully fought the Sempra plant.
When mercury pollution comes from out of state, Idaho is in the awkward
position of trying to influence their neighbors' regulatory decisions. Hayes
has a good point; if Idaho is going to take
that tack, the state's experts need iron-clad evidence. Oregon disclosed Ash
Grove Cement plant's mercury emissions, but that doesn't absolve Idaho of its need to
monitor mercury. It only underscores the value of monitoring.