Coal-fired Power Plants Disproportionately Affect Hispanics in Texas Too!

http://texasvox.org/2011/06/29/air-pollution-an-environmental-justice-issue-for-hispanics/

This Article addresses health risks facing many Hispanic communities in Texas whom are disproportionately affected by poor air quality. The author lists two primary sources of this pollution--diesel engines and coal-fired powered plants.  Although the article is not published in a mainstream media source, it does attempt to cumulatively assess the environmental and health impacts of coal fired power plants and diesel engines on Hispanic populations in Texas. Both the employment and housing situation in Texas brings Hispanic populations into areas with poorer air quality than other ethnic groups. Without coincidence the rates of asthmatic death for non-white peoples in those communities--and across the country--is generally higher. A community’s proximity to a coal-fired power plant obviously endangers their health by polluting the air with carbon emission related particles, and the post cites demographic statistics that include the following excerpted facts: “65 percent of Hispanics live in areas where the air fails to meet federal standards. According to the Clean Air Task Force, Hispanics take in approximately one-and-one-half times the levels diesel exhaust of the average American, resulting in anywhere between 2,000 to 5,000 premature deaths in the Hispanic community annually. Additionally, Hispanics are 3 times as likely as whites to die from asthma.” The post also mentions a statistic that 15% of Hispanics live within 10 miles of a coal-fired power plant. There is much evidence indicating the dangers of elevated mercury released into the atmosphere by coal-fired power plants, and cites a report from the Sierra Club which “indicated that mercury—emitted from coal-fired power plants—is present in high levels in rivers and streams that Hispanics fish. Pregnant women are especially susceptible to the harmful effects of eating contaminated fish because mercury poisoning contributes to babies being born with learning disabilities, developmental delays and cerebral palsy.”  The post has a link to A 2007 University of Texas study that found children living within a 2 mile radius of the Ship Channel in Houston had a 56% higher likelihood of developing leukemia that other children and that area of the city is predominantly Hispanic. Although the EPA sets air quality standards for these plants that enforce limits on air pollution for contaminants like lead, ozone, particles, carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen dioxide, these standards are skirted by local governments through local and state regulation regarding the zoning and permit practices that fail to asses cumulative impact. The post explains how when the companies behind these plants seek to renew or receive permits, the environmental impact of any proposed ‘polluter’ is not assessed properly: “when a polluter applies for an air quality permit, the state environmental agency (the Texas Commission for Environmental Quality – TCEQ) looks only at projected air emission levels from that specific plant.  There is no requirement that they look at the cumulative impacts on air quality and efforts to address cumulative impacts failed to pass in the Texas legislature this past session.” These laws must change and the Texas Commission for Environmental quality obviously need to be reformed in their analytical methodologies that should be designed to protect people, but are obviously protecting profits and industry. This post speaks to the ways that environmental problems intersect issues of race and ethnicity, and is submitted in blog form anonymously. As the internet provides a medium for people of all walks of life to engage with environmental justice issues and learn the relevant ways that these problems are perpetuated, it provides a gleam of hope that science can no longer mislead or minimize the cumulative toxic impacts on communities. It provides citizens access to information on their communities and hopefully with a voice that speak to and bring about changes.