Passing the buck in MTBE leaks
Ifan industry makes a mess on pub
lic land, it is expected to clean up after itself. Common sense sug gests that, if an industry pollutes the public water supply, it ought to clean up that mess, too. But politics isn't always about com mon sense. Sometimes powerful inter ests receive special treatment at the expense of ordinary citizens. That's what's happening in Washington right now, as lawmakers working on a wideranging energy bill consider granting gasoline manufacturers liability immu nity - so called "safe harbour" — in cases of MTBE (methyl tertiary butyl ether) water contamination.
By Jack W. Hoffbuhr, American Water Works Association
the US are repeatedly discovering that MTBE also seeps into drinking water, fouls it, and renders it undrinkable. As
gasoline escapes through leaky storage tanks, spills during traffic accidents and drips from gas-station nozzles, MTBE can quietly and seriously con taminate our most precious resource. A recent study by the US Geologi cal Survey found MTBE contamina tion in 55 percent of the metropolitan water systems that were tested. Even
Gasoline makers relish this blank-
small amounts of MTBE can make
check protection, because it means they are not accountable for a mess
drinking water smell and taste like tur pentine. Health concerns related to MTBE range from headaches and dizziness to burning of the nose and throat, disorientation and nausea. Most alarmingly, the US Environmen tal Protection Agency has classified MTBE as a possible human carcinogen.
that will cost some $29 billion to clean
up. They would rather pass the buck to local water utilities.
MTBE is a chemical commonly used in gasoline for more than two decades. But communities throughout
In South Tahoe, California, severe MTBE contamination led to a lawsuit
filed by the local public utility against several MTBE producers, seeking con tamination clean-up costs. In that case, the jury found that MTBE was a defeetive product, resulting in a settlement in which manufacturers agreed to pay more than $50 million in clean-up costs. Factored into the jury's decision were documents demonstrating that gasoline manufacturers have known for years that MTBE spreads in the environment farther and faster than
other constituents of gasoline and is enormously expensive to clean up. The good news is that there is a movement afoot to eliminate the use of
MTBE in gasoline supplies. The chem ical is now banned in 17 states.
Unfortunately, the damage has already been done in many regions, and some body has to address that damage. So who should pay? The industry that created MTBE pollution, or the local communities that suffer from it?
Let's hope US Congressional lawmak ers choose cormnon sense over special interests. We could all drink to that. â–
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44 Environmental Science & Engineering, November 2003
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