Mining Industry Repeats as Nation's Largest Toxic Polluter

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Mining Industry Repeats as Nation's Largest Toxic Polluter

Bush Proposes to Weaken Environmental Mining Rules as EPA Identifies

Mining Industry as Largest Toxic Polluter for Second Consecutive Year

WASHINGTON, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, Apr. 12 -/E-Wire/-- Today the Environmental Protection Agency identified the mining industry as the nation's largest toxic polluter. Hardrock mining operations accounted for 17 of the top 20 toxic releasing facilities in the United States.

This is the second year in a row the mining industry has earned the title of top polluter in the EPA's Toxics Release Inventory (TRI), its annual report on toxic chemicals released by U.S. industries. Ironically, this report comes just days after the Bush administration proposed to gut new common-sense environmental mining rules that govern the disposal of toxic mine waste reported in TRI.

This year the mining industry was responsible for slightly less than half (3.6 billion pounds) of all toxic releases (7.4 billion pounds) by all U.S. industries combined. Additionally, EPA again identified the mining industry as the nation's largest releaser of arsenic. The mining industry reported releasing 585 million pounds of arsenic and arsenic compounds, 97 percent of all arsenic-related releases.

The mining industry's place as top polluter is mirrored by its impacts on the ground. Last year, EPA identified 40% of the headwaters of all Western watersheds as polluted by mining. All told, the federal government estimates that mining has polluted 12,000 miles of America's rivers and streams and 180,000 acres of lakes.

And, just as the mining industry reasserts its title as nation's largest toxic polluter, the Bush administration is preparing to give the mining industry two enormous regulatory windfalls involving the fate of its toxic pollution:

* Bush and Interior Secretary Gale Norton proposed on March 23rd to weaken or rescind environmental mining regulations that protect taxpayers and the environment from the consequences of irresponsible toxic mine waste disposal;

* Bush and EPA Administrator Christie Todd Whitman are acting to weaken new arsenic standards for drinking water.

Besides his efforts to give the mining industry two regulatory free passes, Bush may add insult to injury by inhibiting citizens' right to know about the toxics reported by the mining industry. The mining industry recently won a preliminary exemption from reporting in TRI many of its future toxic releases. Unless the Justice Department appeals the exemption in court, in the span of a month the Bush administration will have acted to

1. weaken the rules that govern the disposal of toxic mine waste,

2. weaken standards to legalize more toxic mine waste components in drinking water, and

3. weaken the public's right to know about the toxics the mining industry is releasing into our rivers, streams and groundwater.

"The Bush administration is giving the public a toxic triple whammy," said Alan Septoff, Campaign Director at Mineral Policy Center. "Bush has acted to allow irresponsible disposal of toxic mine waste, to legalize the increased amounts of toxics that may get into drinking water as a result, and he may act to blind the public to the amount of toxics being released by the mining industry in the first place."

The environmental mining rules that Bush would rescind were recently enacted after a four-year rulemaking. The rules ensure that mining companies, not taxpayers, pay the multi-million dollar cleanup bills often associated with mining. The rules also acknowledge land managers' authority to deny mine proposals where they would cause irreparable harm to environmental or cultural resources.

President Bush favors a return to the old mining rules, written before the widespread adoption of new mining technologies such as cyanide and sulfuric acid heap leaching. The old rules contained no environmental standards, and stuck taxpayers with a potential $1 billion environmental cleanup bill.

"When you look at the massive amounts of waste this industry produces and uses â cyanide, sulfuric acid, arsenic, and other heavy metals â it's unfathomable that the Bush administration would want to suspend these common-sense environmental protections," Septoff continued. "Mining companies do not have an all-powerful right to mine regardless of cost and consequence. Rolling back to the old rules would be a tragedy for taxpayers and the environment. Rolling back to the old rules would show everyone that the Bush administration's loyalties lie with the polluters, not the people."

TRI data can be obtained by visiting the EPA's Toxics Release Inventory Web site at www.epa.gov/tri/ or by contacting Mineral Policy Center (see contact info above). Data contained in this year's TRI report pertain to toxic releases that occurred in 1999.

Mineral Policy Center (MPC) is an environmental organization working to protect communities and the environment from the impacts of mining, in the U.S. and worldwide. For more information contact the Mineral Policy Center at [REDACTED-PHONE].

Mineral Policy Center

Chris Cervini, 202.887.1872x207; Alan Septoff, 202.887.1872x205, [REDACTED-EMAIL]

http://www.mineralpolicy.org

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