EPA, Defense Department Touting Pro-Industry Study On Safe Levels of Rocke

[JABBS]

A study used to determine "safe" levels of the rocket-fuel chemical perchlorate in drinking water is fueling a controversy.

The study -- funded with $310,250 from perchlorate manufacturers and users Lockheed Martin, Kerr-McGee, Aerojet and Boeing -- was used to support Defense Department arguments for a 200 parts per billion limit on perchlorate in drinking water, saying that such a level had "no effect" on those studied.

If the perchlorate levels are adopted, perhaps the Bush Administration will call it the "Clean Water Initiative," or some other similar Luntz-ian phrase.

In February, the Environmental Protection Agency used the research -- the so-called "Greer" study, named after the lead researcher, the late Dr. Monte Greer -- as a guideline for setting future limits on perchlorate in drinking water. Strangely, that decision rejected the work of the agency's own scientists, who in 2003 found "considerable uncertainty" in the data, and questioned whether the data's small test group could reliably determine anything. The EPA, using primarily animal studies, estimated in early 2002 that 1 part per billion in water was known to be safe.

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For more on this controversy, go to Journalists Against Bush's B.S., at http://jabbs.blogspot.com/2005/06/epa-defense-department-touting-pro.html