Not satisfied with underpriced oil leases, the Bush administration has moved on to the next fertile pasture of industry gift giving. Now it is the process of assessing the risk of environmental pollutants that is under assault. Industry input will now figure largely where science should take the lead.
PEER link
Washington, DC — The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has unveiled a new process for assessing the health risks of new chemicals that allows chemical manufacturers and other industries to play key roles. As a result, it will be much easier to inject corporate influence into public health determinations that should be purely scientific, according Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).
And this change would be effective when? Oh, upon being announced, of course. As to science, well, we don’t need no stinkin’ science.
The overhaul of the EPA “Integrated Risk Information System” became effective on April 10, 2008, the day it was announced. EPA said the changes “created several important opportunities” for affected interests to weigh in “at key points throughout the nomination and assessment” of new environmental contaminants. One hallmark of the changes is pushing government research to the side in favor of outside research which is largely industry-funded. As a consequence -…
The process will leave open the identity of relevant staff, and of course, other sister agencies will have considerable input.
…Affected corporations will be intimately involved in each step of EPA’s risk assessment and will be able to know what staff are assigned to which work, making the agency “research plan” vulnerable to political manipulation through the appropriations process;
The Defense and Energy Departments will have a formal role on how pollutants, such as the chemical perchlorate, are evaluated. In addition, these agencies could declare a particular chemical to be “mission critical” that would allow them to control how “data gaps” are to be filled. All intra-and inter-agency communications on risk assessments are deemed “deliberative” and thus confidential;
And this.
The White House Office of Management and Budget would control both the substance and timing of final decisions on chemical risk assessments.
Accordingly, Senator Boxer has called bullshit:
Washington, DC – U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Chairman of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, made the following remarks regarding revisions to the Environmental Protection Agency’s Integrated Risk Information System (IRIS) announced today.
Senator Boxer said: “In my judgment, these changes to the EPA’s risk assessment program are devastating. They put politics before science by letting the White House and federal polluters derail EPA’s scientific assessment of toxic chemicals. In the near future, the Government Accountability Office will be issuing a study that I requested, which addresses these issues, and we anticipate an oversight hearing on the EPA’s toxics program shortly.”The policy released today gives federal agencies, such as the Department of Defense (DOD), which is a major polluter, a privileged seat at the table to determine which chemicals get assessed and how those assessments are conducted. It also formalizes a new process to be run by the White House that would take place behind closed doors due to the administration’s refusal to make federal agency comments public. Federal, state and international agencies use assessments to create public health protections, including drinking water standards, toxic waste cleanup levels, air pollution limits, controls on dangerous chemicals in food and consumer products, worker protections and other safeguards.
Thank you, Senator.
