Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

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

propublica.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

171–180 of 189 posts

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

#171

Post by SideburnsOfDoom »

refurb wrote: post #167
SideburnsOfDoom wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When you have a fire in your fireplace, you are releasing polluting carcinogens. When you do that, are you also doing something wrong? Yes. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-51581817 https://www.express.co.uk/life-style/property/1430579/wood-b... For the reasons that you set out. It's fairly straightforward.

So you’re for banning almost all foods that brown through baking this form acrylomide, a known carcinogen?

I'm for banning uncontrolled infliction of that and other carcinogens on one's neighbours, yes.

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

#172

Post by kube-system »

wholinator2 wrote: post #170
kube-system wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Looking at the outcome of economic effects with "right and wrong" isn't really a helpful measurement. We should force them, not because they are "wrong" but because the economic incentives deliver an outcome that is undesirable.

Agreed, but I don't see how "economic incentives" and "undesirable outcomes" isn't just a different way of saying right and wrong.

“Right” and “wrong” implies a sense of free will. When the expensive negative externalities of a business are legalized, a market is guaranteed to force any would-be altruistic actors out of existence. Those who get a job in one of these industries have no functional or legal ability to make choices which would bankrupt their own organizations. The only way to solve the issue is with a regulatory level playing field.

Economic incentives are a scientific force. You can’t solve problems by suggesting that people ignore them, you have to work within the bounds of the natural effects that inherently exist. Groups of people do not make moral decisions like an individual person does.

We won’t solve this issue with mere criticism while we continue to financially reward these outcomes. Make negative externalities illegal.

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

#173

Post by throwaway946513 »

azinman2 wrote: post #113
dontcare007 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep, a failure on the part of the beaurocrats to deny the zoning changes.

Houston is imfamous for not having zoning. That's how you get an industrial plant next to a school next to a mall next to housing next to a cattle feed lot.

Aye, but Houston isn't by far the only polluter on the list.

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

#174

Post by curryst »

vineyardmike wrote: post #87
friedman23 wrote: post #75

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.

> 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.

I don't think you really understand the implications of that statement. You can't even have bronze-age level technology with 0 carcinogens. At least not with present technology.

You can't burn wood. You can't heat a lot of metals. Practically anything that requires smelting metal is out because of the preceeding two. Eletrical power is basically a non-starter, because the mining and refining both release carcinogens.

We need more advanced technology to be able to truly isolate those emissions, but we don't have the ability to develop that technology without releasing those emissions. The goal should be managing the amount of emissions we allow, and prioritizing the "emission credits" towards goals that can reduce those emissions further.

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

#175

Post by curryst »

vineyardmike wrote: post #143
sseagull wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A lot of the things we rely on every day have toxic byproducts And we should stop and fix that. Why do we accept this as ok? Of course. But it is not always easy. You can’t always wave your hand and make non-harmful alternatives. Sometimes it is due to incentives, but also sometimes it is really just chemistry or physics. See the “tin whisker” phenomenon when they took lead out of solder.

> Sometimes it is due to incentives, We can fix those. If you could sue a chemical plant (or it's engineers!) that design/implement carcinogenic pollution, i bet the incentives get better fast. > but also sometimes it is really just chemistry or physics. >You can’t always wave your hand and make non-harmful alternatives I think we can more often then we give it credit for. Especially if there was more money flowing i…

> We can fix those. If you could sue a chemical plant (or it's engineers!) that design/implement carcinogenic pollution, i bet the incentives get better fast.

Or the pricing of everything goes up astronomically to account for the new risk, and the poor go back to living in the stone age because they can't afford to pay for the risk assumed by anyone using industrial processes.

Watch how quickly AC vanishes from the poor when Freyon becomes $2,000 for a refill. I doubt the chemicals we use to treat water are free of industrial carcinogens either.

> Why do we accept destruction in our society? Why don't we push for better? Nothing has to be the way it is if we don't want it to be.

Because none of this is free. Handling the tin whiskers wasn't free, there's a certification process for that now. It killed a satellite in 1998, temporarily shut down a nuclear plant, and may have been a culprit in some Toyota car issues.

That was probably worth the tradeoff. It was a fairly minor change, and the payoff was pretty good.

I don't think we can just handwave away that getting to 0 carcinogens would be a net benefit. I'd probably take a 1 in 50,000 chance of dying from industry effects rather than having to go back in time 200 years in terms of quality of life.

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

#176

Post by dang »

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!

This comment broke several of the site guidelines. Would you please review them and please stop doing that?

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

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

#177

Post by dang »

frazbin wrote: post #19
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!

Yep, California has raised the bar, and to do so it had to take risks. In particular, it risked looking silly-- and in penis-politics looking silly in front of your opponents is an existential risk. The good news is, some of these risks paid off and became national standards. So, thanks to California, you are poisoned a little less every day. Speaking personally: fuck you for making fun of that effort!

Breaking the site guidelines like that will get you banned here, regardless of how bad another comment is or you feel it is.

If you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and make your substantive points thoughtfully from now on, we'd appreciate it.

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

#178

Post by azinman2 »

throwaway946513 wrote: post #173
azinman2 wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Houston is imfamous for not having zoning. That's how you get an industrial plant next to a school next to a mall next to housing next to a cattle feed lot.

Aye, but Houston isn't by far the only polluter on the list.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the other places didn’t have similar features. Responsible zoning, imho, would put residential far away from industrial, especially when they have smoke stacks or other offgasing.

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

#179

Post by hcurtiss »

cool_dude85 wrote: post #157
hcurtiss wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "optimal" level of pollution is not zero. While there may be exceptions to individuals, to society as a whole, the benefits of an activity may very outweigh the costs. This is true of every human endeavor. There are always costs. The question is whether they are worth it.

The optimal level in your opinion probably depends heavily on how close you live to that factory. Anyway even if you want to live in Cass Sunstein land where everything is a cost benefit analysis then you have to work on some really hard problems like how it's not really possible to fairly cost something like a person getting cancer. It's also really hard to fairly compare them to the extremely diffuse "benefits", li…

The answer, IMHO, is to assign property rights and let people trade for the optimal outcome. People frequently and willingly make transactions that on average shorten their lives in exchange for short term benefits (e.g., eating at McDonalds or drinking alcohol). There are tools to address the problem of transaction costs.

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

#180

Post by Arrath »

vineyardmike wrote: post #131
scottyah wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

Then you're simply being pedantic, and illustrating the inherent danger of free-for-all negative externalities. If the polluting was done far enough away, it doesn't matter?
Post reply on HN