When families in southwest Detroit's 48217 zip code thought their water had been contaminated, they had to run the tests themselves.
When two tanks at the Marathon refinery blew toxic smoke into their air on the night of April 27, the families in 48217 never got an evacuation notice or information about how to keep their children safe from the fumes.
Communities like Detroit's 48217 live in the shadow of big polluters and their reckless behavior. All too often, don't have safeguards against even the worst accidents -- let alone the routine danger of living downwind from coal-burning power plants and tar sands refineries.
Take action now to close one of the loopholes that endangers communities all across America -- including Detroit's 48217. Let the EPA know that it's time to crack down on SSM exemptions.SSM stands for "startup, shutdown, malfunction," and it's a loophole that lets industrial facilities and coal plants like the ones in Detroit spew pollution into the air with no consequences -- as long as the pollution happens during a startup, shutdown, or malfunction.
Worse still, polluters are exploiting this loophole and claiming that they are "starting up the plant" or that a pollution event was an "accident" just to get out of having to clean up their act. Real lives are being put at risk, whether it's from contaminated groundwater, refinery smoke, or soot and smog from coal-burning power plants.
Asthma, cancer, heart disease, and other health problems don't have loopholes, and neither should the pollution that causes them.Oil, coal, and gas companies are proving over and over that they're not concerned for the health of communities like Detroit's 48217, and our government is failing to protect those communities and hold companies accountable for their pollution. We need the EPA to step in and tell polluters that enough is enough.
Tell the EPA to move ahead with an SSM safeguard that will help protect our communities from some of the toxins they face every day.The EPA is only accepting comments on their SSM proposal for a few more days, so now is the time to act. Submit your comment and protect our communities from reckless polluters!
Thanks for everything you do to protect the environment,
Leslie Fields
Director, Environmental Justice & Community Partnerships
Sierra Club
P.S. Six comments are better than one.
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