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Wednesday, March 31, 2004
Environment - US EPA Bad Marks Hit Home
Updating our entry from earlier today, titled "Environment - US EPA gets bad marks in two reports," (scroll down to read it) is this story today in the Gary Post-Tribune [note that the Post-Tribune does not archive its stories]. Some quotes:
East Chicago’s municipal sanitary treatment plant led the state in water pollution permit violations, according to a report released today called “Troubled Waters.” Compiled by the Public Interest Research Group, a not-for-profit environmental advocacy group, the report analyzed data from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which monitors compliance with the Clean Water Act. The PIRG report’s data, which spanned an 18-month period from Jan. 1, 2002, to June 30, 2003, said East Chicago’s plant exceeded discharge limits 56 times into the Grand Calumet River into Lake Michigan. The most numerous of the pollutants discharged were sulfates and chlorides. In addition, there were one-day discharges of cadmium and chromium, considered more dangerous heavy metal pollutants.The report also listed municipal treatments plants in Hammond, Gary, Chesterton, Crown Point, Lowell, Michigan City, Portage, South Haven and Valparaiso for exceeding permit standards. Companies with permit violations were the BP refinery in Whiting, ISG Burns Harbor and Indiana Harbor, Ispat Inland in East Chicago, NIPSCO generating stations in Gary, Michigan City and Wheatfield, and U.S. Steel in Gary and Portage. The report said U.S. Steel’s Gary Works discharged cyanide on 16 different days during the 18-month period. Cyanide is a byproduct from metal processing in coke plants. * * *
Tim Method of IDEM downplayed the report’s findings. “It’s a very oversimplified report, you can read a lot into it,” Method said. Method said Indiana follows the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s process for determining significant water quality problems. “The system used by the EPA for determining a significant problem is a much smaller subset. It depends on how you do the stats.”
Posted by Marcia Oddi on March 31, 2004 06:35 PM
Posted to Environmental Issues