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The EPA allows polluters to turn neighborhoods into “sacrifice zones”

propublica.org

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Re: The EPA allows polluters to turn neighborhoods into “sacrifice zones”

#131

Post by vineyardmike »

scottyah wrote: post #111
vineyardmike wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eh, not really. Boston area has no big chemical/hard industrial industry, and nothing on that map. Neither does seattle (but the map shows some small process in areaa). Id wager a lot of modern "intellectual" cities (where knowledge worker industries dominate) can be devoid of such processes. Tourism cities too - eg, Vegas and Miami don't have such a history and their maps are clean. Obviously SFBay is a notable exce…

All that stuff is still being made and polluting, "mordor" is just further away.

Then its not really "nearby" is it? Its another city, another nation, and not really related to that city at all?

Re: The EPA allows polluters to turn neighborhoods into “sacrifice zones”

#132

Post by LorenPechtel »

kybishop wrote: post #4
chrisseaton wrote: post #3

Californians have watered down the phrase 'cancer-causing' so much that probably nobody cares! I guess being down-wind of a Starbucks counts as being in a sacrifice zone according to Californian regulations!

Do you have evidence to back up this claim? I'm aware CA puts many warning stickers on various products... but isn't it possible that profit-seeking corporations are, in fact, using cancer-causing materials simply because they're cheaper?

In many cases it's natural risk, not the products at all.

Everything has some amount of lead back from the days when it was used recklessly. Everything has some amount of mercury that's still going up smokestacks. (Now we catch most of it--not all of it!) Plants pick up some arsenic from the soil--for medical reasons I eat a lot of rice and it's enough of an issue I make sure to buy rice grown in low-arsenic areas.

Re: The EPA allows polluters to turn neighborhoods into “sacrifice zones”

#133

Post by LorenPechtel »

actually_a_dog wrote: post #66
ajsnigrutin wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This works, if you have 20 coffee shops, and one of them has "there's asbestos in this building" warning. If you have warnings literally everywhere, for minor things, that noone really cares about, because the risks are miniscule, people will start ignoring even the dangerous but identical-looking signs. "this item causes cancer" ... are we talking about asbestos, or are we talking about a roasted potato? If the labe…

I was going to suggest that asbestos was a bad example, because, in most cases, as long as it's left undisturbed, it's completely safe. The only risk from asbestos is from breathing it into one's lungs. If it's not in the air, it's not a problem. But, then I thought: hmm... maybe his is a great example. People are terrible at assessing risks. The word 'asbestos' is likely to cause a greater reaction than is warranted…

But note the very high cancer rates amongst those who were dealing with the twin towers rubble.

Re: The EPA allows polluters to turn neighborhoods into “sacrifice zones”

#134

Post by vineyardmike »

sokoloff wrote: post #94
vineyardmike wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The engineers didn't set out to create processes that resulted in toxic by-products, your statement is not helpful at all. if the engineers did not set out to create a process free from polluting carcinogens, then they did something wrong.

When you have a campfire (or fire in your fireplace), you are releasing polluting carcinogens. When you heat olive oil to the smoke point, you are releasing carcinogens. If/when you do those things, are you also doing something wrong?

> If/when you do those things, are you also doing something wrong?

Its hard to say you're doing something "right" by releasing carcinogens. But scale is important here. Its hard to really conflate burning olive oil in your kitchen with oil refining.

Re: The EPA allows polluters to turn neighborhoods into “sacrifice zones”

#135

Post by LorenPechtel »

csee wrote: post #14
chrisseaton wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People don't seem to change their behaviour due to those warnings. Nobody's going into a coffee shop, seeing that warning sticker and thinking 'ah whoops better get out of here' are they? The warning 'cancer-causing' has no effect.

Do you have any evidence for this statement? I have changed my behavior in response to health info on labels, so this is anecdotal evidence against your assertion. PR campaigns have been known to work, e.g. alcohol in Russia in the 90s.

The problem isn't labels in general. It's that Prop 65 went way too far, it was a case of the boy crying wolf for every rodent walking around.

Re: The EPA allows polluters to turn neighborhoods into “sacrifice zones”

#136

Post by vineyardmike »

LorenPechtel wrote: post #114
sokoloff wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you have a campfire (or fire in your fireplace), you are releasing polluting carcinogens. When you heat olive oil to the smoke point, you are releasing carcinogens. If/when you do those things, are you also doing something wrong?

Exactly. My former employer had repeated battles with the EPA over his supposed refusal to improve emissions. Never mind that we had already done everything technologically feasible, they only saw the pattern of improvement and then stopping. And they kept comparing us to a competitor that we kept telling them had to be faking the numbers. Took them 10 years to figure out we were right--and we spent more on complianc…

> we spent more on compliance than their penalty

Sounds like a failing over EPA penalty, not that we should allow pollution! Why should we as a society allow large scale pollution to poison our world without containment?

Re: The EPA allows polluters to turn neighborhoods into “sacrifice zones”

#137

Post by joe_the_user »

kaiju0 wrote: post #37

This is a pretty typical growth pattern. Industrial zone establishes and city is set far away in a safe area. City expands and resident need cheap housing. The cheap housing is built near the industrial zone as that is how economic forces work. People then see this and say they built industrial next to the poor people when the opposite occurred. Now the industry is giving cancer to poor people and needs to be punishe…

Now the industry is giving cancer to poor people and needs to be punished. Who is right and who is wrong?

This argument confuses policy and morality and somehow implies we should ignore both.

Morally, if you spew chemicals you know are going to cause significant excess deaths, you will have to live with yourself and myself and many people will think little of you.

Legality, if you spew an otherwise unknown chemical that you happen to know is quite toxic, you'll be liable. If you stay with EPA guidelines but happen to know this is going to kill or injure significant number, you only have public perceptions and your own conscious to answer for.

Policy wise, the EPA should impose regulations that make all neighborhoods reasonably safe. Moreover, I suggest structuring the regulation process to incentivize creating compliant processes rather than in terms of after-the-fact punishments. (I've heard a variety of contrasts between the US and Europe, where despite the US very "pro-capitalist", the regulatory paradigm is entirely adversarial).

Re: The EPA allows polluters to turn neighborhoods into “sacrifice zones”

#138

Post by csee »

LorenPechtel wrote: post #135
csee wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have any evidence for this statement? I have changed my behavior in response to health info on labels, so this is anecdotal evidence against your assertion. PR campaigns have been known to work, e.g. alcohol in Russia in the 90s.

The problem isn't labels in general. It's that Prop 65 went way too far, it was a case of the boy crying wolf for every rodent walking around.

I agreed with that, I was talking about labels in the abstract but they can definitely be put to bad use.

Re: The EPA allows polluters to turn neighborhoods into “sacrifice zones”

#139

Post by agonmon »

sokoloff wrote: post #94
vineyardmike wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The engineers didn't set out to create processes that resulted in toxic by-products, your statement is not helpful at all. if the engineers did not set out to create a process free from polluting carcinogens, then they did something wrong.

When you have a campfire (or fire in your fireplace), you are releasing polluting carcinogens. When you heat olive oil to the smoke point, you are releasing carcinogens. If/when you do those things, are you also doing something wrong?

Yes. If you care about the surrounding people's health.

Re: The EPA allows polluters to turn neighborhoods into “sacrifice zones”

#140

Post by pirate787 »

boringg wrote: post #98
kaiju0 wrote: post #37

This is a pretty typical growth pattern. Industrial zone establishes and city is set far away in a safe area. City expands and resident need cheap housing. The cheap housing is built near the industrial zone as that is how economic forces work. People then see this and say they built industrial next to the poor people when the opposite occurred. Now the industry is giving cancer to poor people and needs to be punishe…

I think they way you described was a bit harsh. That said this is a serious challenge for industry that have large footprints and health risks to the community. In the electric markets there are lots of power plants that were originally far from communities but then housing spread and fell into the catchment areas. Going forward wouldn't it make sense to zone an entire area to not be allowed to build for residential…

You're underestimating the ruthless disregard most large industrial producers have for the communities where they locate. These companies are led by sociopaths and fools.
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