.jpg)
Local Press Articles
Salt Lake Tribune
Salt Lake Tribune Article, 6/7/2007 - About UPHE
Salt Lake Tribune Article, 5/21/2007 - Bite the Bullet
Salt Lake Tribune Article, 5/18/2007 - Clean Air Panal
Salt Lake Tribune Article, 5/17/2007 - Walk the Walk
Salt Lake Tribune Article, 5/12/2007 - Message from Carson
Environmental Health Letter, Spring 2003
Push for new coal plants recipe for disaster April 15, 2007
Brian Moench
http://www.sltrib.com/opinion/ci_5668746
The Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment tapped a massive reservoir of public concern and frustration recently with our declaration that air pollution along the Wasatch Front constitutes a public health crisis.
We outlined strong evidence that without drastic action, this crisis will evolve into a full-blown catastrophe within 20 years.
One of the ingredients of this recipe for disaster is the plan by the electric utilities to build four new coal power plants in Utah adding to the current five in operation. More coal plants are a full frontal assault on the public health of all Utah citizens, especially the 520,000 in Central Utah and Utah County who will be downwind.
Most people are familiar with "acid rain" from coal combustion and CO2's complicity in global warming. Few people know that among coal's many impurities are thorium and uranium, which are released into the atmosphere during combustion, with the end result that people living near coal power plants are exposed to higher radiation doses than those living near nuclear power plants.
The population-effective dose equivalent from coal plants is 100 times that from nuclear plants. Coal plants deserve the same scrutiny as nuclear waste dumps for exactly the same reasons.
Coal combustion is responsible for 40 percent of atmospheric mercury, the second most toxic substance on Earth, whose effects concentrate in the nervous system.
Despite industry claims, there is no effective mercury-capture technology currently available. The EPA considers mercury the most toxic component of air pollution.
Strong circumstantial evidence suggests that mercury is responsible for a nationwide epidemic of autism. The autism rate has increased tenfold over the past 20 years, and other neurobehavioral disorders like attention deficit disorder have tripled. This increase is not explained by better diagnostic and reporting methods.
Because there is no such thing as a genetic epidemic that occurs within just one generation, we can be almost certain that the increase is environmentally triggered, and numerous studies point directly to mercury.
One in six pregnant mothers in this country has mercury blood levels high enough to cause loss of intellectual capacity and psychomotor dysfunction in their infants. Mercury levels in umbilical-cord blood average twice as high as in maternal blood.
Pregnant women are already warned not to eat fish because of mercury contamination. These coal-fired power plants are the main reason why the water and fish are contaminated.
I have described the scene of an environmental crime, and the victims are millions of children and their families. We cannot, without doubt, convict mercury yet. But as long as it remains the chief suspect, any public policies that allow more mercury into the atmosphere callously defy common sense.
This is even more true now that renewable and clean sources of energy like wind, solar and geothermal, as a group, are as cheap as coal.
Considering that the public-heath costs of coal are now in the billions and growing, the choice is clear.
Right now the coal-fired power generators and their lobbyists are frantically attempting to sign up municipalities throughout Utah to long-term financial commitments supporting these new power plants. On their first day of operation, these plants would be competing on the world energy stage as technological dinosaurs, and capital and resources would have forever been drained away from clean energy alternatives and opportunities.
If they are built, they will disseminate acid rain, CO2, nuclear radiation and mercury for 50 years. All of us will be left paying the
price: some with our lives, some with our health and some with our children's lost potential.
---
* BRIAN MOENCH is founder of Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment. He is a physician at LDS Hospital and former instructor of anesthesia at Harvard Medical School.
------------------------------------
Doctors: Air-quality catastrophe looms for Utah By Judy Fahys The Salt Lake Tribune Article Last Updated: 03/31/2007 08:29:17 AM MDT
http://www.sltrib.com/search/ci_5563235
Utah's pollution problem has reached crisis levels, according to a group of local physicians. On Monday, they plan to present a list of steps the state can follow to keep the air breathable and to protect the health of all Utahns. One doctor gave a sneak peek Friday of the group's warning to policymakers.
Here is the philosophy behind the doctors' effort: "We believe clean air is an inherent right for all Utah citizens and that the atmosphere belongs to all of us. All industries, elected officials, and individual citizens share a stewardship that compels us all to protect this most precious of natural resources. We do not tolerate dangerously contaminated food in our state, nor do we tolerate dangerously contaminated water. We must no longer tolerate dangerously contaminated air."
The warning is blunt.
Air pollution has reached a crisis level in northern Utah, a local doctors group says, and elected leaders must do more to head off a full-blown catastrophe.
The newly formed Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment met privately Friday with Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. to discuss its concerns.
After telling the governor that air pollution damages health, much the same way as smoking does, the group recommended specific policies to address the problem.
"When people realize the air they are breathing is killing them and their children," said Brian Moench, a Salt Lake City anesthesiologist who began organizing the group last winter, "then maybe they will sit up and pay attention."
Moench's group plans a news conference Monday to detail its findings about the magnitude of the health problems facing Utahns because of the pollution, as well as why "Band-Aids" won't do much to clean up the air.
In their Friday meeting with Huntsman, doctors noted that Huntsman was struck in particular by the trouble children face because of air pollution.
"Every child is affected, whether they have asthma or not," said Salt Lake City pediatrician Shellie Ring, past president of the American Lung Association in Utah. She explained that, compared with children who are not exposed to air pollution, those who are never attain their full lung function.
The doctors group is raising the alarm after a winter pollution season when the northern Utah communities from Provo to Logan had severe episodes of fine-particle pollution. For a few days this month, pollution levels were worse in Salt Lake City and Logan than in any other U.S.
cities.
Meanwhile, lawmakers this year decided to maintain the state's current funding for environmental programs, even as they doled out hearty increases to other agencies from a $1.7 billion budget surplus.
Kathy Van Dame, director of the Wasatch Clean Air Coalition and member of the state Air Quality Board, welcomed the doctors' efforts.
She said much of Utah's past regulatory focus has been on meeting federal air-pollution limits, not the health effects. Meanwhile, more and more studies suggest "we're the frogs sitting in the water and the water's getting hotter."
"These guys [the doctors] have the ability to raise the issue above business-as-usual," she said. "They bring credibility to the issue. And they are passionate."
Utah researchers have made some important strides in advancing understanding about the health effects of air pollution.
Brigham Young University's Arden Pope participated in a landmark study that showed increases in PM2.5, the microscopic soot that plagues northern Utahns during wintertime inversions. That translates into an increased risk of illness and even death from heart and lung ailments.
Those findings wound up being part of a U.S. Supreme Court case that allowed federal standards for PM2.5 to go forward after a decade of controversy.
And a 12-year, 12,000-patient study Pope conducted with doctors at LDS hospital showed people suffer more heart attacks and other coronary events when winter pollution increases even for just a day or two. Also this winter, a University of Southern California study of thousands of children concluded that growing up near a freeway significantly increases the risk of serious lung and heart diseases later in life.
Rick Sprott, director of the Utah Air Quality Division, attended the meeting with Huntsman on Friday and called the doctors group "pretty well informed." He said he invited the doctors to speak to the Air Quality Board about their recommendations.
"People listen to physicians," he said. "They have a lot of credibility with the public and with patients."
------------------------------------
Utah doctors cry foul air, push lower speed limit, mass transit By Judy Fahys The Salt Lake Tribune Article Last Updated: 04/03/2007 01:38:53 AM MDT
http://www.sltrib.com/ci_5581437
They might seem an unlikely group to storm Utah's halls of power to demand action on behalf of the people.
But that's exactly what Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment promised Monday, launching a campaign to cut the air pollution that is sickening Utahns and killing as many as 1,000 of them a year. Otherwise, they say, Utah's air-pollution crisis will become an air-pollution catastrophe that claims the health and the lives of people forced to breathe the bad air.
Scott N. Hurst, an LDS Hospital anesthesiologist, likened air pollution's impacts to those of smoking cigarettes.
"You and I can choose not to smoke," he said. "But we can't choose not to breathe."
Air pollution harms the most vulnerable - children whose lung function can be forever damaged, old people and those with heart and lung disease - but all Utahns feel the impact and suffer the economic impact of higher health-care costs and impaired "livability," the doctors said.
They hope outraged citizens will help, as well as Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr., who got a preview of the campaign last week.
They'll likely need it. Some of their ideas for tackling air pollution are sure to chafe some of Utah's most powerful political interests, especially the energy industry.
Topping the list of suggestions is blocking new coal plants - including four already proposed in the state - and pushing for the toughest possible controls on plants already in operation.
Tim Wagner, energy policy coordinator for the Utah chapter of the Sierra Club, applauded the group's goals but warned of challenges ahead.
"They're up against a couple of major industries that have deep pockets," he said. "They're up against a Legislature that hasn't been very friendly to these issues. And they're up against a strong component of public apathy."
Brian Moench, an anesthesiologist who started the group at the end of this year's high-pollution January, says that public education and, ultimately, public involvement, backed by the science, is key to pushing the issue to the top of the policymaking agenda.
"The science tells us this is making us all sick to some degree and killing some of us," he said.
Other doctors participating in the effort include: Maunsel B. Pearce, a retired cardiovascular surgeon; Shellie J. Ring, a Salt Lake pediatrician; Gerald H. Ross, a doctor of family and environmental medicine; and Richard E. Kanner a professor of internal medicine at the University of Utah.
Dianne Nielson, director of the Utah Department of Environmental Quality, said the group has been invited to work with the Air Quality Board and regulators to look at practical solutions to the problems they raised.
Cutting pollution will require experts on both health and regulation, she said. They also will require large-scale efforts - such as the use of cleaner vehicles and cleaner fuels - as well as homespun ones - such as driving less.
Sen. Pat Jones, D-Holladay, predicted some easy fixes, such as the doctors' suggestion that school buses be barred from idling their engines so children have less exposure to harmful diesel exhaust.
She added that, while lawmakers may not embrace some of the suggestions, like the coal-plant moratorium, many of the ideas are likely to gain the public's support and, eventually, that of lawmakers. The doctors already appear to have Huntsman's attention, she said.
"Knowing him, he will not let it drop," she said.
"I wouldn't be surprised if he took the lead in some fashion."
fahys@sltrib.com
* Q. Is Utah's air safe to breathe?
* A. Most of the time, Utah air is excellent, and its cities don't rank among the top 100 for year-round pollution nationwide. But spikes of fine-particle pollution during winter inversions and periods of ground-level ozone in the summer can make air quality deteriorate to levels considered unhealthy, based on health-based standards set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The best way to monitor air quality in Utah is by checking the three-day forecasts at www.airquality.utah.gov/.
* Q. Is local air quality getting better?
* A. By all measures, the air has gotten cleaner in the past three decades, when federal regulators set limits on the level of pollution considered safe. At the same time, more and more scientific studies show that air pollution causes serious, and often irreversible, harm to health even if someone is only exposed to episodes of it rather than a steady stream of bad air. The impacts are worst on the most vulnerable
populations: the very young, the very old and people with heart and lung problems.
* Q. Then why did Salt Lake City have the most "red" air-quality days ever this winter?
* A. All the new scientific data about the dangers of pollution prompted the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to toughen the standard for its health warnings for PM 2.5, beginning last Dec. 18. Utah had 22 days that exceeded the new standard in the winter of 2006-07. There would have been only four under the standard that was in place before Dec. 18.
* Moratorium on new coal plants.
* Mandatory state-of-the-art controls on existing plants.
* Reduction of speed limit to 55 mph when air pollution exceeds federal standards.
* Offering public subsidies for mass transit to encourage free ridership and expanded service.
* Aiming for a 20 percent cut in pollution emissions through the Utah Air Quality Board.
------------------------------------
Vulnerable Population - children
Cherise Udell Article Last Updated: 05/19/2007 12:00:12 PM MDT
http://www.sltrib.com/opinion/ci_5937370
As a mother of two small children, I was horrified by the dangerous quality of our air this past winter. On red alert days, I felt as if I were locking my daughters in a windowless room full of chain smokers.
And sure enough, a new group called Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment held a press conference last month confirming that that is exactly what we're doing to our children.
Breathing Salt Lake City's dirty air during a winter inversion is the same as smoking half a pack of cigarettes each day. The image of my baby with a cigarette dangling from her toothless mouth was enough to move me to action.
Utah Moms for Clear Air was born that day with a simple but heartfelt e-mail to about 100 moms inviting them to join together to make Utah's air cleaner and safer. The response has been phenomenal. In three short weeks, Utah Moms for Clean Air is almost 300 strong and counting. Utah moms have already made our voices heard at the Air Quality Board hearing on the health effects of pollution and held our first public meeting that more than 100 moms (and dads) attended.
Air pollution harms the most vulnerable, especially children whose lung function can be forever damaged. Air pollution has been linked to SIDS, premature birth, heart failure and childhood cancers. But all of us are at risk. Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment estimates that 1,000 Utahns die prematurely each year as a result of our dirty air and warns that we face "a public health catastrophe" in the foreseeable future if air pollution levels persist.
Mothers are in a special moral position to advocate for clean air.
Our intent is simple: to ensure that our children, whose lives are entrusted to us, have a healthy environment in which to grow and flourish. Cooping them up indoors to avoid toxic air outside is not the solution.
We do not tolerate dangerously contaminated food, nor dangerously contaminated water, so why do we tolerate dangerously contaminated air?
There are concrete steps we can take to make a change. We support a ban on vehicle idling around school yards and reducing the speed limit to
55 mph on acutely polluted days (which will increase fuel efficiency of cars by about 22 percent).
Alongside the Utah physicians, we are also challenging the building of four new coal-based power plants slated for Utah and will encourage government leaders to create new incentives for cleaner transportation and lifestyle choices.
We have also encouraged individual action such as installing an inexpensive programmable thermostat, eliminating one car trip per day (the average American family takes four or five car trips per day), signing up for Blue Sky renewable power (utahpower.net) and getting a home energy audit (utahcleanenergy.org). I am doing the above, as well as swapping my Jeep Cherokee for a hybrid by the end of the year.
We are, after all, responsible for our children's lives and health, and as a society we are failing to protect them.
We deliberate over car seat models and the right foods to feed our kids. We study the latest child development information, investigate schools and choose appropriate after-school activities. We often agonize over our children's safety, worrying about crime and abuse and accidents.
Yet the way we are living is permanently damaging our kids' health.
Convenience should not trump our children's well-being, nor should we allow our elected officials to prioritize industry profits over citizen health. We can choose to behave differently; Utah's children are depending on us to do so.
Please visit our website: utahmomsforcleanair.org or send an email to supermoms@utahmomsforcleanair and join the effort to clean up Utah's air.
--- * CHERISE UDELL is a Salt Lake City resident, mother of two and founder of Utah Moms for Clean Air.
------------------------------------
Deseret News Press
Sunday, April 1, 2007
Air quality has reached crisis level, doctors say http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,660207967,00.html
Associated Press
A group of local physicians says Utah's air pollution problem has reached crisis levels and a public health catastrophe looms if something isn't done.
On Monday, Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment are expected to present a plan with steps that could keep the state's air breathable and protect the health of residents.
The group met privately Friday with Gov. Jon Huntsman to discuss its concerns. After telling the governor that air pollution damages health, much the same way as smoking does, the group recommended policies to address the problem.
"When people realize the air they are breathing is killing them and their children," said Brian Moench, a Salt Lake City anesthesiologist who began organizing the group last winter, "then maybe they will sit up and pay attention."
In their Friday meeting with Huntsman, doctors noted that Huntsman was struck in particular by the trouble children face because of air pollution.
"Every child is affected, whether they have asthma or not," said Salt Lake City pediatrician Shellie Ring, past president of the American Lung Association in Utah. She explained that, compared with children who are not exposed to air pollution, those who are never attain their full lung function.
The group is raising the alarm after one of the worst winter pollution seasons on record.
The state's Winter Air Quality Alert program set a record this season for the number of bad air quality days. Northern Utah communities from Provo to Logan had severe episodes of harmful fine-particle pollution.
Meanwhile, lawmakers this year decided to maintain the state's current funding for environmental programs, even as they doled out hearty increases to other agencies from a $1.7 billion budget surplus.
Kathy Van Dame, director of the Wasatch Clean Air Coalition and member of the state Air Quality Board, said much of Utah's past regulatory focus has been on meeting federal air-pollution limits, not the health effects. She said she applauds the doctors' efforts.
"These guys have the ability to raise the issue above business-as-usual," she said. "They bring credibility to the issue. And they are passionate."
------------------------------------
Tuesday, April 3, 2007
Utah MDs campaign for clean air to ease 'health crisis'
http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,660208466,00.html
By Joe Bauman
Deseret Morning News
Alarmed by death and damage to health caused by air pollution, several Utah physicians are calling for the state to take strong action.
From mandatory dips in freeway speed limits during smoggy days to a ban on new coal-fired power plants, Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment proposed what they acknowledge are bold actions Monday during a press conference at LDS Hospital.
Among the proposals are reducing speed limits on bad-air days, a moratorium on building coal-fired power plants and an air-pollution course in elementary school curriculum.
They cited scientific studies showing that heart attacks and strokes are linked to air pollution; that methyl mercury pollution is blamed for declining wildlife; that ozone pollution may cause faster aging; and that air pollution could cause genetic changes that will be passed on from generation to generation.
Such concerns prompted them "to be activists for our patients,"
said Dr. Brian Moench, a Salt Lake anesthesiologist.
"Current air-pollution levels along the Wasatch Front constitute a health crisis," he said. If the increasing levels of pollution aren't checked, in 20 years a full-blown catastrophe could happen, he said.
Because of population growth, motor vehicle traffic — the source of
65 percent of air pollution — could double in 20 years, he said. With climate changes, more droughts could be expected, also increasing ozone pollution, he added.
Four new coal-fired power plants are on the drawing boards for the Beehive State, according to Moench; they are among 150 such facilities planned across America. The plants release mercury pollution, and there is no way to capture the vapor, he added.
Mercury is deposited on the ground and into water. When bacteria transform it, the material becomes dangerous methyl mercury. That accumulates up the food chain, increasing many times, he said, and poses a danger. It is particularly serious for babies, the most vulnerable members of society.
"More electricity from coal would simply be a full frontal assault on public health," Moench said.
In terms of health and other impacts, he added, air pollution costs Utah people at least $4 billion annually.
The danger from air pollution extends beyond Salt Lake City and Provo, according to Dr. Richard Kanner of the University of Utah School of Medicine, whose speciality is the respiratory system. "It's more than the Wasatch Front," he said.
"We know that Cache County has a problem." And problems like Cache County's high particulate levels might show up elsewhere in Utah if the state had monitors in many locations, he said.
The very young and old are at most risk, along with "patients who have heart and lung disease," Kanner said. Citing a Harvard study involving six cities and PM10 particulate pollution, he added, "They didn't find a level below which it was safe." The panel recommends that Utah:
• Impose a moratorium on new coal-fired power plants and retrofits existing plants with new air pollution control technology.
• Reduce the speed limit along the Wasatch Front to 55 mph on bad air days.
• Expand mass transit throughout the Wasatch Front, offering it free to the public.
• "Reduce Utah's air pollutants by 20 percent through numerous strategies such as assessing auto taxes based on a car's M.P.G.."
• Make people more aware of air pollution's impacts, for example by adding an air-pollution course to the school curriculum.
• Pay special attention when issuing warnings about air pollution to note the danger that pollution can pose to the unborn so pregnant women can reduce their exposure.
• Ask that school buses not idle in school yards while waiting for students. "The engine should be shut off to decrease children's exposure to diesel exhaust."
• Encourage school districts to use buses that run on alternative fuels.
As air pollution worsens, said Dr. Scott N. Hurst of LDS Hospital, "we'll see a further rise in people suffering from heart and lung disease."
--E-mail: bau@desnews.com
------------------------------------
Friday, April 6, 2007
http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,660209305,00.html
Air quality takes a village
Deseret Morning News editorial
Earlier this week, Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment launched a campaign centered on the health concerns related to air pollution. The group says air pollution sickens many Utahns and kills some 1,000 people a year. This crisis, they say, could potentially become a catastrophe.
Medical research clearly ties air pollution exposure, even episodic exposure, to certain respiratory and heart ailments. Such research spurred the Environmental Protection Agency to hand down tougher air quality standards, which recently went into effect. But the prognostications of this physicians group need to be examined in context.
Utah's air quality has improved over the past three decades, largely due to federal regulation of industrial and motor vehicle emissions. It's cleaner despite a marked increase in motor vehicle miles traveled. Most of the time, Utah's air quality is excellent, occasional winter inversions and summertime buildups of ozone notwithstanding.
The physicians group recommends putting bans on coal-fired power plants, improving mass transit, requiring freeway drivers to drive at 55 mph on smoggy days and asking school bus drivers not to idle buses in school yards while waiting for students. Some of these suggestions have considerable merit, such as increasing mass transit usage and imposing slower freeway driving speeds on smoggy days. Some Utah school districts have already begun to switch their school bus fleets to cleaner fuels such as natural gas and bio-diesel. Others have implemented idle-reduction policies.
Barring electrical production from coal is more problematic. What are the realistic alternatives? Nuclear energy will play a larger role in the future, but for the time being, there is no waste-stream solution.
Moreover, American electrical consumers will not tolerate supply interruptions. Yes, utilities should be looking for alternatives, but for the foreseeable future, coal — with very stringent emissions controls — will do the heavy lifting in energy production.
There is clearly room for Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment to work with policymakers — federal, state and local — to help develop policies that protect health and the environment and address energy and transportation needs. There is clearly a need for more incentives that encourage clean air and energy conservation. There may also be a need for higher fuel taxes or increased motor vehicle registration fees to help curb the number of vehicles on the road.
Keeping the air clean depends greatly upon personal choices — what cars we drive, whether we use mass transit or carpool, or if we choose to burn wood in our fireplaces. Government policies can only go so far. It will take a village to further address our air quality and accompanying health issues.
------------------------------------
Sunday, April 15, 2007
Coal-powered electricity increases air pollution levels
http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,660211289,00.html
By Brian Moench and eight others
Decisions regarding Utah's future energy sources should be driven by science and the facts. Those facts indicate that the most broad-based public interest is not served by more coal.
Although standard wisdom is that coal is the cheapest source of electricity, the equation changes significantly when the full price of coal is calculated. Just as the true costs of smoking go far beyond the purchase price of cigarettes, the true cost of coal also goes far beyond the purchase price. Like smoking, the costs of the health consequences from coal combustion accumulate and reach into the billions. When these costs are factored in, the price of coal actually doubles, making it more expensive than all renewables.
Individually we can decide not to smoke, but we should not let others decide for us that we will breathe even greater quantities of NO2, SO2, carbon monoxide, mercury, arsenic, uranium, thorium, radium, polonium and lead — all products of coal combustion — even with strict emissions controls. To imply this is the price we have to pay to keep the lights on is disingenuous. It ignores the reality of clean energy alternatives and the cleanest and cheapest of all alternatives, serious conservation.
Proponents of more coal for Utah never mention that the proposed four new power plants will consume as much water annually as a municipality of 1 million people. In a desperately dry state, destined to become even drier and hotter, that kind of public policy is a brutal assault on an already vulnerable agriculturally based community.
Ultimately, water is just as valuable as electricity.
People skeptical of our message emphasize that our air is cleaner now than 30 years ago, but that is largely due to better auto emission controls mandated by the federal government, the closing of Geneva Steel and improvements at Kennecott. Reminiscing about the air quality of 30 years ago fails to mitigate the health consequence of our current air pollution levels.
The characterization of Utah's air quality as "excellent" with "occasional inversions" contradicts the American Lung Association's declaration that Salt Lake City, Logan and Provo rank in the top 10 worst polluted cities in the country, at No. 5, No. 6 and No. 9, respectively.
The forecast of worsening air pollution stems from (a) UDOT's projection of vehicle traffic (the source of 65 percent of our air pollution) doubling in the next 20 years, (b) the obvious impact of the proposed four new coal power plants and (c) climate change models predicting hotter, drier temperatures with more summer ozone buildup, more Western forest fires and more winter inversions.
The history of scientific progress teaches valuable lessons.
Asbestos, lead, DDT, tobacco, PCBs and nuclear radiation were all accepted as harmless or even health-promoting in their day. Over time, we learned how dangerous they were, and public policy was changed. We have reached a similar threshold with air pollution, yet the editorial board's acknowledgement of air pollution's health impact was limited to "a tie to certain respiratory and heart ailments." Our interpretation of the recent scientific data matches that of the hundreds of scientists who did the research.
The scientific evidence is clear. Levels of air pollution previously thought to be benign are not. There is no threshold below which there is no health impact. All families along the Wasatch Front are affected. The health consequences include but are not limited to increased rates of the following: death from heart attacks, congestive heart failure, strokes and respiratory failure, infant mortality, SIDS, low birth weight, birth defects, genetic damage in newborns, cancer rates in children and adults, permanent arrested development of lung capacity in children. Mercury, the most toxic component of air pollution, according to the EPA, is classified as such because of its association with a broad range of neurologic disorders from minor loss of intellectual capacity to autism.
Our conclusions are unpleasant, but it doesn't make them any less true. Because air pollution affects us all, especially our children, we need everyone's help to eliminate it. We invite the Deseret Morning News and its readers to join us.
----These physicians have signed their names: Brian Moench, Gerald Ross, Scott Hurst, Maunsel Pearce, Zell McGee, Richard Kanner, Chris Cowley, Shellie Ring and doctoral candidate Charles Langelier.
------------------------------------
Ogden Standard Examiner
The air out thereSunday, April 8, 2007
http://www.standard.net/live/opinion/editorials/101501/
It is time to face facts: The air out there is really bad. And it's a big health hazard for all of us.
That's a message a group of doctors want to make sure the public knows.
As reported by the Standard-Examiner's Charles F. Trentelman, the doctors met with Gov. Huntsman to deliver the message.
The doctors, who all represent various specialties, see the effects of the record amounts of pollution in this state. They deal with patients whose lives are ended or are shortened as a result of the foul air.
What is occurring is chilling: According to anesthesiologist Dr. Brian Moench, of LDS Hospital, we Utahns are seeing their life expectancy cut as if we smoked a pack a day of cigarettes. And it's not just adults being affected. It's our children too. The consequences are deadly:
l An increase in heart attack deaths for post-menopausal women l Pollution as a cause of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, low birthweight and infant mortality l Pollution causes inflammation in our arteries and makes us age prematurely l "There are roughly 1,000 people who die from the consequences of air pollution every year along the Wasatch Front," says Moench.
l Even more suffer heart attacks and strokes due in part to the bad air.
So, what can we do to alleviate these health risks? The doctors have some sensible ideas that we hope will be considered by Utah's leaders.
l Stop the construction of four proposed coal-fired electricity generating plants in Utah. Encourage wind and solar power as an alternative.
l Make sure current coal-fired plants in Utah are retrofited with the most up-to-date pollution control technology, including ways to capture mercury.
l Make the highway speed limit 55 when air pollution exceeds EPA standards.
l And make mass transit along the Wasatch Front free via a state gasoline tax. The doctors hope that would double the usage of Utah mass transit.
We have other suggestions as well. We wonder why UTA does not have tiered pricing. Such pricing would increase incentives to use mass transit during peak times.
Another suggestion is for communities to provide bikes for individuals who prefer to cycle to work or other errands. Other communities have done this. The bikes are a particular color -- sometimes pink -- and can be used and dropped off at community bike racks.
As consumers, we need to start placing a higher buying emphasis on fuel-efficient cars. So far, in the United States, we don't.
There are steps being taken to fight air pollution. As reported by Trentelman, Ogden deserves credit. "A Sustainable Ogden committee is working up ways to cut greenhouse gases, promote alterantive transportation and keep you and me alive," writes Trentelman. Ogden is buying Blue Sky units from Rocky Mountain Power. As Trentelman explains, it is is noncoal-generated and reduces potential greenhouse gases.
There are others means to make a difference. Time magazine just posited
51 ways to slow global warming. They range from the most intricate -- building more skyscrapers -- to just turning off your computer.
To put it bluntly, we are breathing poison. And it's hurting the littlest among us and as much as it is the tallest. We must do all we can to keep the air healthier.
------------------------------------
Publication:Standard-Examiner Digital Edition; Date:May 10, 2007;
Section:Front Page; Page Number:1A
Utah physicians group hopes to improve Utah’s air quality BY WENDY GREEN Standard-Examiner correspondent
WEST BOUNTIFUL — Potential health problems because of bad air along the Wasatch Front was the theme of a meeting Wednesday night with Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment.
Residents from West Bountiful, Centerville, Farmington, North Salt Lake, Woods Cross and Bountiful filled West Bountiful’s City Hall to discuss problems relating to air pollution.
Increased traffic from multiple highways and the expansion requests from several local oil refineries make these cities particularly vulnerable to the effects of air pollution.
Dr. Brian Moench, an anesthesiologist at LDS Hospital and spokesman for the group, explained that UPHE is particularly concerned about the vulnerability of residents in this area because of their proximity to substantial traffic and five local oil refineries.
Moench expressed concern that Utah already has some of the fastest population growth in the nation, Utah Department of Transportation projects vehicle traffic to double by 2020 and that vehicles are the cause of 65 percent of Utah’s air pollution. He related air pollution problems to the effects of cigarette smoking. “Air pollution shortens everyone’s life span with contaminants equal to 25 percent of the adverse effect of onepack-a-day smoking.”
Children are the most vulnerable, he said. “There is no such thing as a safe level of air pollution. There is no threshold below which people who breathe bad air are safe.”
In addition to pollution caused by traffic, pollution from oil refineries is of particular concern. “Oil refineries are one of the largest sources of air pollution in the United States, no doubt about it,” said Dr. Cris G. Cowley, member of UPHE and chairman of the division of cardiovascular anesthesia at LDS Hospital.
Charts displayed by Cowley showed that the worst producers of dangerous chemicals in the area are Chevron and Flying J, both in North Salt Lake, and the Holly Refinery in West Bountiful.
Holly produced the most carbon monoxide of the three.
“One of the main problems is that hazardous chemicals escape from refineries due to broken equipment or undetected malfunctioning of systems,” he said. “These problems often go unreported by the refineries.
Fugitive emissions from oil refineries are significantly underestimated.”
Bountiful resident Karen Bergeson addressed the audience while holding a picture of her 4-year-old son, Lincoln.
“Every February, when the worst of the inversions is present, Lincoln suffers the most. He has chemically induced asthma all year long. I’m not against capitalism; I’m against irresponsible business — alarmed to hear that our first quarter usage of fossil fuel products was the highest ever.”
She also expressed frustration at the lack of representation from her native city.
“Despite repeated calls and e-mails asking for Bountiful’s city council members to attend this meeting, no one is here. That really makes me angry. Where are they?”
Other suggestions included more emphasis on conservation, reliance on public transportation, exploring alternative energy sources and even more frequent changing of furnace filters.
Residents were encouraged to contact local leadership for support.
Moench asked city leaders to reject or postpone approval for any refinery expansion until several conditions and monitoring options had been fully explored.
For more information, contact UPHE liaison Kira Kilmer at 359-8929 or the newly formed Utah Moms for Clean Air at utahmomforcleanair.org.
------------------------------------
Other Sources
Catalyst Magazine - Toward a Healther EnvironmentAn excellent source of up-to-date articles and information.
Catalyst Magazine Article