NLV pollution high, but dropping

Friday, Jan. 24, 2003 | 11:10 a.m.

North Las Vegas led the state in the release of carcinogenic pollutants from 1987 through 2000, a report issued by a national environmental and consumer group said.

But the study by the U.S. Public Interest Research Group erred by failing to note a dramatic drop in releases in 1999 and 2000, local air quality officials said.

The study, an effort to call for greater national monitoring of toxic releases and their effect on health, argues that toxic releases are increasingly coming from the fast-growing Sun Belt and moving away from the traditional home of heavy industry, the Rust Belt of the Northeast.

The study said almost 446,000 pounds of suspected carcinogenic materials were released in the 89030 ZIP code in North Las Vegas. Jeremiah Baumann, a U.S. PIRG environmental health advocate, said the information came from the federal Environmental Protection Agency's annual inventory of toxic releases.

Baumann said two companies appeared to generate most of the pollutants: Universal Urethane Inc. on Lone Mountain Road and Capital Cabinet Corp. on Losee Road. Their production of emissions peaked in the mid-1990s, when the two companies produced more than 200,000 pounds of airborne chemical pollution.

In 1994 Capital Cabinet released 91,000 pounds of potentially toxic chemical pollution and Universal Urethane released 133,000 pounds of the material. Not all of the material would be included in the PIRG definition of "carcinogenic," but Baumann said it put North Las Vegas at the top of the list for total releases.

But Clark County Air Quality Director Christine Robinson faulted the study for failing to note that both companies produce far less pollution today.

By 2000 Capital Cabinet's release dropped by less than 12,000 pounds and Universal Urethane dropped to less than 7,500 pounds, she said.

The EPA and Clark County's regulatory agencies worked with both companies, and both companies voluntarily added new emission control systems, switched chemicals used in the manufacturing processes and took other steps to reduce emissions, Robinson and officers with the two companies agreed.

"The key is that our agency worked with Universal and Capital Cabinet to significantly reduce their emissions, and that is working," she said.

North Las Vegas Mayor Michael Montandon said while he has not had an opportunity to review the study, he would question the relevancy of any report that relied on five-year-old data.

"The last time I remember any difficulties with Capital Cabinets was 1997, the year I took office," Montandon said. "I remember we met with them and they took big steps to improve things and we haven't had a problem since."

The entire city's environmental status has improved "by leaps and bounds" in recent years, Montandon said.

"It would be misleading to suggest otherwise," Montandon said.

T. Scott Evans, Universal Urethane president, said the improvements at his company came with the investment of about $200,000. One major change was switching part of the production process -- the company makes plastic items -- from a volatile chemical to water.

"We never got a pat on the back from anybody," Evans said.

Rick Anderson, Capital Cabinet president, said his company has always been in compliance with federal and state requirements -- but the EPA wanted more emissions cuts. Several years ago the company began putting new technologies to work.

"Basically, we have been experimenting and successfully experimenting with the lowest achievable emission reduction," he said. "As time evolved and there were better products out there for companies to use, we would implement them.

"They go above and beyond what the law requires us to do."

Despite the local improvements, PIRG organizers said more needs to be done on a national scale to track the effects toxic releases have on human health. The report also notes discharges from other sites throughout the state, including mining in Central and Northern Nevada, two power plants locally, and the U.S. Army's chemical weapons facility in Hawthorne.

The cumulative impact needs to be studied, the study authors argued.

"Polluters in Nevada discharge millions of pounds of toxic pollution while the people of Nevada have no knowledge of how it is affecting their health," Ben Prochazka, PIRG field organizer, said.

Prochazka said the point of the study was to hold more corporations accountable by highlighting the health risks of various emissions. The data also boosts the argument for a national environmental health database, something PIRG has pushed for in the past, Prochazka said.

"When you don't have all the pieces of the puzzle, it's more difficult to solve," Prochazka said.