NAFTA Commission Asked to Investigate U.S. Mercury Emissions

MONTREAL, Quebec, Canada, September 17, 2004 (ENS) - A coalition of American and Canadian environmental groups is using the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) to force the United States to reduce its emissions of mercury from coal burning power plants.

The coalition filed a formal complaint with NAFTA's environmental commission on Thursday demanding an investigation into the increase in mercury contamination of U.S. lakes and rivers.

NAFTA's Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC) is responsible for investigating and reporting on countries that fail to enforce their own environmental laws. The CEC Secretariat, based in Montreal, must now determine if the United States will be asked to respond to the allegations and whether an international investigation is warranted.

The Waterkeeper Alliance and Canada's Sierra Legal Defence Fund, which represent the coalition, allege that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is failing to effectively enforce provisions of the U.S. Clean Water Act against coal-fired power plants, "degrading water bodies and leading to widespread fish consumption restrictions."

Coal-fired power plants like this one emit mercury into the air. (Photo by Phillip Redman courtesy USGS)

The Canadians object that they are downwind of the U.S. coal burning facilities. The province of Ontario is next door to Ohio, Pennsylvania, Indiana, and Illinois, which all rely heavily on coal-fired power, and the prevailing winds carry contaminants into Canada from seven of the 12 worst mercury emitters - power plants in the Ohio Valley.

"We are more exposed to U.S. pollution than many Americans," said Albert Koehl, staff lawyer with Sierra Legal Defence Fund in Toronto.

“U.S. coal plants are using our waters as toxic waste dumps,” said Robert Kennedy, Jr., president of the Waterkeeper Alliance.

“The Bush administration’s refusal to enforce the Clean Water Act gives these companies an unfair advantage over their law abiding competitors, our international trade partners under NAFTA," Kennedy said. "We are asking this NAFTA Commission to take action to stop a corporate handout and to protect the health of children in the U.S. and Canada.”

“Public utilities are increasing their profits at the expense of world health,” said Scott Edwards, Waterkeeper Alliance Legal Director. “The international health crisis caused by lax enforcement of mercury emissions is the very type of practice the CEC was created to address.”

The coalition maintains that mercury is contaminating an increasing number of fish. In the past decade, the number of U.S. states issuing warnings against eating fish because of mercury poisoning jumped from 27 to 45.

Over the same period, the number of mercury related fish consumption advisories issued for particular waterbodies more than doubled. One-third of all U.S. lakes and hundreds of thousands of river miles are affected by these advisories today.

Trout caught in the Great Lakes which are bordered by the United States in the south and Canada to the north. Great Lakes fish are increasingly contaminated. (Photo courtesy U.S. EPA)

"Mercury, in massive amounts, goes up into the air from U.S. coal-fired power plants. Gravity brings that mercury back down, much of it in our treasured lakes and streams, said Koehl. "We don't expect U.S. EPA to interfere with the laws of gravity but we do expect them to enforce the laws that protect our shared water resources from contamination."

The nervous system is very sensitive to all forms of mercury, according to the U.S. government's Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, a branch of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). Methylmercury and metallic mercury vapors are more harmful than other forms, because more mercury in these forms reaches the brain, the agency says.

"Exposure to high levels of metallic, inorganic, or organic mercury can permanently damage the brain, kidneys, and developing fetus. Effects on brain functioning may result in irritability, shyness, tremors, changes in vision or hearing, and memory problems."

Earlier this year the CDC issued a finding that one in 12 U.S. women of childbearing age has blood mercury levels at or in excess of what is considered safe by the EPA.

In the province of Ontario, 98 percent of all fish consumption restrictions for inland lakes are due to mercury contamination. It is estimated that 38 percent of mercury deposition in the Canadian portion of the Great Lakes originates from U.S. sources. Most of the rest is from international sources, the Canadians say.

Signatories to the petition include the Centre for Environmentally Sustainable Development, Earthroots, Friends of the Earth Canada and Friends of the Earth U.S., Great Lakes United / Union Saint-Laurent, Grands Lacs, Pollution Probe, the Sierra Club in the U.S. and in Canada, and the Waterkeeper Alliance.

The Commission for Environmental Cooperation is showing an interest in the issue of transboundary mercury pollution. A CEC report on industrial pollution issued in June says that 64 percent (43,384 kg) of mercury air emissions in North America came from coal-fired power plants in 2001. The CEC published an article on mercury pollution in the Summer 2004 issue of its newsletter "Trio."

American Electric Power Company's coal burning power plant in Conesville, Ohio, released 413 kilograms of mercury into the air in 2001. It ranked 11th in North America. (Photo courtesy CEC)

If the Clean Air Act were enforced instead, they say, the mercury would disappear from the environment at least a decade before that.

The EPA proposed two alternatives for controlling mercury. One approach would require power plants to install controls known as maximum achievable control technology under the Clean Air Act. If implemented, this proposal would reduce nationwide mercury by 14 tons or about 30 percent by early 2008, says EPA Administrator Mike Leavitt.

A second approach proposed by EPA would create a market-based "cap and trade" program that, if implemented, would reduce nationwide utility emissions of mercury in two phases. When fully implemented mercury emissions would be reduced by 33 tons, nearly 70 percent.