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Sun-Times Says Boycott BP

Chicago area newspapers fight permit for new pollution

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The Chicago Sun-Times called for a boycott of BP today in response to a permit the oil giant received in late June to significantly increase the amount of toxic waste it dumps into Lake Michigan every year.

“If BP insists on dumping more pollutants into our lake, it’s time for us to stop pumping its gas into our tanks,” reads the paper’s editorial. “We’re calling for an all-out boycott of BP gas.”

“Tens of thousands” of Chicagoans have protested the permit, which allows BP’s refinery in Whiting, Indiana, twenty miles from Chicago on the south shore of the lake, to discharge 54 percent more ammonia and 35 percent more suspended solids into the water annually. The facility also received an exemption from meeting tough limits on mercury pollution for the next five years. BP contends that it needs the permit (the first it has received since 1990) for a $3.8 billion expansion that will enable the refinery, already the largest in the Midwest, to process more heavy Canadian crude oil. The company has attempted to justify the expansion by pointing out that it will create eighty permanent jobs and 2,000 construction jobs; that its discharges meet or beat state and federal emissions standards; and that it will invest $150 million to improve its onsite wastewater treatment facility.

Since the Indiana Department of Environmental Management approved the permit in June, however, there has been what local newspapers variously describe as a “blitzkrieg,” “firestorm,” “avalanche,” and “groundswell” of protest from around Lake Michigan. But the opposition has been fiercest in Chicago, where mayor Richard Daley and others have threatened legal action to block the permit, and are leaning on the federal Environmental Protection Agency to reverse its statement that the new pollution limits would not violate the Clean Water Act. In late July, the U.S. House of Representatives approved a resolution urging Indiana to reconsider the permit.

The Sun-Times boycott comes just one day after BP and Indiana regulators for the first time “softened their defense” of the permit, saying they would review suggestions from Chicago officials, the EPA, and environmental groups about technologies that could reduce the Whiting refinery’s pollution. Mayor Daley has urged his constituents to hold off on the boycott pending a “credible, independent” evaluation ordered by Indiana governor Mitch Daniels this week. But local newspapers have been adamant in their opposition to allowing more toxic waste.

The Sun-Times has now published three editorials railing against BP’s new permit. “Even if the giant oil company proves that the extra waste it will be dumping is no threat to aquatic life or humans,” the paper wrote in July, “we must have zero tolerance for the release of any additional pollution into our precious lake waters.”

Lake Michigan supplies most of the region’s drinking water and is popular for fishing and other forms of outdoor recreation. Although BP denies that increasing its toxic discharges will “damage” the environment or harm individuals, all of the effluents covered in the permit pose hazards. Ammonia and suspended solids have received the lion’s share of attention - ammonia can cause algal blooms that kill fish, and suspended solids can work their way into the food chain via the aquatic life that swim in polluted water. A third and even more toxic effluent, for which BP received a discharge exemption, has received much less attention. Mercury, one of the most strictly regulated environmental toxins, can cause brain and nervous system damage in even low dosages. The new permit allows the Whiting refinery to continue dumping two pounds into the lake annually until 2012, when it must meet federal standards that will drop the limit 8/100th of a pound.

Both the Sun-Times and the Chicago Tribune have done an impressive job covering the various and far-flung protests that erupted after the permit was granted, but only the latter has given any significant attention to the environmental science behind BP’s toxic waste. In late July, the Tribune published an excellent investigation highlighting the “little-noticed” mercury exemption contained in BP’s permit. Reporter Michael Hawthorne points out that the Whiting refinery is only one of two polluters that still dump mercury into Lake Michigan, but he also gives respectable balance to the story by pointing out that the amount released is small compared to that which falls into the water from air pollution. In addition, Hawthorne provides a thorough review of all the other nasty chemicals coming out of the refinery.

It would be nice to see more technically inclined articles such as this, but credit must still be given to Chicago papers for mounting such aggressive opposition to BP’s plans, and for covering all the related protests in such depth. The Sun-Times’ boycott call follows the lead of the city’s most powerful alderman, Edward M. Burke. Two weeks ago, Burke introduced a plan in the City Council that would stop the city’s use of roughly ninety-seven BP gas station credit cards. Burke is also trying to block three major banks that have ties with BP from receiving lucrative city bond deals. “The stakes are high,” the Sun-Times reported, with millions of dollars on the line.

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Comments

padikiller

Sat 18 Aug 2007 09:51 PM

What we're dealing with here is liberal math.

According to liberal "reasoning" the "Man" is supposed to provide everything under government supervision, without cost to or imposition upon the citizenry. Free gasoline. Clean water. Good jobs. Universal health care. Infinite revenue. Etc.

The Sun-Times can't seem to wrap its head around the reality (a reality most easily gleaned from a day trip to Gary, Indiana) that refineries pollute things. In the language of thermodynamics, such a realization is postulated; the scientists call it "entropy". You simply can't separate gooey crude oil into lighter components without creating waste products. Period.

What's the answer to Lake Michigan't woes?

Innovation? Conservation? Exploitation?

The simple reality is that refining petroleum is an inherently nasty business. The heavy-metal catylists and waste products simply must go"down the drain" somewhere.

A reasonable solution to the problem requires ditching petroleum SOON. THIS is what responsible editors should be calling for.

Matt

Wed 22 Aug 2007 12:36 PM

I am concerned about the amount of mercury that is released into environment. I am the father of a young child. Mercury is a deadly neurotoxin. Emitted mostly from coal fired power plants, it eventually makes into the food chain. Children and pregnant/nursing mothers are most at risk. In my mind there has to be a connection between the explosion of Autism/ADD/ ADHD and mercury poisoning. Autism went from rates of 1 in several thousand to now 1 in 160. Where is the outrage? I am just starting to explore this subject bc a friend's 2 y/o just got diagnosed with autism. The EPA is being sued by 9 states over mercury emissions. Cap and trade rules create hot spots of mercury emission. Under Clinton ( in 2000 Clean Air Act) EPA ruled that these emissions were supposed to reduced by MACT (maximum achievable control technology). Supposedly these emissions can be halved if not by more. But profits usually come before public health.

padikiller

Wed 22 Aug 2007 09:41 PM

Mercury is just the beginning.

Coal-fired plants release more radiation than nuclear plants (radioactive isotopes of carbon and trace elements go up the chimney and straight into the atmosphere)

All kinds of heavy metals end up dispersed by combustion processes. Furthermore, there is a growing body of evidence that indicates that particulate pollution (soot) is HIGHLY dangerous- it has been linked to heart disease and respiratory illnesses.

Any energy policy based on either conservation or continued exploitation of fossil fuels is clearly doomed; the first is doomed by market forces and the second by limited resources.

Nuclear (fission) processes are better than fossil fuels, but still problematic. Resources are isolated and subject to political and economic competition. The costs of production are substantial, and the waste products are dangerous.

The answer is technology.

We need to develop a real policy based on renewable or unlimited resources.

Solar energy (and solar-driven sources like wind, hydroelectrical, ethanol, biodiesel, etc) can theoretically meet all of the world's energy needs for the foreseeable future with existing technology that needs minor refinement.

Fusion is another technology that has the potential to permanently solve the world's energy problems. The only source needed (aside from technology) is plain water, which is everywhere. In fact, the top inch of Lake Erie has the equivalent energy potentional of all the world's oil reserves.