January 16, 2005 Houston IN HARM'S WAY, Troubled neighbors (air pollution)

Jan. 16, 2005, 2:25AM

IN HARM'S WAY, Troubled neighbors
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People who live nearest to the area's refineries and petrochemical
complexes have little idea what's in the air that blows across
industry's fence line and into their lives.

By DINA CAPPIELLO
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle

Mary Guerra lives in a community of fences.
Chain-link, picket or wrought-iron varieties surround nearly every
house, as well as the nearby refinery and chemical plant. Some have
vines growing on them, others are topped with barbed wire. Many have
signs -- "No trespassing," "Beware of dog" -- in English and Spanish.

The fences are meant to keep out the strays that wander the streets of
Houston's Manchester neighborhood, the prostitutes who sometimes strut
down its blocks and the drug dealers who residents say have settled
into some of its run-down trailers.

What the fences don't stop are the sharp, sometimes sweet odors that
waft from the chemical plants and refineries on the nearby Ship
Channel, or the black dust occasionally released by the stacks that
ring this working-class community just outside the East Loop.

For Guerra and the tens of thousands of others who live near the
region's numerous industrial plants in so-called fence-line
communities, the odors, dust and noise long have offered clues that
something is amiss.

What few of these residents have had, until now, is proof of pollution.

The Houston Chronicle tested the air in public parks, playgrounds and
neighborhoods bordering some of the state's largest industrial plants
and found the air in the Manchester area so laden with toxic chemicals
that it was dangerous to breathe.

The Chronicle collected air samples on three days last summer in four
communities in Houston, Baytown, Freeport and Port Neches. The test was
carried out with the same equipment used by plant workers to detect
hazardous chemicals in the air, and the samples were analyzed for 18
toxic substances by the University of Texas School of Public Health.

The results of the Chronicle's investigation show that the region's
refining and petrochemical industries are in some places contributing
to what leading experts on toxic air pollution would consider a risky
load of "air toxics," substances that can cause cancer, kidney and
liver damage, or other serious health effects in places where people
live and work, and where children play.

At 49 of the 100 locations where the newspaper hung
air monitors, attaching them to structures such as windowsills,
clotheslines, swing sets and Christmas light strands, the quantities of
up to five different chemicals would have exceeded levels considered
safe in other states with stricter guidelines for air toxics. Unlike
the more well-known air pollutants that cause asthma and respiratory
effects, the compounds found at elevated levels by the Chronicle have
all been linked to cancer. More specifically:

· Levels of the human carcinogen benzene were so high in Manchester and
Port Neches that one scientist said living there would be like "sitting
in traffic 24-7."

· Eighty-four readings measured by the Chronicle were high enough that
they would trigger a full-scale federal investigation if these
communities were hazardous waste sites.

· Some compounds detected by the Chronicle, such as the rubber
ingredient 1,3-butadiene found at four homes in the Allendale area near
Manchester, if inhaled over a lifetime at the concentrations found,
could increase a person's chances of contracting cancer, according to
federally determined risk levels. Concentrations here were as much as
20 times higher than federal guidelines used for toxic waste dumps.

Such levels attract little attention in Texas and especially in
Houston, which for more than half a century has been home to one of the
nation's largest industrial complexes and some of the most powerful
petrochemical and oil companies.

At only a few locations where the Chronicle tested did the chemicals
exceed long-term levels considered acceptable by the Texas Commission
on Environmental Quality.

But the Texas benchmarks for carcinogens are among the most lenient in
the country, and the toxic air levels found by the Chronicle would be
considered a serious health risk in other states. Two exceptions were
Freeport and Baytown, where, despite the presence of large industrial
plants, the concentrations of benzene detected during the test were
equal to or lower than what would be found in non-industrial Houston
suburbs.

Even those levels come with some risk, however.

While the findings suggest that people living near some of the region's
400 large industrial plants are exposed to greater concentrations of
air toxics than suburbanites in, say, Tomball or Aldine, everyone has
cause for concern. The system set up to protect people from these
cancer-causing and health-damaging pollutants in Texas cannot guarantee
on any given day that anyone is safe.

"I certainly would question whether the state's system is protective,"
said Rob Barrett, who headed up Harris County Pollution Control for 26
years, until his retirement late last year. "The state is operating in
a vacuum. Data like the Chronicle collected are needed to say whether
air pollution is affecting public health."

`The smell of money'

While industrial plants along the upper Texas coast release some air
toxics in greater amounts than plants in any other part of the country,
with Harris County leading the nation in benzene and butadiene
releases, there has been little outcry.

Part of the reason is cultural. Residents who have lived with and
sometimes worked in industry for decades learn to put up with
pollution's effects. Few know exactly what chemicals are in the air
they breathe.

Many Houstonians proudly refer to the chemical odor as "the smell of
money," though most don't have to live with it. Some of the chemicals
released by these huge facilities dissipate as they travel away from
the plants. Others quickly react with other chemicals in the
atmosphere.

For years the risk posed by the fumes that spew from the region's
economic engine have been overshadowed by the region's other
high-profile air pollution problem -- lung-damaging smog.

Finally, critics say, the hazards of air toxics are masked by the very
system that Texas uses to protect citizens from the thousands of
contaminants released by the state's industry and traffic every day:

· Despite a pollution-monitoring network that is larger than any other
in the country, the state's environmental agency cannot guarantee that
at any given time air in specific neighborhoods is safe.

· The state conducts reviews for more than 1,000 air toxics, well over
the number the federal government recognized in the 1990 Clean Air Act.
But the piecemeal evaluation the state conducts when most companies
apply for a permit to release pollution can allow some facilities to
contribute to a level of pollution that would make living in the
surrounding areas risky.

· And vagueness in the state Clean Air Act, which does not clearly
define when air pollution becomes a threat to health, means state
officials struggle to punish companies when conditions do become
dangerous.

"The state is definitely obscuring the air toxics problems in Texas,"
said Jim Tarr, who was an engineer at the Texas Air Control Board when
the state system to evaluate risks from air toxics was being developed.

The Chronicle's study

The Chronicle's study took place over four consecutive weeks in July
and August. Monitors were hung at each location for roughly 72 hours.

The substances that exceeded standards the most often were the chemical
building blocks chloroform and benzene, which are used in industrial
processes to make dyes, detergents and plastics, and can also come from
sewage treatment (chloroform) and traffic and cigarette smoke
(benzene).

These two chemicals were found at levels above federal guidelines at
nearly half of the 100 sites the newspaper monitored. But only at some
locations in Port Neches and Manchester were levels high enough that if
breathed over a lifetime, one additional person in 100,000 would get
cancer.

Not every chemical detected had an industrial source.

Monitors also found the solvents trichloroethylene, an ingredient in
spot removers, or tetrachloroethylene, used in dry cleaning, at 11
sites. It was unclear where they were coming from.

All four communities had levels of chemicals above
standards in other states and above levels used by the U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency to determine whether to thoroughly
investigate hazardous waste sites.

The concentrations were also higher than those the EPA estimated in the
county in 1996 based solely on industrial emissions. The Chronicle did
not count as potential health hazards those sites where measurements
were below these so-called background levels, although it doesn't mean
that people weren't exposed to toxic substances.

"There isn't really a difference between a benzene molecule that comes
off a hazardous waste site, a refinery or a car tailpipe," said Mark
Hansen, chief of the EPA's toxics enforcement section in Dallas.

Nowhere were the levels higher or more widespread, or the industry
connection more clear, than in Manchester and Allendale, two
predominantly Hispanic neighborhoods that are located close together in
southeast Houston. They are surrounded by industrial plants that
release the same air toxics the newspaper found at elevated levels
around people's homes.

For example, at houses on Gober Street in Allendale that back up to the
fence of Texas Petrochemicals and Goodyear, concentrations of
1,3-butadiene ranged from 1.11 micrograms per cubic meter to 13.45
micrograms per cubic meter over the three days the Chronicle measured
air quality.

According to the EPA's Integrated Risk Information System, exposure to
3 micrograms per cubic meter of butadiene over a lifetime would cause
one extra cancer case in 10,000 people, excluding other causes of
cancer such as genetics, smoking and diet. This is equal to the average
level the state measured at the nearest long-term monitoring site to
the neighborhood. Levels there were equivalent to 100 to 400 cases of
cancer for every 1 million people.

The EPA considers an acceptable risk to be one additional cancer case
in 1 million people.

Benzene levels in traffic are typically between 2 and
3 micrograms per cubic meter, according to academic research based in
Detroit. Levels at 14 of the locations in the Chronicle study were
above 2, and at several of the houses along Gober were 6, which is
twice Texas' long-term screening level.

"Manchester is ground zero for toxic air pollution in Harris County.
The data reflect that," Tarr said.

He was one of five experts asked to review the newspaper's data.

The worst air

Of the 23 houses and one park where the Chronicle measured for
pollution in the Manchester area, all but three had concentrations of
at least one chemical that would raise concern in other states -- the
most of any area studied.

A dozen houses had more than one chemical that exceeded guidelines used
elsewhere to evaluate the risks of air toxics -- more homes than in
Freeport, Port Neches and Baytown combined.

The levels measured were also higher. In Manchester, the median
concentration, or the middle reading for all results, for chloroform
was double what it was in Port Neches and Freeport. For benzene, the
levels were six times higher along Gober Street than in Freeport and 10
times higher than the average concentration in Baytown. When compared
with the benzene standard considered acceptable in New Jersey, the
median concentration in Manchester would exceed it by more than 12
times.

The only place where the concentrations came close to those found in
Manchester was Port Neches, where benzene hovered around 1.3 micrograms
per cubic meter, compared with Manchester's 1.7.

Few are more in the dark about these numbers than the people living in
industry's shadows, who typically are not told when high levels are
found and who do not have ready access to the data the state collects
at the 76 monitoring stations across Texas. Even if they did, many of
the monitors may not reflect what is at a resident's house because
often they are not located in the neighborhoods.

"We can't tell you what the concentration is at this house or that
house," said Michael Honeycutt, manager of the TCEQ's toxicology
section. "We can give ballpark estimates."

Several residents who have lived next door to chemical plants and
refineries for decades vowed to move after seeing the results of the
Chronicle's study.

One participant contacted a lawyer to pursue a possible lawsuit.
Another wants his physician to help him interpret what the values mean
for his health. At that same house, the reaction was to telephone a
friend who had worked for the plant to get more information.

Until the Chronicle monitored for air pollution at her
house this summer, Hildegard Bruce, who has lived on Gober Street for
nearly 50 years, didn't know for certain that the air in her back yard
was contaminated.

There were hints: the odors, the dish-rattling boom of a flare burning
off chemicals at the nearby plant, and the times the company came
around asking questions or offering a free turkey for Thanksgiving.

Her eyes welled tears when she was told her house was among the most
polluted in the study.

"I always knew this was bad for us," Bruce said. "But to know for sure,
that means a lot to me."

At the Bruce residence and three other houses in the same area,
concentrations of 1,3-butadiene and benzene were higher than at any
other location monitored. Both compounds have been strongly linked to
cancer. Almost 20 years ago, when concentrations of these chemicals
were likely much higher, Bruce was diagnosed with uterine cancer. After
months of radiation and a hysterectomy, she is now in remission.

Other families along the street worried that the pollution would tip
their chances.

"It's already running in my family. It's already in our genes," said
Sandra Davila, who lives farther east on Gober. The monitor at her
house was placed on the children's jungle gym. "Then if you add this,
it's another factor."

The state Health Department has found no more cancer than one would
expect in any of the ZIP codes in which the Chronicle tested air
quality -- even in those with high concentrations of chemicals.

But data from a ZIP code can obscure clusters in communities. And even
when cancer is found, it's impossible to isolate what role, if any, a
nearby chemical plant is playing because of the myriad causes of the
disease.

The companies respond

The Davila house, one of four in the area with high concentrations of
1,3-butadiene, is next to Texas Petrochemicals, which released the
third-largest amount of the rubber-making chemical into the air in
Texas in 2002.

Industries in ZIP code 77017, which includes Gober Street, were
responsible for 32 percent of all 1,3-butadiene emissions in Harris
County that year, according to federal data.

Goodyear, which is next to Texas Petrochemicals, also emits butadiene,
but the Chronicle's research was unable to determine the source of the
chemical detected on the monitors.

"The data provided is consistent with what we know, what we communicate
to the public and within permitted emissions levels," read a written
statement from Texas Petrochemicals provided to the Chronicle.

Goodyear, Mobil Chemical and Valero Refining, all possible sources of
the chemicals detected in the area, had similar responses.
Lyondell-Citgo, which operates a refinery that releases large amounts
of benzene just to the north of these houses, had much the same
reaction when it was told that chemicals were found in high
concentrations along the street.

"The ... data in your report appears to be similar with that obtained
from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality monitors and
consistent with our understanding and message we communicate to the
public," read the Lyondell-Citgo letter, which was faxed in October.

But the company said the state agency in charge of enforcing Texas and
federal pollution laws found nothing wrong.

"A recent TCEQ fence-line monitoring study at our facility showed no
adverse health effects from any of the chemicals monitored, including
benzene," it said.

Plant managers in Baytown sent a letter to local officials, in advance
of the Chronicle's publishing its report, touting pollution reductions.

Some scientists who reviewed the data said industry played a role in
the elevated concentrations and were surprised that the levels were not
higher, given the number of plants in the area and how much pollution
they release. State data collected nearby in recent years has shown
that they can be worse.

"There's no doubt that there is an industrial connection in my mind,"
said Tarr, who owns a private environmental consulting firm in
California. "The predominant direction of the wind was out of the
north-northeast, right across the Lyondell-Citgo refinery."

Other researchers were more cautious and said the elevated levels
detected by the newspaper were only a snapshot that warranted further
study.

"Clearly, the Chronicle's monitoring shows some `hits' in Manchester
during the sampling period. This should be investigated," said Stuart
Batterman, chairman of environmental health sciences at the University
of Michigan School of Public Health.

Those who live there say the pollution never should
have gotten to this point. Rosalinda Davila, Sandra's mother, vented
her frustration at the state. When she moved to the area, she said, she
assumed the government would protect her.

"The state allows them to do this," she said of the pollution. "They
are the ones that should be protecting me. The companies are just
running their business."

State admits shortcomings

Internal documents obtained by the Chronicle, and numerous research
papers, including one commissioned by the TCEQ, show that the state has
known about the system's imperfections. It has admitted some of its
levels are wrong, given new research on the chemicals' effects.

"We built a system and sort of lived with it," said TCEQ Commissioner
Ralph Marquez. "Perhaps we waited too long to say there is enough new
science out there to do things a little different."

The problems became apparent after the TCEQ accused several oil and
chemical companies of contributing to unhealthy levels of air
pollution. Letters drafted by the companies in 1997 and 2001 argued
that the state couldn't punish them because they had gotten approval to
release these quantities. The agency's internal counsel then sought
outside legal help.

With an EPA grant, the agency paid Thomas McGarity and two other
University of Texas law professors to dig into the legal argument.

Their conclusions, in a paper finished in 2003, were scathing. The
authors found that the state was "handicapped" when it came to
protecting the public from air toxics because the state's pollution law
does not clearly define when toxic air pollution becomes a problem.

Chief among their concerns was the possibility that the state could
approve a permit for pollution that by itself would not be injurious to
public health but when combined with emissions from cars and other
industrial plants would exceed levels that are safe.

McGarity said he has seen little reaction to his work from the TCEQ or
the federal government, although the state is currently reviewing its
enforcement practices.

"What's going on here is an agency that is more concerned with not
getting in a huge fight with industry than it is with protecting the
public health," McGarity said. "They know if they ever did weigh in and
say, `This is a condition of air pollution, and you have to do
something about it,' they would be in court for the next three years."

The EPA said the McGarity paper was not meant to be a plan for better
management of air toxics.

"Some of the report's recommended remedies have been adopted," the
agency's regional office in Dallas said in a written statement. "Other
recommendations may be acted upon when fundamental information ... on
the size of the problem is better established."

The Texas Chemical Council, a trade association, criticized McGarity's
work, saying the lawyer had an agenda. Numerous industrial groups
interviewed by the Chronicle said they had no input into how the
state's "screening" levels were set.

"Our perspective is that we have done a real good job on air toxics,"
said Jon Fisher, vice president of the council, one of the few groups
that defended the state's policies.

But even Fisher said the state cannot use its screening levels for
enforcement.

Local officials also said the state's permitting system is flawed.

"There have been occasions when there have been an excessive amount of
emissions, but it was authorized," said Arturo Blanco, director of
Houston's Bureau of Air Quality Control. "From our perspective, unless
it is written clearly in the rules, and there is clear violator of that
rule, there is nothing you can do."

The Texas permitting system, like those in many other states, is based
almost solely on educated guesses. When companies apply for a permit to
release hazardous chemicals, they must estimate how much of a certain
chemical they will emit from the part of the facility for which they
seek the permit.

In some cases, they may be required to predict what effect those
emissions will have on the surrounding community using complicated
computer models that factor in the number of structures, their distance
from the plant and meteorological conditions.

If the estimated concentrations of chemicals in the neighborhood are
below levels set by Texas to protect public health, the company is
issued the permit. If they are above these levels, the company may be
required to adjust the permit or do further analysis before it is
issued.

But there have been instances, after a permit has been granted, that
the company has admitted making mistakes in its math and the state has
had to review the application anew.

Critics blast loopholes

When the state reviews the potential for air toxics to affect health
and property, it is usually considering the impact of only one
smokestack, boiler or unit, not what the emissions of an entire plant,
or multiple plants, can do to an area, according to state environmental
officials.

Nor does the TCEQ always evaluate the effects of facilities that were
built prior to 1972 (although it will soon), or the effects of
unscheduled releases of pollution, called "upsets."

Critics say these loopholes have the potential to make air in
communities a risk.

"You are not breathing the air of one plant. To not add up the
synergistic effects is ignoring reality," said Mary Kelly, an attorney
with the environmental group Environmental Defense. "The TCEQ considers
facilities in isolation when they do permitting. You don't live in a
vacuum, you live around 10 plants."

These synergistic effects could explain the higher levels of pollution
detected by the Chronicle in Manchester.

The community is surrounded by 10 major producers of gasoline, rubber
and chemicals that collectively release 1.9 million pounds of pollution
each year.

"No matter what direction the wind is blowing, Manchester is downwind
of something that ain't good for you," said Tarr, the former Air
Control Board engineer. "I don't know of another place in the country
where that is true."

By comparison, the other three communities in the Chronicle's study are
each dominated by one large company: Dow Chemical Co. in Freeport,
Exxon Mobil in Baytown and Huntsman Corp. in Port Neches.

"The large, more visible companies tend to be better regulated," said
Maria Morandi, an assistant professor at the University of Texas School
of Public Health in Houston. Morandi was not involved in the Chronicle
analysis.

"Even with the amount of stuff they produce, their emissions tend to be
lower."

In Freeport, for example, concentrations of benzene along a block just
north of the city's port were higher than at homes downwind of Dow.
Prevailing winds must have carried the emissions into the community
from the boats and 18-wheelers being loaded and unloaded with bananas,
rice and other commodities.

"We were expecting something like this, but I thought
maybe it was because of the plants," said Livoria Perez, who lives in
one of the houses with higher levels in Freeport. Benzene at the five
houses along her block was double the concentration found at the other
sites in the town.

Others, near Dow, expressed relief at the findings.

"I'm surprised because of all the plants and stuff," said Mary Pharris,
a Freeport volunteer whose husband fixes turbines at chemical plants
across the state. "You would expect something in the air."

In some cases, the source of the toxics wasn't industrial at all. In
numerous locations where chloroform levels were slightly elevated, the
monitors were close to public pools and backyard ponds treated with
chlorine.

Manchester was the only site where chloroform seemed to be linked to
wastewater treatment. Houses adjacent to two of the city's wastewater
treatment plants had higher concentrations of the chemical then
elsewhere.

Houston's Department of Public Works and Engineering confirmed that it
used sodium hypochlorite to disinfect. When mixed with organic solids,
that chemical can form chloroform, although the department said it was
in compliance with all environmental regulations.

"I feel confident that if we were exceeding any limits set by the TCEQ,
they would let us know about it," said department spokesman Wes
Johnson.

State review under way

The state plans to investigate the 1,3-butadiene levels in Manchester.

Since 2002, when the state's mobile monitoring vans detected
concentrations of butadiene in Manchester that raised concern within
the agency, officials have been looking for a place to put a permanent
monitor.

The closest monitoring station has had the highest annual
concentrations of 1,3-butadiene in the state over the past three years,
although they fall below the TCEQ's screening level. The state says it
is still concerned because the level it has set for butadiene is likely
too high.

But its efforts have been stalled because, it says, it can't find a
place for a monitor.

"You do not find them in the middle of a neighborhood because there is
no room," said Marquez, the TCEQ commissioner.

Officials say efforts are under way to bring levels of 1,3-butadiene
down, largely because it is one of the most potent chemicals in the
formation of ground-level ozone, the main component of smog.

In the meantime, companies are buying up adjoining residential property
and moving people out, reducing the number of people who can be studied
for health effects or complain about the pollution. In Manchester,
Valero Refining is attempting to create a 10- to 12-block buffer around
the plant. It still needs to purchase a few more houses, but residents
in the tight-knit community are hard to move.

"It's not a situation that gets the whole public upset, like smog,
which affects millions and millions of politically viable people," said
McGarity, the UT law professor. "What you have here are a few
not-so-well-off folks who are unfortunate enough to live next to large
petrochemical facilities and who are isolated geographically."

The Chronicle asked each of the dozens of state, local and federal
officials interviewed for this series if they would choose to live next
door to a refinery or chemical plant. Only a handful said yes.

"Are you kidding?" asked Chris Jones, a chemist with the TCEQ.

Posed with the question one night while he was monitoring for toxic
emissions along a dark road lined with industry, Jones said it wouldn't
be worth the risk.

"I have a family," he said.

"There are no regulations to speak of," he added, and without a clear
definition of what's good or bad, "over time, it's cancer, man."

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Chronicle projects reporter Lise Olsen performed data analysis for this
story.