New Study Calculates the Economic Costs of Mercury Pollution

It was one of those small blips, duly noted and immediately forgotten by the mainstream press. Eleven states sued the Bush administration this week for failing to protect their citizens from the damage caused by mercury emitted from power plants.

The new mercury rules, enacted by the Environmental Protection Agency earlier this year, slowed the pace of mercury reduction (levels were steadily reduced during the Clinton years) and gave coal-burning power plants an additional decade to meet the health standards on mercury and other toxic emissions set in 1990. They also instituted a controversial trading scheme that would, in essence, shift pollution around without getting rid of it.

Environmentalists argue that this will leave many areas of the country with “hot spots,” a troubling prospect if one of the hot spots happens to be where your kids are growing up. About 70 percent of the mercury in the environment comes from coal-fired power plants, chloralkali production, waste incineration and other industrial activities. Once airborne, it travels long distances before landing in soil and water and entering the food chain. It reaches very high concentrations in predatory fish like swordfish and tuna. A potent neurotoxin (this was first learned in the 1950s when mercury-exposed Japanese mothers at Minimata had severely deformed and retarded children), mercury imposes its harshest penalties on developing fetuses and infants – the years before the blood-brain barrier is completely formed.

But instead of moving rapidly to control this known hazard, the utility industry has dragged its feet for years. Now, a new study from the Center for Children’s Health and the Environment at the Mt. Sinai School of Medicine in New York has calculated the price our society is paying for this short-term boost in utility company profitability.

According to Leonardo Trasande and colleagues, anywhere from 316,000 to 637,000 children have cord blood mercury levels above the levels associated with a loss in IQ. The authors calculated that this neurological damage costs society anywhere from $2.2 billion to $43.8 billion a year in lost economic activity, largely through lost productivity.

Unfortunately, the EPA didn't take these costs into account when calculating the potential benefits of its new rule. In fact, it deliberately ignored its own study showing a much higher benefit from stricter controls. According to the Bush administration's EPA, your brain-damaged kids are your problem or the school system's problem, not the companies' problem.

This latest study on the health effects of mercury pollution was funded by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, and Physicians for Social Responsibility and two environmentalist foundations. It can be found at http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/members/2005/7743/7743.html.