WASHINGTON -- Utility executives and their lobbyists are working furiously to fend off an environmental rule they say could send electric rates soaring for the sake of negligible public health benefits.

The rule, to be proposed by the Environmental Protection Agency in December unless Congress supplants it with legislation, would require coal-burning power plants to install controls that would keep mercury, a combustion byproduct, from fouling lakes and streams. It would target 642 plants -- 21 of them in Texas -- that collectively put out 48 tons of mercury each year, and it would require deep cuts in emissions by 2008.

"Mercury is the bombshell issue for the electric power industry today," said Frank O'Donnell, executive director of the Clean Air Trust, a Washington-based environmental group. "It's a very hot-button issue with the public, and it's one the industry fears very much."

It's a matter of fairness, said John Stanton, vice-president of the National Environmental Trust. "There is one, and only one, unregulated source of mercury emissions in this country, and it's coal-fired power plants," he said.

A regulatory battle over mercury has been building for years and may reach a climax after Congress returns this week from its summer recess.

Officials with Dallas-based TXU Corp. and other utilities are aggressively promoting President Bush's "Clear Skies" legislation, which calls for more gradual mercury reductions over a longer period of time. A "hard" EPA rule, they say, would prompt mass switching from coal to more expensive natural gas, a recipe for rate shock and power outages.

"There are people that you will probably never satisfy, but the alternative is to shut down 40 percent of our electrical generation and have rolling blackouts in Texas," said John Cornyn, one of the state's two Republican senators and a supporter of Clear Skies. "That's an untenable situation."

Although some smaller plants might have to close if the EPA puts forward a tough rule, on the whole "it's not an issue of the lights being out," said Christine Tezak, an electricity analyst with Charles Schwab and Cos. Research Group in Washington. "It's an issue of how much we're willing to pay to breathe cleaner air."

As toxic air pollutants go, mercury and its various compounds are released in relatively small quantities -- about 150,000 pounds a year, two-thirds of which comes from utilities. By comparison, 6 million pounds of cancer-causing benzene and 122 million pounds of ammonia, a severe respiratory irritant, enter the atmosphere annually. Because of its ubiquity in U.S. waters, its ability to concentrate as it moves up the food chain and its capacity for attacking the human brain, however, mercury tends to produce an emotional reaction among environmental activists and health authorities.

They dismiss the utility industry's dire economic predictions as a ruse to avoid spending money on pollution controls that are long overdue and decry what they see as an attempt to undermine the Clean Air Act with industry-friendly legislation. Mercury contamination, they point out, has caused 44 states to issue advisories against the consumption of fish -- especially by pregnant women, whose fetuses are highly sensitive to mercury and other neurotoxic compounds.

Researchers with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that 8 percent of women of childbearing age -- about 5 million -- have mercury "levels of concern" in their bodies, suggesting that more than 300,000 newborns are at increased risk of developmental effects ranging from the loss of a few IQ points to mental retardation.

"I think a strong case can be made" for stiff mercury controls, said Dr. Ted Schettler, a physician and science director of the Science and Environmental Health Network in Boston. Most of the mercury that enters the atmosphere is of human origin, he said, and the bulk of that comes from burning coal. "The elephant in the room remains the coal-fired power plants," Dr. Schettler said.

Facing billions of dollars in capital costs, plant operators say that mercury control technologies are commercially unproven. At least one of these technologies has shown promise in recent tests, however, and manufacturers say product development probably would be much further along if they knew utilities had to meet the 2008 deadline.

[COMMENT: We should be diverting those billions being squandered in Iraq into worthwhile endeavors like mercury pollution here at home! Our priorities for protecting the health and safety of the American people are completely misplaced, which is probably an understatement. R.]

Utilities officials also note that the science on mercury is somewhat murky. For example, a study of children in Seychelles, an island nation in the Indian Ocean, suggests that pregnant women's consumption of fish containing methyl mercury -- an organic form of mercury -- does not cause neurological impairment in their offspring. A study of children in the Faroe Islands, in the North Atlantic, suggests that it does. Nonetheless, Dr. Schettler said, "Nobody's arguing that mercury's good for you."

On that basis, the Natural Resources Defense Council sued the EPA in 1992 in an attempt to force the agency to regulate mercury emissions from power plants. To settle the lawsuit, the EPA agreed to develop a rigorous standard for mercury released by coal-burning utilities, as it has for other toxic compounds and industries. As things stand, all utilities by 2008 would have to match what the best plants in the country are doing to control mercury, although allowances would be made for different types of coal.

Other major sources of mercury -- medical waste and municipal waste incinerators -- already have had to meet best-in-the-industry standards, and they have seen 90 percent reductions in mercury emissions as a result. Why, public health advocates ask, shouldn't utilities have to do the same?

"In the utility world, it's just very different," said Jeffrey Holmstead, assistant EPA administrator for air and radiation. Although power plants capture some mercury in the course of controlling two other pollutants, sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide, Mr. Holmstead said, "there are not mercury-specific controls out there."

It's unreasonable to expect every plant in the country to meet a strict mercury limit in 4.5 years, he said, and such a mandate almost certainly would lead to industry lawsuits that could tie up the regulatory process for years.

The prospect of an inflexible rule is particularly scary to TXU and other utilities that burn soft brown lignite, which is plentiful in Texas and contains more mercury than other types of coal. It would render "useless a very valuable natural resource" measured in the billions of tons, said Wes Taylor, president of TXU Energy Generation, and force the utility to switch to natural gas, three to four times more expensive than lignite.

TXU relies on lignite -- and, to a lesser extent, sub-bituminous, or Western, coal -- for nearly half of its annual generation. It operates nine lignite-burning units at four plants, all in the eastern half of the state. Three of these units are at the Monticello plant, near Mount Pleasant, which is consistently at or near the top of the list of mercury polluters. In 1999, according to the EPA, Monticello released a ton of the element -- more than any other power plant in the nation. In 2001, the last year for which data are available, Monticello ranked third, putting out slightly more than 1,300 pounds.

[COMMENT: Locally around Mount Misery, we are advised not to eat the fish that can be caught in area lakes and streams like the Sulphur River. I would presume, however, that one would have to eat such fish on a consistent basis to reach toxic mercury levels. An occasional catfish from the Sulphur River would certainly do no lasting harm. Nevertheless, that is no "justification" for this continued mercury pollution. Certainly our local Northeast Texas area is more polluted by mercury than other parts of the state. R.]

Four of the top 10 mercury-emitting plants in 2001 were in Texas. These plants have contributed to mercury contamination in a number of lakes -- notably, the much-treasured Caddo, recognized the the United Nations as a wetlands of international importance -- although the extent of their contribution is in dispute. Given mercury's behavior in the atmosphere -- some forms are deposited within a few miles of the source, others can travel thousands of miles -- the precise impacts of the plants may be impossible to characterize.

[COMMENT: There is a chart accompanying this article listing the Top Ten mercury polluters: (1) Keystone Reliant, Armstrong, PA; (2) Mount Storm Virginia Electric & Power, Grant County, W. VA.; (3) Monticello TXU, Mount Pleasant, TX; (4) Rockport American Electric Power, Spencer, IN; (5) Jeffrey Energy Center Westar, Pottawatomie County, KS; (6) Limestone Reliant, Jewett, TX; (7) Pirkey American Electric Power, Hallsville, TX; (8) Martin Lake TXU, Rusk, TX; (9) Miller Alabama Power, Jefferson, AL; (10) Gavin American Electric Power, Gallia, OH. R.]

Mr. Holmstead, a lawyer who represented industry and agribusiness before joining the EPA in 2001, has emerged as a major Bush administration proponent of the Clear Skies legislation, which has come to overshadow two more exacting mercury bills. In addition to requiring additional controls on sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide -- major components of acid rain and smog -- Clear Skies would aim for a reduction in nationwide mercury emissions from 48 to 26 tons by 2010 and 15 tons by 2018.

In the end, there could be a 70 percent reduction in coal-related mercury pollution. (In 2001, the EPA told the Edison Electric Institute, a utility trade group, that a mercury rule could require a 90 percent reduction by 2008; the agency has since retreated from this figure.)

The president's bill would allow utilities that got ahead of the curve on mercury to trade pollution credits to companies that were unable to meet their targets. Unlike the mercury rule under consideration, Mr. Holmstead said, it would give the industry much-needed time to adjust, and certainty about the regulatory hurdles they would have to clear.

Critics of Clear Skies dislike its "cap-and-trade" provision, which would set a national limit for mercury emissions but could result in wide disparities from region to region. "It does not provide protections for local communities near the big sources of mercury," said Mr. O'Donnell, of the Clean Air Trust. "In fact, it could permit increases. TXU could actually increase the amount of mercury it releases under the Clear Skies plan if the company went and bought emission credits from another company that could be as far away as Maine or Idaho."

No congressional vote on Clear Skies is expected until fall. In the meantime, the utilities are engaged in full-out lobbying. TXU, for example, has hired Andrew Lundquist, former director of energy policy for Vice-President Dick Chaney.

Edison Electric Institute president Thomas Kuhn -- like TXU chairman Erle Nye, a Bush "Pioneer" who raised at least $100,000 in campaign contributions before the 2000 election -- said in a recent memorandum that he intended "to organize an industry outreach effort to mobilize [utility] employees, retirees and shareholders to build support for Clear Skies around the country."

The industry has the political muscle to be heard. During the 2002 campaigns, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, power companies and their trade groups gave nearly $21 million to candidates for federal office. Two-thirds of the money went to Republicans. Among individual utilities, the Atlanta-based Southern Co. topped the list of contributors, giving a little more than $1.9 million. TXU gave just under $1.1 million.

In the Senate, Mr. Cornyn, the recipient of $27,060 in TXU funds in 2002, has become a champion of lignite interests. "Mercury is a serious concern," he said. "What it requires is for serious people to try to come up with a policy which will strike a balance between the need to protect the public and keeping our economy alive. Before we take drastic steps, we ought to make sure ... that we're not asking industry to do things that are tremendously expensive which will really not have an effect."

Some in the pollution-control business say the cost could go down if manufacturers and suppliers -- reluctant to sink too much money into production facilities -- know for sure that utilities were facing a tight deadline and that a market, by necessity, would materialize. "The equipment is pretty simple and fairly far along," said Dr. Michael Durham, president of ADA Environmental Solutions in Littleton, Colo., which makes activated carbon injection systems designed to collect mercury before it can leave power plant stacks.

Government-funded field tests over the last two years suggest that such systems remove a sizable amount of mercury -- 60 percent to 90 percent -- from bituminous coal, burned mainly in the East, and sub-bituminous coal, a common fuel in the West. Tests on lignite haven't been performed, but Dr. Durham anticipates that they will be in the next year and will yield similar results.

Mr. Taylor, of TXU, is adamant that the control technology is still a long way from commercial applicability, and Dr. Durham acknowledged that EPA tests on existing devices in 1999 were discouraging. However, Dr. Durham said, "A lot of [the industry pessimism] is based on old information. It doesn't reflect recent results."

Some states aren't waiting for the EPA, Congress and the utilities to reach an accommodation. A new law in Connecticut, for example, requires a 90 percent reduction in mercury from coal-fired plants within five years. The law was developed with input from one of the utilities it will affect -- PSEG Power, which owns the Bridgeport Harbor plant, fueled by sub-bituminous coal.

The law gives utilities an out: The mercury standard can be adjusted downward if a company makes a good-faith effort to quell emissions but the technology doesn't measure up. Nonetheless, PSEG believes it ultimately will be able to remove 92 percent of the mercury from the coal it burns, said spokesman Neil Brown. "We think it can be accomplished at a reasonable cost," Mr. Brown said.

Yes, it was expensive to remove lead from gasoline and house paint. Yes, the transition discomforted manufacturers of those products. But would anyone seriously argue that removing the toxic metal didn't justify the cost? Would anyone seriously argue that preventing neurological disease in children wasn't worth the discomfort?

Of course no one would. Good riddance to lead. One's only regret should be that it took so long to remove it. And yet some people argue about toxic mercury as some people did about lead before the federal government banned it during the 1970s.

It's too expensive to remove that mercury that pours from coal-fired electrical plants, they grumble. The economy will suffer, they complain. Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas even suggests that the health benefit would be minimal compared to the cost of removing the mercury, and that the lights may go out.

Nonsense. The United States is vastly richer than it was before the lead ban, its people vastly healthier. Removing the lead was infinitely worth doing, and so would be removing the mercury that pollutes Texas and other U.S. water bodies and causes mental retardation and other developmental illnesses in children.

If Texas utilities must burn more natural gas and harness more wind to produce mercury-free electricity, so be it. If the federal government, which encouraged coal-generated electricity during the 1970s, must subsidize the installation of coal-cleansing machinery, so be it. If the genius of the United States must turn to producing new and better coal-cleansing technologies, so be it. Great nations do not, they must not, sacrifice their children for the sake of ephemeral profits.

Despite opposition from some politically powerful electrical companies, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency should move ahead with its proposed rule requiring coal-fired electrical plants to reduce emissions. And President Bush should remove the provision from his proposed Clear Skies legislation that would allow utilities to trade mercury pollution rights, since the trading would condemn some communities to poorer health than others.

Lead and mercury: same difference.

"Danger Is Obvious" by Frank O'Donnell, Executive Director, CleanAir Trust

Though it didn't generate headlines, the news this month from the University of Maryland School of Medicine was sobering. In a journal published by the National Institutes of Health, researchers reported that exposure to low levels of toxic mercury pollution could accelerate autoimmune disease.

The study was just the latest in a long list of medical research raising serious concerns about mercury, which is released into the environment when coal is burned at electric power plants. Earlier studies have linked exposure to mercury to developmental problems in children, as well as possibly autism, heart attacks and infertility.

It is becoming clearer with each new study that we need to move quickly to reduce our exposure to this toxic metal in order to protect people's health. The Environmental Protection Agency could take a significant step toward that goal by setting tough restrictions on toxic mercury emissions from electric power plants. The EPA is under a court order to issue a proposal by mid-December.

Electric power plants are the largest source of mercury in the nation -- and the only unregulated industrial source -- collectively spewing about 48 tons of the toxin into the air each year. That is more than a third of all mercury emissions. That may not sound like a lot, but it doesn't take much mercury to poison a lake. In fact, just 1/70th of a teaspoon is enough to contaminate a 25-acre lake.

People are exposed to mercury when they eat fish from a lake, river or stream that has been poisoned. The problem is widespread and growing. Forty-four states have issued advisories warning against eating mercury-contaminated fish. That includes Texas, which has warned about the Gulf of Mexico and various water bodies within the state, including Caddo Lake.

The best-documented health threats appear to be those affecting pregnant women and babies. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, one in every 12 women of childbearing age has mercury "levels of concern" in her body. That means more than 300,000 newborns each year face the risk of problems ranging from a lower IQ to mental retardation.

The National Academy of Sciences reported in 2000 that children born to women who ate large amounts of fish and seafood during pregnancy "have to struggle to keep up in school" and "might require remedial classes or special education".

To help reduce the threat, Bill Clinton's EPA agreed to set standards that would require every power plant in the nation to clean up by the end of 2007. The power industry has been lobbying ever since to delay the standards, weaken them or repeal them outright through President Bush's misleadingly named "Clear Skies Initiative".

Power companies like TXU Corp. argue that cleaning up their plants won't do much to solve the problem because much of the mercury originates outside the state. That sort of sophistry, of course, ignores the fact that if the EPA sets tough standards, all power companies in the nation would have to reduce their mercury emissions. That would mean less mercury spewing from Texas power plants and less mercury blowing in from other states. It also would prompt the development of cleanup technologies that could be exported to other countries.

Indeed, a number of companies are creating effective technologies to clean up mercury. But there is no incentive to perfect those products -- and no market -- unless power companies have to clean up. If we had waited for "commercially demonstrated technology", as the power companies demand, we wouldn't have catalytic converters on cars today.

Rather than investing more heavily in pollution control technology, TXU is spending on lobbyists. And it apparently is paying top dollar, hiring Andrew Lundquist, former director of energy policy for Vice-President Dick Cheney. That makes it appear that the fix is in. For the sake of the children -- and the rest of us -- let's hope that isn't the case.

"Coal Plants Aren't Main Culprit" by Walter Shaub, Senior Science Advisor, U.S. Chamber of Commerce

The saber rattling over the control of mercury emissions from power plants continues to rage. The industry, which generates 51 percent of the nation's electricity, claims that onerous, mandatory mercury emissions controls will boost operating costs and lead to greater natural gas use. Environmentalists argue there are health problems due to prenatal exposure to methyl mercury, which they say is associated with mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants. They say that exposure must be prevented despite a significant economic impact.

Not surprisingly, the debate remains unresolved. That is because there are no simple answers, no silver bullets, and what benefits will be realized from mandated emissions controls remain an open question. Compounding all of that are rampant confusion and untruths about the issue.

Reading Jim Morris' Aug. 31 Dallas Morning News article, "Mercury battle hits fever pitch", one is led to think U.S. coal-fired power plants are the major source of mercury emissions in the environment. That simply isn't true. U.S. power plants account for less than 1 percent of global mercury emissions. The rest comes from oceans, volcanoes, wildfires and foreign man-made sources. All of that mercury, over which we have no control, is capable of long-range transport through the world.

If we do choose to regulate mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants, it doesn't take an Einstein to realize that even reducing all of the roughly 40-plus tons of emissions from the plants will leave mercury levels in ocean fish virtually unchanged, since the world's oceans contain millions of tons of mercury. That is an important point, since fish consumption is the primary way that humans are exposed to mercury, and most fish eaten by Americans are ocean fish.

Furthermore, University of Rochester pediatric neurologist Gary Myers recently testified to Congress, "We do not believe that there is presently good scientific evidence that moderate fish consumption is harmful to the fetus. However, fish is an important source of protein in many countries, and large numbers of mothers around the world rely on fish for proper nutrition. Good maternal nutrition is essential to the baby's health."

Some people assert that because it is relatively easy to reduce mercury emissions from garbage incinerators, we should be able to do the same with coal burners by simply transferring the technology. That, too, isn't true. It is the much higher chlorine content of garbage compared to coal that helps promote the easy capture of mercury in incinerators. In contrast, the lower levels of chlorine and mercury in coal, and the fact that amounts vary widely by type and source of coal, make mercury removal difficult and costly and control technologies are generally applicable across the board at coal-fired power plants.

The Environmental Protection Agency's own analyses reveal there is no demonstrated, one-size-fits-all technology for limiting mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants. Trying to fit one technology to all power plants is like trying to fit a '67 Chevy carburetor to a '71 Ford. It just can't be done, and absent any silver bullet fix, it is no wonder there is considerable uncertainty.

A robust economy requires a plentiful supply of electricity at a reasonable cost. If mandatory mercury reductions from power plants are imposed before a control technology is developed, it could result in significant increases in the cost of electricity and a further loss of manufacturing jobs to other countries -- and for no measurable health benefits.

In view of those and other scientific, technological and economic uncertainties, time must be allowed to establish what works and what doesn't and under what circumstances. Coal-fired power plants must have sufficient flexibility to assess what options work at their plants on a case-specific basis.

Beware Of Overstepping
By Ronald R. Blanck, D.O., President, University of North Texas Health Science Center, Fort Worth

As Congress considers proposed legislation that would place mandatory caps on mercury emissions at an additional cost to electricity ratepayers of billions of dollars, policymakers should be mindful of serious economic implications of singling out U.S. coal-fired electrical plants. These plants aren't the major culprit.

The Annapolis Center for Science-Based Public Policy points out that man-made emissions of mercury worldwide range from 2,000 to 3,000 tons annually and that China's coal-fueled power plants accounted for 22 percent of the total. Russia and India are not far behind China.

Compare that with coal plants in the United States, which release no more than 40 tons of mercury each year, less than 2 percent of the global pool. There is no appreciable health risk from eating fish in reasonable amounts. As a physician, I know that women of child-bearing age can eat a variety of fish to help maintain good nutrition.

A punitive crackdown on mercury emissions, if implemented, will impose huge costs on consumers and taxpayers, without making a notable difference in public health.

Just Clean It Up
By Richard Bach, Garland

Re: "Mercury Pollution -- "Don't sacrifice children to coal-power plants," Sept. 3 Editorials.

Thank you for this strong editorial. I hope President Bush and Sen. John Cornyn see it. It's time that industry stop whining and just get on with doing the right thing -- cleaning the air.

Allowing the power industry to burn coal that releases mercury into the air is nothing more than corporate welfare. But the whole Bush administration's approach to the environment is nothing more than corporate welfare. Unfortunately, the average citizen pays the welfare tab in the health damage from dirty air and water.

AUSTIN -- Texas is ranked worst in the nation in the amount of mercury emitted into the air by power plants, according to a report issued Thursday by three advocacy groups. Texas power plants emitted 8,992 pounds of mercury into the air in 2001, the most recent year for which figures were available, according to the report by the Texas Public Interest Research Group, Public Citizen and the Sustainable Energy and Economic Development Coalition. The "Toxic Neighbors" report evaluated 2001 Toxics Release Inventory data, the nation's database of toxic air, water and land pollution, the groups said. The groups urged the federal government not to backtrack on protecting the environment and the nation's health in regard to mercury.

The Bush administration on Monday [December 15] proposed giving power plants up to 15 years to install new technology aimed solely at reducing mercury pollution, a week after science advisers said the government should issue stronger mercury warnings to pregnant women. The Environmental Protection Agency's first proposed controls on mercury from power plants would be less than the limits envisioned by the Clinton administration, sometimes letting owners delay meeting requirements until 2018.