In an open letter to the U.S. and Canadian governments on Wednesday, more than 100 environmental and health groups on both sides of the border are calling for improved tracking of hazardous radioactive substances in the Great Lakes basin, saying that they should be categorized as "chemicals of mutual concern."
This categorization would recognize that radionuclides can have serious immediate, long-term and intergenerational hazards for human and environmental health, which in turn would require governments to create a strategy for controlling their dissemination into the lakes, as National Newswatch explains.
These chemicals, such as uranium or plutonium, can lead to birth defects, genetic mutations and cancer in people and animals. "Radionuclides can have very serious immediate, long-term and intergenerational effects on human and non-human health," the letter declares. "There is no level of radionuclides below which exposure can be defined as 'safe.'"
A recent report commissioned by the Canadian Environmental Law Association in support of the new designation reveals that although the Great Lakes are surrounded by nuclear generating stations, fuel-processing and waste disposal facilities, and uranium mine-tailing locations, the monitoring systems for radioactive substances in the lakes is alarmingly deficient.
"With the exception of Lake Superior, our lakes are surrounded by nuclear facilities," report author John Jackson said in an interview Wednesday. "This isn't something small scale; this is something ringing the basin."
In 1997, an International Joint Commission determined that regulating and keeping tabs on radioactivity was basically left to users and companies, which has resulted in a patchwork of monitoring and reporting approaches. As Jackson's report states, even by 2016 "this situation has not improved."
Additionally, Fe De Leon, a researcher for the Canadian Environmental Law Association, notes that to this point only four toxic substances have been officially listed as such, while environmental watchdogs have created a list of more than 500 that should be categorized under the proposed "chemicals of mutual concern" designation. Part of the issue is getting Canada and the U.S. to work together.
"Recognizing that both countries work with a different political framework and have different laws that relate to managing chemicals, that's one challenge," she acknowledged, WBFO reports.
"The evidence is there to demonstrate that these are really problematic chemicals and given that we are challenged with a number of a environmental problems in the Great Lakes, I would hope that we're not waiting for a situation where they need full evidence of harm before they take action," De Leon explained.
The Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement (2012) currently allows the public to submit "chemicals of mutual concern" in order to identify gaps in controlling the release of contaminants in the lakes, and the Canadian Environmental Law Association claims that this letter is the first endeavor by any collective to make use of this process.
