Read more about the health impacts of hexavalent chromium in a blog by Sarah Janssen, senior scientist in NRDC’s Public Health Program:
See STW™ Related News Brief / Vol.III / No.210 / July 25,2012

SAN FRANCISCO–(ENEWSPF)–August 14, 2012 –The Natural Resources Defense Council and the Environmental Working Group today sued the California Department of Public Health for failing to protect millions of Californians from hexavalent chromium, the cancer-causing chemical made infamous in the movie “Erin Brockovich” for contaminating drinking water and sickening residents in the town of Hinkley, California. The agency was supposed to establish a safe drinking water standard for hexavalent chromium eight years ago, but has failed in its duty to safeguard citizens from the toxin.

An Environmental Working Group analysis of official records from the California Department of Public Health’s water quality testing conducted between 2000 and 2011 revealed that about one-third of the more than 7,000 drinking water sources sampled were contaminated with hexavalent chromium at levels that exceed safe limits. These water sources are spread throughout 52 of 58 counties, impacting an estimated 31 million Californians.

In 2001, the California State Legislature mandated the agency adopt a standard by January 1, 2004, giving it two years to do so. Eight years past its legal deadline, the agency still hasn’t made any visible progress and says it could take several more years before a final standard is completed. Filed in the California Superior Court of Alameda, NRDC and EWG’s suit contends the department’s delay is unjustified and it must rapidly proceed to finalize the standard.

“Communities all over California and the U.S. are being poisoned by this dangerous chemical,” said Erin Brockovich, an environmental and consumer advocate. “We have waited long enough and the people of California should not continue to be exposed to unsafe levels of this toxin in their tap water. The California Department of Public Health needs to do its job and adopt a strong standard for hexavalent chromium in drinking water.”

Drinking water sources in Sacramento, San Jose, Los Angeles and Riverside were found to exceed the safe limits of hexavalent chromium, according to a 2010 Environmental Working Group report that tested 25 U.S. cities’ tap water for hexavalent chromium contamination.

The report also found this threat isn’t limited to California. At least 74 million Americans in thousands of communities across 42 states drink tap water polluted with “total chromium,” which includes hexavalent and other forms of the metal.

Even though hexavalent chromium is known to cause cancer, reproductive harm and other severe health effects, there is no national or state drinking water standard for hexavalent chromium. Therefore, water agencies don’t have to comprehensively monitor for or remove hexavalent chromium before it comes out of the tap.

“You’d think the state of California would have moved quickly to protect its citizens from this carcinogen, which, sadly, still flows from the taps of millions of residents,” Renee Sharp, a senior scientist and director of EWG’s California office said. “It’s absolutely unacceptable that at this minute countless children in California are likely drinking a glass of water laced with unsafe levels hexavalent chromium.”

The California EPA’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment announced a final “Public Health Goal” for hexavalent chromium in drinking water in July 2011, a preliminary step in creating a drinking water standard. The goal was set at 0.02 parts per billion, a level that does not pose a significant health risk to people.

While this goal has been set for more than a year, the department has not taken the necessary steps for setting a “Maximum Contaminant Level” – the maximum concentration of a chemical that is allowed in public drinking water systems – for hexavalent chromium.

The department’s plan to take several more years to finalize a rulemaking that is already eight years behind schedule is too long, especially since the agency could fall behind its own intended schedule, and industry pressure could delay the standard even more.

Communities adjacent to industrial facilities using hexavalent chromium or Superfund sites, such as low income communities like Hinkley and communities of color are among those most highly exposed to hexavalent chromium pollution. People can be exposed to hexavalent chromium by drinking contaminated water, eating contaminated food, by inhaling it, or by exposure to contaminated soils.

Hexavalent chromium usually enters the drinking water supply by running off from industrial operations into surface waters or leaching from soil into groundwater.

Hexavalent chromium is used for the production of stainless steel, textile dyes, wood preservation, leather tanning, and as an anti-corrosive as well as a variety of niche uses. Due to its wide use by industry, hexavalent chromium is a common pollutant found at contaminated sites and has been documented at approximately two-thirds of Superfund sites.

Read more about the health impacts of hexavalent chromium in a blog by Sarah Janssen, senior scientist in NRDC’s Public Health Program: http://bit.ly/Pn0FEU

The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) is an international nonprofit environmental organization with more than 1.3 million members and online activists. Since 1970, our lawyers, scientists, and other environmental specialists have worked to protect the world’s natural resources, public health, and the environment. NRDC has offices in New York City, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Livingston, Montana, and Beijing. Visit us at www.nrdc.org and follow us on Twitter @NRDC.

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Another Viewpoint is a column The News-Herald makes available so all sides of issues may by aired. Katherine McFate is president of OMB Watch, a nonprofit research and advocacy organization dedicated to promoting government openness and increasing citizen engagement.

I first heard about fracking (the drilling of natural-gas wells using a method known as hydraulic fracturing) in 2009 when environmental advocates charged that natural-gas drilling could endanger New York City’s water resources. I lived in the city at that time, so the news that natural-gas drilling could threaten my drinking water was alarming.

Many other New Yorkers shared these concerns, and the question of whether or not to allow fracking in the state flared into an ongoing political battle, one being re-enacted across the 30 states where natural-gas drilling is occurring. Nearly half a million natural gas wells are operating across the country, with more than 313,000 in just six states: New Mexico, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Texas and West Virginia.

OMB Watch, a government accountability group I lead, recently published a new report on fracking — The Right to Know, the Responsibility to Protect — and what we found is troubling. Disclosure of chemicals used in fracking is spotty and incomplete. States have begun to respond to citizen complaints, but no state requires enough upfront collection of data and monitoring of drilling operations to ensure protection of local water supplies.

You’re probably thinking: Isn’t there a law against poisoning water? The answer is yes (the Safe Drinking Water Act) and no (a clause was inserted into the 2005 Energy Policy Act, exempting natural-gas drilling from that drinking water law). Just as hydraulic fracturing was getting cheaper and the demand and price for natural gas was rising, federal oversight was removed.

Our report examined actions state officials have or have not taken to require drillers to disclose chemicals used in fracking. Roughly a dozen states have passed a law or had agencies establish a rule requiring disclosure. But there are two gaping holes in these laws that render them essentially toothless.

First, owners and operators of natural-gas wells are not required to gather baseline information on sources and quality of water near their planned well sites before drilling. Without baseline water and air quality measurements, local communities can’t test to see whether water sources are being contaminated. Measuring before drilling occurs is just common sense, but no state requires this. Only a few states even require companies to report the chemicals they’ll use before fracking begins.

Second, there’s a loophole built into most state disclosure laws. Gas companies claim that fracking chemicals are “trade secrets” and that releasing details about the chemicals would disadvantage them with their competitors. Pepsi and Coke publish the ingredients in their products on every can; producers of fracking chemicals can do the same.

Companies don’t want to disclose the chemicals they use because some ingredients are known to cause cancer, and others cause long-term neurological and kidney disorders. Yet without details on the chemicals, authorities and average citizens don’t know what to test for.