Lone Star Chapter Sierra Club

For more information see --
http://www.sierraclub.org/mercury/



Click on the image for more information on the "Mercury Cycle"

"Notice Of Intent to sue" letters to Sandy Creek and Oak Grove.

Sierra Club Hosts Mercury Hair-Testing Event and Announces Legal Action

Austin Moms line up to get tested for toxic mercury

(Austin) —The women who lined up at Wet Salon in South Austin today were not here for an ordinary hair cut—they came because they were concerned that they may be at risk of mercury poisoning, and the Sierra Club is offering a simple hair-test to find out exactly how much mercury is in your body.

One in six women of childbearing age already has enough mercury in her body to put a baby at risk of developmental disorders and learning disabilities.
Coal-fired power plants emit mercury into our air, where it rains down into our rivers and streams and finds its way to our bodies via contaminated fish.

“As moms, we all teach our kids that if you make a mess, you should clean it up,” said Karin Ascot, Sierra Club mother of six-month old Theo. “Why don’t the polluters have to follow that same rule?”

For the past two years, Texans from all walks of life have been fighting permitting of polluting coal plants at the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and in the courts.  Besides providing this public service at Jan’s today, Sierra Club also took legal action with Public Citizen that could impact 13 coal plants, including two two recently permitted plants currently under construction Dynegy/Brazos’ Sandy Creek in Riesel near Waco and TXU’s Oak Grove near Robertson in Franklin County east of Waco. A third coal plant, TXU’s Sandow 5 near Rockdale in Milam County remains under investigation.

“Sierra Club and Public Citizen are stepping into the breach caused by TCEQ's failure to enforce the law.  As the notice letters point out, no competent lawyer could have thought, after March 14th (the date of the DC Court's mandate), that continued construction of these plants was legal,”
said Attorney David Frederick whose firm Lowerre, Frederick, Perales, Allmon, & Rockwell sent Notice of Intent to sue letters to TXU and Sandy Creek Dynegy/Brazos on Tuesday, May 6. [See attachments.] “The absence of the required preconstruction analyses for hazardous air pollutants (e.g.,
mercury) places the environment and human health at unnecessary risk. Congress sought to avoid this, and the Club and Public Citizen are going to do their parts to support the law, even if the companies and TCEQ have not the gumption to do so.”

“The good news is that there is something we can do about mercury pollution,” said Dr. Neil Carman of the Sierra Club. “We have the technology to reduce mercury pollution. Coal plants across the country must reduce their mercury pollution and update their pollution controls to comply with new, more protective pollution standards. Most importantly, we don’t need new coal plants to meet our energy needs. We need to implement already available efficiency measures across all sectors and build more and more renewable energy – wind and solar power.”

The hair test involves cutting a small sample of hair and sending it to an academic laboratory, the Environmental Quality Institute at the University of North Carolina-Asheville, which will process the results. The participant’s data will also be added anonymously to a UNC research study, which will have the largest sample size of any study to date, on the effects of mercury in the U.S. population.

"I find it outrageous that polluters are allowed to spew mercury into the air that ends up on my dinner table," said Karin Ascot. “Public health should be the first priority, and we already have the solutions to clean up mercury. These companies must use them."

For women who missed the testing event today, it’s not too late to find out how much mercury is in your body. The testing kits for this project can be purchased online for a small non-profit fee at www.sierraclub.org/mercury.