Mr. Simpson's guest editorial in the Humboldt Herald shows that he is not willing to acknowledge the enormity of the problem of pollution from the Samoa Pulp Mill. "The real issue with the Samoa mill is not about pollution, it is about a 37 year old antiquated EPA evaluation system...." He doesn't discuss the enormity of past violations and the fact that nothing has changed since these violations that would prevent them from happening again.
"For the 35 months February 2005 through December 2007 the pulp mill, while under operation by Evergreen Pulp Inc....exceeded the monthly average BODs limitation...for eleven months. In addition to exceedances of BOD and total suspended solids limitations, the discharge exceeded the average ALDRIN concentration for one month. For the nine months until closure of the mill in October 2008, the discharge from the mill exceeded the monthly average BODs for all 9 months of operations..."(Draft Water Permit 2010) They were fined over $400,000 which was never paid. They could have been fined $59,297,999,000.
BOD means biological oxygen demand. The amount of dissolved oxygen needed by aerobic decomposers to break down the organic materials in a given volume of water at a certain temperature over a specified time period.
ALDRIN is LISTED AS A CANCER CAUSING CHEMICAL BY THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA. Symptoms of aldrin exposure include mental confusion,
incoordination, muscle twitching, vomiting, nausea, headache, dizziness, convulsions and cancer.
In addition the mill water emissions must be tested for certain other chemicals, because they have been found in previous mill outflow. HCH, TCDD equivalents, aldrin and total DDT. There is a long list of other chemicals that could reasonably be found in mill water emissions. (Draft Water Permit)
This does not even begin to address the issue of all the chemicals already in the testing wellls on the mill site including HEXAVALENT CHROMIUM, NICKEL, ARSENIC, MANGANESE and pages and pages of other toxic cancer causing chemicals. What is to prevent these from going out the pipe into the ocean? If these are not a problem, why is the Water Board making them clean up the site? (See Geotracker)
IN SUMMARY, IT IS CLEAR THAT MR. SIMPSON AND OTHER OWNERS OF THE MILL ARE NOT RESPECTFUL OF THE ENVIRONMENT AND THE TOXIC CHEMICALS THAT THEY ARE WORKING WITH IN A PULP MILL. AGAIN AND AGAIN MR. SIMPSON MINIMIZES THE RISK, DISRESPECTS THE E.P.A. AND IGNORES THE CONCERNS OF THOSE OF US WHO LIVE NEAR THE MILL.
This is only addressing water pollution. Apparently the mill already has the air permits, so we won't even have a chance to speak up about air quality.