New numbers released by the government show one state pollutes more than any other in the region when it comes to toxic chemicals released into the air. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush reports:
Transcript
New numbers released by the government show one state pollutes more than any
other in the region when it comes to toxic chemicals released into the air.
The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush reports:
In the eight states surrounding the Great Lakes, Indiana tops the list for
cancer-causing chemicals released into the air. The EPA’s Toxic Release
Inventory shows that 34 million pounds of these chemicals were released in 2002.
Indiana is responsible for 8.7 million pounds of that. That’s more than one
quarter of the entire region’s release of that kind of pollution.
Karen Teliha is with the Indiana Department of Environmental Management.
She says these chemicals are mostly released in the northern counties of the
state:
“Our number one carcinogenic chemical that’s released is Styrene. And it’s one
that we’ve been working on with the fiber reinforced plastics industry, and in
Indiana that’s mainly RV and boat manufacturers.”
Teliha concedes that the amount is high, but she says it’s been declining over
the last five years. Environmentalists say the state isn’t doing enough to curb
the release of these cancer-causing chemicals.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Mark Brush.