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No delay on consent order, but Curran supports special session

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Illinois

* Background is here if you need it. Sen. John Curran (R-Downers Grove)…

This morning I asked the Illinois Attorney General, the DuPage County State’s Attorney, and the Governor to delay next week’s hearing and implementation of the settlement agreement and consent order regarding the Sterigenics litigation.

This delay would provide for greater public input on their proposed agreement, an agreement that provides Sterigenics with a road map to open, and fails to hold them accountable for their past environmental violations that have damaged the public’s health in and around the Willowbrook area.

Unfortunately, the Illinois Attorney General has declined my request.

I also informed Governor Pritzker today that I fully support his offer to call a special session to address this critical issue. It is vital that we ensure every action is taken within the law to prevent Sterigenics from operating and emitting ethylene oxide, a known carcinogen, in Willowbrook and the surrounding community.

* I just want to point out this one thing from AG Raoul’s statement yesterday…

The new law imposes new certification requirements, but, through litigation, Sterigenics attempted to exploit a loophole in the law to avoid those requirements. Through the consent order, we eliminated that loophole. Sterigenics will now always be subject to the certification requirements that area legislators insisted be included in the law. The final result is that, combined with the Matt Haller Act, the consent order ensures that Sterigenics will not reopen unless and until it installs new emissions controls that will reduce its emissions to no more than 85 pounds of EtO per year.

Sterigenics’ permit issued by the Rauner administration allowed it to emit 36,400 pounds of ethylene oxide per year.

posted by Rich Miller
Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 12:26 pm

Comments

I thought republicans wanted Illinois to be more business friendly?

Comment by 360 Degree TurnAround Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 12:33 pm
===I also informed Governor Pritzker today that I fully support his offer to call a special session to address this critical issue. It is vital that we ensure every action is taken within the law to prevent Sterigenics from operating and emitting ethylene oxide, a known carcinogen, in Willowbrook and the surrounding community.===

Curran will do what Durkin won’t?

This is an interesting take.

Comment by Oswego Willy Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 12:34 pm
I find it stunning that Sterigenics is attempting to re-open at their current location, or anywhere in Illinois for that matter. They’re radioactive. It smacks of an arrogance and/or tone deafness to the current public outcry. The pitchforks are out Sterigenics. Better get while the gettin’s good.

Comment by PublicServant Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 12:35 pm
Curran has always been less of a partisan I think, OW.

Adding to Rich’s point: the current EPA Director is a holdover from the Rauner administration involved in the original permitting, which is, as they say, part of the rub. There is plenty of mistrust to go around.

Comment by Thomas Paine Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 12:39 pm
I thought these types of regulations are bad for business in our state? “Red tape”.

Comment by 360 Degree TurnAround Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 12:46 pm
Where is the business community on the call for special session?

Comment by 360 Degree TurnAround Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 12:50 pm
Can they measure precisely enough to get to 85 pounds per year? What other activities create EO and at what levels?

A continuous onsite monitoring team is required.

Comment by Last Bull Moose Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 1:00 pm
85lbs is a modeled number, and deals with emissions, not ambient concentrations specifically. You can break it down into 12 monthly doses too, like they do on TV infomercials to get you to buy a snuggie, but this is a class 1 carcinogen where there is no safe dose. This is nestled into a community. It would not be allowed under the current law as a new permit.

Comment by MarginofEra Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 1:11 pm
Keep in mind Rauner had personal financial interest in sterigenics.

Comment by El Conquistador Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 1:53 pm
John Curran is a good egg. He’s one of the few that will work with both sides of the aisle and doesn’t stand in the way of Labor.

Comment by BR91 Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 1:55 pm
=== - Last Bull Moose - Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 1:00 pm:

Can they measure precisely enough to get to 85 pounds per year? What other activities create EO and at what levels? ===

The human body produces EO. Here is an interesting (and current) article:

https://www.medtechdive.com/news/looming-epa-ethylene-oxide-rules-hang-over-device-supply-chain/556954/

Comment by Birdseed Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 2:41 pm
===It is vital that we ensure every action is taken within the law to prevent Sterigenics from operating and emitting ethylene oxide===

So

The bill Leader Durkin sponsored and was signed… didn’t go far enough?

Sounds like it

Comment by Oswego Willy Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 2:49 pm
Birdseed-
data collected after Willowbrook was forced to close bolsters the IRIS review, Reed said. In comments to the EPA, she noted that ethlyene oxide emissions dropped 90% after the plant closed and pointed to a March report from the Illinois Department of Health that found cases of Hodgkin’s lymphoma among women in Willowbrook were almost 90% higher than the number of cases diagnosed in women in a nearby county.

And the “science” you tout in the article is from a manufacturers trade group

Name change since yesterday?

Comment by Morty Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 3:42 pm
Chemistry - Thursday, Jul 18, 19 @ 4:26 pm:

The human body doesn’t make Uranium. It does make Ethylene Oxide though.

Also, even if you close down Sterigenics in Willowbrook for good, vehicles still release Ethylene Oxide. About 6,800 pounds of it in DuPage County a yea

Birdseed - Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 2:41 pm:

=== - Last Bull Moose - Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 1:00 pm:

Can they measure precisely enough to get to 85 pounds per year? What other activities create EO and at what levels? ===

The human body produces EO. Here is an interesting (and current) article:

https://www.medtechdive.com/news/looming-epa-ethylene-oxide-rules-hang-over-device-supply-chain/556954/

Rich-Sterigenics’ permit issued by the Rauner administration allowed it to emit 36,400 pounds of ethylene oxide per year.

Just a random chemistry buff?

Comment by Morty Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 3:47 pm
“There are significant issues with the unusual approach that EPA applied in the EO IRIS Assessment to derive one of the highest cancer UREs in IRIS history,” the American Chemistry Council wrote in a comment to EPA on an recent regulatory filing on hydrochloric acid.

Wikipedia- The American Chemistry Council (ACC), formerly known as the Manufacturing Chemists’ Association[1] (at its founding in 1872[2]) and then as the Chemical Manufacturers’ Association[3] (from 1978 until 2000[4][5]), is an industry trade association for American chemical companies, based in Washington, D.C.

Comment by Morty Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 3:49 pm
On April 7, the Illinois State Medical Society Issued a resolution urging, “The substitution of ethylene oxide with less toxic alternatives that are currently available…which do not release carcinogens into the workplace or community.” They also stated, “Safer substitution is the most effective means to address this problem of EtO community exposures…alternatives exist that are equally efficacious.”

Comment by Morty Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 4:04 pm
Smart political move by Curran. Not worrying about anything but keeping the locals happy.
While Durkin plays cat and mouse with the Gov, Curran goes to issue and says do more.
Good move, Durkin should be doing the same.

Comment by Dupage Bard Friday, Jul 19, 19 @ 4:31 pm