A is for Air Pollution Part II: Effectuating Your Right to Know
by Jane Dale Owen
The quality of the air we breathe is at the top of the list of factors beyond parental
control that impact the ability of our children to grow, learn and play normally while
risking affliction by serious environmentally caused health impairments. A dominant
concern among Houston area residents is the health threat to all of us, particularly
children, unavoidably imposed by our chronically polluted air.
Studies show that children are more sensitive than adults to airborne chemical
pollutants. Their bodies' biological defense systems are still developing, and in addition,
they tend to exercise more and spend more time outdoors. Their breathing rate is more
rapid, they breathe lower to the ground, where the winds are lighter and pollution
concentrations are higher.
Toxic air pollutants inflict adverse health effects ranging from mild irritations and
ADD (attention deficit disorder) to life threatening diseases The potential health effects
of breathing pollutants include genetic damage, damage to the nervous system, disruption
of reproductive development and other cellular processes. Other effects include learning
impairments, cancer and birth defects.
Children are routinely exposed to these toxics when they participate in what should be
healthy outdoor activities, such as recess or sports.
At-Risk Schools Revealed
"What You Don't Know Can Hurt Your Children" is the subtitle of a newly released
publication that addresses these concerns informatively with facts, figures, background
information, commentary and some fruitful recommendations.
Titled "A is for Air Pollution, Part II," it is based on a study* by the Refinery Reform
Campaign, a project of the Sustainable Energy and Economic Development (SEED)
Coalition, directed by Peter Altman.
The study reveals how many children are going to schools that are near major toxic
polluters. Harris County ranks highest, with Jefferson County second in number of school
children exposed to large volumes of toxic chemicals while at school. The report
tabulates by counties the number of At-Risk Schools, At-Risk Enrollment, Number of
Plants and annual Plant Emissions in pounds. The At-Risk enrollment totals 142,147
children with chemical plant pollution in their daily learning and play environment.
There are 100 refineries and chemical plants near 216 schools in the eight counties
studied. In the year 2000 they released into the air nearly 40,000,000 pounds of toxic
pollutants, some of which are known to cause cancer, learning disabilities, birth defects
and other serious health problems.
Safe at School Plan Proposed
The report points out that "nearly two thirds of all the toxic pollution from Texas'
chemical and refining plants is emitted within two miles of a school." To protect children,
a Safe at School plan is advocated to assure that children are safe from neighboring toxic
pollution sources while at school.
The public's Right to Know is a dominant theme of the report, and of the Safe School
plan, which advocates a schoolhouse and plant fence-line air monitoring program. In the
monitoring program, air monitors tuned to detect chemicals known to be emitted by
nearby plants are placed both at the school and near plant fence lines. It recommends that
the monitor data be compared to established safety health levels and made available to
parents, children and school officials.
Monitors Placed at Schools, Plants
Although there is no protocol for measuring these pollutants at schools to ensure that
the air children breathe is safe, placement of the monitoring equipment has, in fact,
begun, implemented by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.
The report recommends that the cumulative impact of toxic pollution on children
should also be taken into account in setting Effects Screening Levels (the potential
concerning health effects, odor nuisance potential, effects with respect to vegetation, and
corrosion effects likely to occur as a result of exposure to concentrations of constituents
in the air).
The report strongly urges that health evaluations of children attending nearby schools
also be considered in decisions involving future land use, development and local industry
expansion plans.
To help pay for the health evaluations and other costs of the Safe at School program,
the report proposes an assessment of monetary penalties against industries that exceed
their permitted emissions- for example, a dollar a pound when plants release more than
10,000 pounds of accidental emissions-with the revenue to be put into a Safe At School
funding account.
Texas Lacks Toxin Warning System
Currently Texas does have a state system to warn schools of high ozone levels.
However, ozone is only one of the offending agents, and unfortunately there is no system
in place that alerts children, parents, or teachers to the potentially dangerous chemicals
and toxic pollutants they may be breathing from nearby refineries or chemical plants.
Such a system is very much needed, but at present is non-existent, even at locations
where children are at greatest risk. The hazards to schools downwind and in close
proximity to refineries tend to be overshadowed by the attention devoted to ground level
ozone and related concerns.
Throughout Harris County there are a total of 98 schools at risk with a total combined
enrollment of 77,972 students. In the Baytown area eleven schools, with a total combined
enrollment of nearly eight thousand are located within a two-mile radius of the
ExxonMobil refinery. Eight of the eleven are elementary schools with an enrollment of
nearly five thousand young children.
Health Risks Shown Near Plants
Recent studies by researchers at the University of Birmingham Medical School have
shown that children who are born near heavy industrial concentrations, such as those in
Harris and Jefferson Counties in Texas, are at significantly greater risk for serious illness
and even death than children born in areas farther from industrial polluters. Studies have
also shown that children born near industrial areas are 20% more likely to die of
leukemia before reaching adulthood.
The Woodriff Study, of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, SIDS, has shown that higher
particulate pollution levels are significantly correlated with more premature deaths, and
cleaner air less premature death.
Our children are our most precious natural resource. All citizens, parents especially,
should help implement a "Safe at School" plan to protect our children. Industry should be
encouraged to apply the best available technology to mitigate pollution. Continually and
excessively polluting industries should be sternly castigated and sufficiently fined, so that
their continuing pollution abuse is no longer a viable business consideration, and the only
solution is compliance with acceptable community health standards.
There remain many undiscovered effects of industrial chemical pollutants; however,
since no one has yet shown that pollution is better for your health, we can be certain that
pollution prevention is health protection. And prevention IS attainable. We must continue
to spread the information, in the "A is for Air Pollution" study, and encourage citizens,
public sector enforcement agencies and industry to recognize that progress is made with
continuing innovation and plant procedural reforms.
