Sierra Club, Environmental Law and Policy Center and Workers United/SEIU joined today in praising EPA’s action. The plan announced by EPA includes further health and safety studies of the effects of NPEs on people and the environment, while beginning the process to regulate the chemical under the Toxic Substances Control Act. Future actions would add NPEs to the Toxics Release Inventory and encourage the use of safer substitutes.

“We know these chemicals are highly toxic and we know there are safer alternatives,” said Albert Ettinger, Senior Attorney with the Environmental Law & Policy Center. “If we want to protect public health, then NPEs should stop being used for many of their current applications. This action by the EPA is an important step in that direction.”

“Union members have been demanding government and industry action on toxic detergents for over half a decade. The detergents have been banned in Europe and Canada for almost a decade,” said Eric Frumin, Health and Safety Director for Workers United/SEIU. “We commend Administrator Jackson for acting swiftly on these hazards, and call upon the laundry industry to get rid of these chemicals immediately, as they have already done Canada and in Connecticut.”

“When chemicals in our environment, such as NPEs, affect the gender of fish, it’s a danger sign that more scrutiny is needed for chemicals we produce and use.  The action plan for NPEs that EPA announced today is a welcome first step to protect wildlife and human health,” said Ed Hopkins, Director of the Sierra Club’s Environmental Quality Program.  “But Congress must give EPA the regulatory tools it needs to control dangerous chemicals more effectively.”

In 2007, Sierra Club, Environmental Law and Policy Center, Workers United (formerly UNITE HERE), Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Association, Physicians for Social Responsibility and Washington Toxics Coalition petitioned the EPA under the Toxic Substances Control Act to require further toxicity testing of NPEs and to take steps to control it.  EPA largely denied the petition, but following litigation and an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, today’s action marks initial steps by the Obama administration to address NPEs health and environmental risks.

“Putting economics above public safety and the environment appears to be a pervasive practice” at BP, said ELPC senior attorney Faith Bugel. “If there’s a loophole, the practice appears to be to find their way through it. Our concern is that what happened in the Gulf doesn’t happen here.”

Read the full article in the New York Times

The EPA agreed with ELPC and our coalition that the state’s draft rules are insufficient, stating “we believe several components of the draft rules appear to be inconsistent with applicable federal requirements…” If Indiana doesn’t improve its standards, EPA could take away the state’s authority to issue wastewater permits.

ELPC will continue to push for regulations that protect clean water and public health in Indiana.

Read coverage in the Post-Tribune

“The US EPA is stepping up to protect children’s health, the Great Lakes and our environment by reducing toxic mercury pollution from major sources,” said Howard A. Learner, Executive Director of the Environmental Law & Policy Center. “Mercury is a neurotoxin that can pass through a pregnant woman’s placenta and harm fetal brain development. Coal plants and these industrial smokestacks are the largest sources of mercury pollution.  Today’s announcement leads the way to better protection for children’s health and the environment.”

Asian carp—particularly silver carp and bigheads— have invaded the Mississippi River and some of its tributaries, including the Illinois and Chicago Rivers, disrupting the ecosystem by starving out native fish. If they reach Lake Michigan, they could do the same to the Great Lakes, causing a decrease in biodiversity and severe economic impacts.

ELPC’s new report, “Cultivating Clean Water,” was released recently.  The report, authored by ELPC and the Mississippi River Collaborative, provides an overview of existing state programs that regulate runoff pollution from agriculture and gives a template for creating effective regulations that work well for farmers and the environment.

To download a copy of the report, click here.

To see the full press release, click here.

To download a copy of the report, click here.

“This is great news for Iowa,” said Brad Klein, Staff Attorney at ELPC. “After years of delay, the legislature made the choice today to protect Iowa’s environment and economy and make this a better place to live.”

A university of Iowa study found that an estimated 11,479 jobs, $242.9 million of income and $424.9 million of gross state product are associated with the spending by visitors to Iowa lakes. The rules provide additional protections for Iowa’s few remaining high-quality waters, for example West Lake Okoboji and several trout streams in Northeast Iowa.

After decades of meetings, letters, delays and, finally, a legal intervention, clean water advocates gathered at the statehouse in Des Moines this morning to witness the final meeting and decision needed to adopt clean water ―anti-degradation rules for Iowa.

Clean water advocates said today that the Iowa rules are long overdue and that they have worked for years to get antidegradation Rules written and passed in Iowa. With the passage of the federal Clean Water Act in 1972 states were required to enact antidegradation rules by 1985 to prevent the further pollution of lakes, rivers and streams. Iowa adopted rules but the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency informed Iowa that its rules violated federal law as early as 1997.

Repeated delays in rewriting the rules led a coalition of environmental organizations – the Environmental Law & Policy Center, Iowa Environmental Council, Hawkeye Fly Fishing Association and the Iowa Chapter of the Sierra Club  – to file a Petition for Rulemaking with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources in 2007 requesting that the State act immediately to adopt antidegradation implementation rules.

This action initiated a rule-making process that included several opportunities for public comment and a hearing before the Iowa Environmental Protection Commission, which approved the revised rules in December of last year. Monday’s meeting of the legislative Administrative Rules and Review Committee marked the final step in a decades-long process.

Advocates stressed that the rules will allow Iowa to grow sensibly and sustainably. “These rules will stem the tide of declining water quality in Iowa, protect the outstanding jewels that remain, and serve as an economic engine for those communities with the foresight to protect and leverage the potential of these remarkable waters,” said Shannan Garretson, water program legal analyst for the non-profit Iowa Environmental Council.

The groups have worked with IDEM for years in an attempt to improve Indiana’s water pollution rules, but the regulations still do not meet standards of the federal Clean Water Act. Large coal mines are currently allowed to pollute many of Indiana’s lakes and streams while pollution from industry and agriculture has contaminated over 800 Indiana Waterways with e coli bacteria.

The petition asks EPA to take back the authority for enforcing the Clean Water Act if IDEM does not improve its water pollution control program.

Read ELPC’s press release.

 Read coverage in the Indy Star.

Read the editorial “In Defense of Clean Water” by the Indy Star’s editorial board.

The EPA pledged to begin regulating nitrogen and phosphorous pollution—coming from farms, lawns, and municipal water treatment plants—in Wisconsin’s waters back in 1999.  Nitrogen and phosphorus contaminate drinking water by promoting the growth of cyanobacteria or blue-green algae and also contribute to algal blooms in the Great Lakes and ‘dead zone’ in the Gulf of Mexico.

Wisconsin’s public health has been negatively affected, with the cyanobacteria causing death of pets, rashes, sore throats, and eye irritation, but that is not the only ill-effect the state has experienced.  “Businesses located on waters tainted with toxic algae are really hurting,” said Denny Caneff, Executive Director of the River Alliance of Wisconsin. “They lose customers who flee the stench and the health hazards posed by toxic algae.  EPA needs to act to limit the nutrients causing these algae blooms.”

According to ELPC Senior Attorney Albert Ettinger, EPA needs to take responsibility. “The current Administrator of EPA, Lisa Jackson, is obviously not the one to blame for the decade-long failure to establish standards for controls on phosphorus and nitrogen pollution, but under the Clean Water Act, she is now the one with the responsibility to fix the problem.”

Read coverage in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Daily Reporter and Greenwire (subscription required)

Read the Press Release