Alliance For A Clean Environment
A Report on the State of Our Environment                     July 2003
THE ACE REPORT
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Original concept
and design  by
Nina Robertson
May 2002
Update: Health Survey Distribution Still Needed
Over the past several weeks, members have been working hard to gather evidence received via the ACE health survey. Response to the surveys has been very enthusiastic but much more is needed before their efforts can be considered successful.
ACE is requesting the help of area residents to distribute and collect surveys which are designed to pinpoint patterns of illness. The survey is expected to show relationships between illnesses and polluting industries.
Surveys can be taken to churches, civic organizations, local government meetings and any other location the survey can be widely distributed. Forwarding them to everyone on e-mail lists who lives in the area and taking surveys door to door will also help to assure complete results. To view and download the survey, please visit: www.acereport.org/survey.html
Call For Action
With only a few days remaining before the July 24th deadline for letters to DEP's Francine Carlini, ACE is asking for your help.
Waste Management has applied for three more permits that will result in increased risks to the health of area residents. Letters can continue to be sent to DEP Secretary McGinty and Governor Rendell after the deadline, but letters to Carlini must be sent right away, please hurry.
read more
National News
American Lung Association:
Montgomery County Gets F
On Pollution Test
The American Lung Association ranks Montgomery County's ozone pollution as among the worst in Pennsylvania, second only to Bucks County.
The results, included in the association's annual "State of the Air" report for 2003, concludes that Montgomery County had more unhealthy ozone days than Philadelphia and even industrialized Pittsburgh's Allegheny County.
Released each year on May 1, the report examines the most current ozone air quality data from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), grades and ranks counties on how often their air quality reaches "unhealthful" categor-
ies of the EPA’s Air Quality Index for ozone air pollution.

DANGERS OF OZONE
Ozone gas, one of the most hazardous of the common air pollutants, is a known lung irritant: it sears lung tissue. Ozone exposure can lead to shortness of breath, chest pain when inhaling deeply, wheezing and coughing. Long-term exposure can result in reduced breathing ability and increases the risk of respiratory disease later in life.  read more

CHILDREN ARE VULNERABLE
A recent study of 1,150 children followed for three years suggests that long-term ambient ozone exposure might negatively affect the growth of human lung function. The researchers observed small but consistent decrements in lung function in the children that were associated with ambient ozone exposure.  read more

State of the Air Report: Pennsylvania
ACE Report Compiles Data on Pottstown Landfill's Air Pollution
A recent report compiled by ACE confirms serious health threats from Pottstown Landfill's air pollution. The data, compiled from such sources as EPA, ATSDR, OSHA, and NIOSH, provides evidence to indicate health risks to area residents, most importantly, children and the elderly.
A few of the synergistic health impacts identified in the report are the bacterial breakdown of mercury, radiation with ozone, sulfur compounds with other chemicals, and even synergistic combinations of the main constituent in the gas itself, methane.
What no agency has comprehensively evaluated are the synergistic health impacts of all the chemicals together. Additive long-term health impacts of individual chemicals and synergistic combinations have not been accurately determined.
ACE Vice President, Donna Cuthbert, states in the report that there are far more health risks than can be identified by levels of contaminates in landfill gas. The levels of contaminants are not the major risk from landfill gas, but instead continuous exposure to vast numbers of toxic substances and their even more toxic synergistic combinations.
Since comprehensive perimeter monitoring for an extended period of time, for all toxic contaminants in Pottstown Landfill gas has never been done, there is a lack of accurate verifiable data on Pottstown Landfill’s air pollution. DEP has only ever done one test on Pottstown Landfill gas and Mrs. Cuthbert states that test was severely flawed.
All testing, monitoring, calculations, and reporting for all permit information and reports are done on the honor system by Waste Management meaning that reports on levels of pollution are based on calculations done by Waste Management, who has a vested interest in the outcome. Levels reported to be within safe limits are not verifiable, there is no real independent on-site verification of any report, calculation or monitoring. read report

Make a comment about this or any article in this newsletter, visit: Forum
ACE Responds to Pottstown Landfill Letters to Editor
In letters to the Pottstown Mercury, proponents of the landfill are encouraging visits in an effort to decrease public concern regarding the dangers to public health.
In one such letter, an employee of Waste Management touts the benefits in an itemized list of free services and donations. Included on the list is free trash cans for local events and savings for trash and recycling services estimated at over a million dollars.
In response, ACE counters that the risks far outweigh the services and donations. The letter states that while Waste Management claims to protect the environment and residents' health, it continues to emit massive amounts of poisons into the air 365 day a year.
Also, very little of the waste is local with much of it being hazardous industrial waste that poses serious health risks. Tours of the landfill are misleading, it states, because you can't see air pollution or people getting sick from it and being closer to the landfill (during a tour) will not benefit your health.
Citing national statistics, the letter goes on to explain that the landfill continues to emit radiation and many other extremely harmful chemicals into the most unhealthy and carcinogenic air in the nation. read more
ACE
Link of the Month
Every month we search the web for informative webpages pertaining to current issues.
This month we highlight the issue of Science For Sale with a paper written by experts on the matter.
'Practical Environmental Ethics: Is There an Obligation to Tell the Whole Truth' addresses the conflict of interest that exists when a client or employer wants only certain "positive" project-supportive informa-
tion revealed to the public, and other "detracting" information omitted.

Science For Sale


Please note: the internet is an ever changing medium and we cannot guarantee that the links, which may work this month, will not change in the future.
Health Study Based on Epidemiology Won't Work
A health study proposed by state Representative Mary Ann Dailey has ACE concerned. Believing that the results will do more to help polluters like the Pottstown Landfill, ACE would prefer that taxpayers dollars be spent providing help to area residents.
The study, which will cost taxpayers $290,000, "is intended to put to rest one way or the other whether there is a relationship between the landfill and industry of this area and cancer."
ACE points out that past epidemiological studies have failed, preventing other communities from receiving much needed health care or removing the source of pollution to improve quality of life for residents.
ACE believes the reason for using such a study which is designed to fail is because finding health problems would mean someone, government or industry, would have to be held responsible for those problems.
If a health study does not provide long term clinical oversight of the affected population, or does not provide any proactive help for their health and environmental problems, then the study should be stopped and the taxpayer money should not be wasted. read more
ACE Activist's Hall of Fame/Shame

This months inductees into the..

    Hall of Fame:
Goes to Dr. Fred Winter for facilitating and improving the community health survey. He is a tireless worker against environmental pollution in order to protect the health of Greater Pottstown Area residents.

    Hall of Shame:
This month, our Hall of Shame position goes to Waste Management for not including its eastern expansion in the application for permit, using flares when safer alternatives are available and for buying science to twist and hide the truth about cancer statistics around the landfill. Thus showing a complete disregard, if not contempt, for area residents. read more
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Support ACE Today!
Your memberships and donations help us aggressively pursue your rights to clean, safe air and water. Every day, ACE continues to fight for those rights, but we still have a long way to go. There is so much more that is needed to secure a cleaner, healthier future for our children and grandchildren. If you haven't joined or sent your contribution, do it today!
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