May 15 2009
The First Steps to Regulating Mercury Contamination Have Been Taken by the EPA
Nearly everyone has heard of the repercussions from eating certain types of fish due to the mercury contamination. How pregnant woman and young children should stay away from fish, as mercury is a neurotoxin. It attacks and attempts to destroy the nervous system, the spinal cord and the brain. During the first several years of human life, a child’s brain is developing rapidly; exposure to mercury can inhibit development causing possible mental retardation, cerebral palsy and many other complications.
There are two main contributors to mercury pollution; they are chlorine chemical plants and good ol’ fashioned coal-fired power plants! The process of extracting chlorine from salt uses huge amounts of mercury each year. Many of the more modern chlorine plants are using a cleaner technology; however, seven of the older plants continue to use mercury. There is nearly 200 tons of mercury kept at these plants at all times and nearly every year these plants have admitted to ‘losing’ dozens of tons of mercury during the extracting process. Where this mercury goes still remains a mystery to both the plant and the Environmental protection agency (EPA)!
Coal is naturally contaminated with mercury and during the burning process 50 tons of mercury is released into the air annually. Pollution control devices could be installed, however, during 2004 the Bush Administration proposed a plan that would put an end to the EPA considering emissions that are produced by coal fire plants to be considered hazardous, and would consider the emissions released to be just your basic average pollutants. Therefore, power plant emissions are unregulated.
Other sources of mercury emissions are gold production, smelting and cement production. Recently the EPA is proposing to reduce the mercury emissions from Portland cement kilns, which is a big step towards cleaning up the environment and perhaps making it safe to eat fish again. The fact that the EPA is starting with the cement kilns could mean that maybe it will only be a matter of time before they make their way to coal fired plants.
Spreading the word
~Wind
Yet something else bushey did for us………groan. I am so repulsed by that man I can’t for the life of me figure out why people voted for him. errrrrrr
But, why is the mercury thing worse now? I mean as kids we all played with it. Used it in school for experiments on a pretty regular basis, and yet fewer in my generation have problems.
Go Greeln!
Good article
Sandy
Have a good wkend
I too played with it as a child, we didn’t know any better. Just like smoking, but many are seeing the effects from it now. Some say the first sign is memory loss…who were you again?!?
~Wind