Everything From Chemical Plants to Wood Stoves : EPA Unveils Strategy to Cut Emissions

The Environmental Protection Agency--apparently seeking to ease pressure for stricter air pollution laws in the wake of the Bhopal, India, gas disaster--Tuesday unwrapped what it called an “air toxics strategy” to cut hazardous emissions by everything from chemical plants to wood stoves.

The EPA said the strategy not only will reduce routine venting of dangerous gases from factories and other sources but also will improve state vigilance against catastrophic one-time gas releases such as that which killed more than 2,000 Indians last December.

EPA Administrator Lee M. Thomas said the strategy “builds on significant efforts already undertaken to control releases of toxic chemicals into the nation’s air.”

Assailed by Critics

However, the plan was assailed by environmental critics, some of whom said that the proposal would turn critical air pollution decisions over to unwilling or ill-prepared states.

David D. Doniger, senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council, called the strategy “a policy with no moral content.” He said it would effectively exempt from federal regulation some air pollutants that have been closely linked to cancer in humans.

The EPA long has regulated six noxious pollutants, such as carbon monoxide, that make up much urban smog and cause respiratory illnesses. But since the Bhopal disaster, it has been accused of failing to control toxic air pollutants--cancer-causing or disabling gases, for example--and for failing to safeguard citizens against chemical plant disasters.

Smog Controls Cited

An April EPA draft report concluded that 16 common toxic air pollutants--a fraction of those known to exist--caused about 1,800 cancer deaths in 1980. But the report also said that was about half the 1970 death toll, partly because smog-control efforts indirectly had removed many toxic gases from the air.

The new EPA strategy, which has no legal force, closely follows concerns outlined in a House bill sponsored by California Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Los Angeles) that would force stiffer federal regulation of the chemical industry and require stronger accident prevention measures by chemical firms and the government.

Thomas’ air toxics strategy proposes to do some of the same things voluntarily. The agency intends, for example, to issue an “acute hazards list” of extremely toxic gases that could be accidentally released and to promote disclosure of hazardous substances by chemical companies. The agency also pledged to help train state workers in emergency-response planning.

Pledges $3 Million

To reduce routine venting of toxic gases, the agency pledged $3 million to help states develop air toxics regulation programs and state “inventories” of toxic emissions. It also will expand efforts to regulate such newly identified sources of air toxics as wood stoves, sewage treatment plants, toxic waste landfills and degreasing operations.

According to the study, heavy industry is responsible for only about 20% to 25% of toxic air pollutants, while dry cleaners, wood stoves, autos and other smaller sources combine to pose much larger health threats.

As a result, the strategy calls for few nationwide controls on many toxic gas emissions by chemical factories and other heavy industry. Such emissions often pose only local health threats and are better controlled by the states, the EPA said.

‘In the Same Boat’

Doniger strongly criticized that conclusion, saying: “It means that your life is not significant if . . . EPA concludes there are only a small number of people in the same boat with you.”

Waxman called it “bad policy based on bad science.” And an aide said: “The idea that EPA has now decided we should allow the most egregious sources of hazardous emissions to go unregulated while we put controls on the corner dry cleaner is ludicrous.”

In a related move, the EPA said Tuesday that it intends to propose curbs on air emissions of chromium, a common industrial chemical that has been linked to cancer. It also decided not to regulate three other toxic gases--methyl chloroform, a solvent that is primarily used as a degreasing agent; CFC-113, which is primarily used as a degreasing and dry-cleaning agent, and epichlorohydrin, an ingredient of epoxy resins and a solvent--because normal use of the gases pose “extremely small” health threats.