But as one of our tour guides reminded me, “It’s what you can’t see that will hurt you.”

The Portland Harbor may be the city’s least understood environmental problem. No one sees the river sediments that are contaminated with PCBs, heavy metals and pesticides. Nor can we spot the toxic groundwater that leaches into the river, carrying pollutants like DDT and dioxin.

This week, I was part of a group that toured the Superfund area on a boat trip sponsored by the Portland Harbor Community Advisory Group. I’m just beginning to understand the issue and I’m no expert by any stretch of the imagination.

So with that in mind, here are some impressions from the trip.

The former Arkema site, described as "ground zero" of the lower Willamette River. In the 1940s and 1950s, the company manufactured pesticides. The groundwater is contaminated with DDT, hexavalent chromium and benzene. A hidden plume leaches the pollutants into the river.

This Is Taking A Long Time

The lower Willamette River was declared a Superfund site in 2000. Ten years later and we’re still waiting for the clean up to start. About $75 million has been spent just studying the problem. Judy Smith with EPA says that’s because – even by Superfund standards – this is an unusually complex mess.

First, it’s a big site, more than 11-miles long from downtown Portland to Sauvie Island.

There’s also a lot of blame to go around. The EPA has identified more than 100 parties it says are responsible for the pollution and need to pay for the clean up.  Getting them to work together isn’t simple, but Smith says the level of cooperation in Portland is pretty good.

The clean up won’t be simple either. It helps to think of this as a collection of toxic hot spots, each requiring a different kind of clean up plan. What works in one spot may not work at another. Some toxins, such as PCBs, are widespread through the lower river. Other chemicals, like DDT, are in one or two isolated locations.

Smith says a clean up plan should be completed in the next year or two. That will be followed by a period of public comment and then EPA makes a final decision. So we’re still a few years away until the work begins. But early clean up is underway at a few locations.

There’s Lots Of Room For Improvement

This trip changed my mind about what we can do to improve wildlife habitat along the lower Willamette.

Beforehand, it seemed to me this was a hopeless cause, that there was little habitat left worth trying to save or restore.

That’s still true along the river near downtown. But as you go further downstream, I saw lots of riverbank that hadn’t been developed. In some spots there was only 50 or 100 feet between docks. Elsewhere there were long stretches of empty waterfront.

Some of the bigger empty areas could be restored as marshes and wetlands – safe havens for salmon, otters, beaver, herons and other wildlife. In the smaller sections, we could replant the riverbank with native trees and bushes. Even a strip ten feet wide along the river can help. Sand and gravel can be placed along the water’s edge, providing salmon friendly habitat. That’s already happening in some places.

At the federal level, a group of agencies and tribes will lead efforts to restore the lower Willamette once the clean up work is completed. Portland has its North River Reach plan, which would require companies that develop the riverfront, to also pay for habitat restoration. But businesses are fighting it in court.

It’s naive to think that the lower Willamette River can return to the way it was 100-years ago. No one expects that. But I’m now convinced there are plenty of opportunities for improvement, and that this working section of the river can support both industry and more wildlife.

For More Information:

EPA Portland Harbor Superfund

Portland Harbor Community Advisory Group

Portland Harbor Natural Resource Damage Assessment

But Tuesday’s announcement by the Environmental Protection Agency opens a whole new front. The agency says it will study BPA’s impact on the environment.

BPA is used in many consumer and industrial products. People are most likely to come into contact with it by drinking liquids or eating food from containers that are lined with BPA. That type of BPA is regulated, at the federal level, by the Food and Drug Administration. In January, the FDA said new testing raised questions that even low levels of exposure might effect the brain, behavior, and prostate gland of fetuses, infants and children.

Now the EPA tells us there’s a lot more BPA out there. Only 5% of BPA is used in food and drink packaging. Most of it is used in the manufacture of plastics and resins. EPA says more than a million pounds are released into the environment every year.

The agency says it will take the following steps to study bisphenol-A’s environmental impacts.

• Adding BPA to the chemical concern list on the basis of potential environmental effects.
• Requiring information on concentrations of BPA in surface water, ground water, and drinking water to determine if the chemical may be present at levels of potential concern.
• Requiring manufacturers to provide test data to assist the agency in evaluating its possible impacts, including long-term effects on growth, reproduction, and development in aquatic organisms and wildlife.
• Using EPA’s Design for the Environment program to look for ways to reduce unnecessary exposures, including assessing substitutes, while additional studies continue.
• And, continuing to evaluate the potential disproportionate impact on children and other sub-populations through exposure from non-food packaging uses.

BPA was a hot issue in the special session of the Oregon Legislature. The state’s environmental community wanted lawmakers to approve a ban on many types of BPA lined containers. But the bill died after a tied vote in the Senate.

Related Information:

• EPA: Bisphenol A (BPA) Action Plan Summary
• Natural Oregon: Bill Will Protect Oregon Children From Exposure To BPA
• Oregon Environmental Council: Working for an end to BPA exposure

According to the NW Examiner, DEQ told residents almost a year ago that air pollution from the foundry was “only a sliver of the area’s air pollution.” But now DEQ is saying that it’s much higher, and for people who live close to ESCO, 95% of the toxins they breathe come from the foundry.

Another surprising fact from the paper, emissions of lead from ESCO increased 32-fold from 2001 to 2007.

For more information see the NW Examiner website and look for the March edition. The story is on the front page and was written by Paul Koberstein of Cascadia Times. And a big thanks to Mary Peveto, who runs the PDXAIR blog. I came across this story because she was tweeting about it.

At a cost of about $40 million a year, the bill creates a team at the EPA office in Portland that will work with states, tribes, local governments and other federal agencies across the Columbia River Basin.

It gets a hearing before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Wednesday morning – about 6:30am our time. Merkley is a member of the committee.

In the past year, I’ve written a number of stories about the growing awareness of pollution in the basin and its possible impacts on wildlife and human health. About a year ago, the Environmental Protection Agency released a report saying the levels of four major pollutants in the Columbia River Basin are so high, they remain a threat to the health of the people, fish and wildlife. On that list you’ll find Mercury, DDT, PCBs and PBDE flame retardants.

Some of these pollutants, such as DDT, were banned years ago. In the case of PBDE flame retardants, Oregon and Washington approved new bans that kicked in on the first of the year. All of these chemicals take years to break down in the environment and can remain a threat for decades.

In April, NOAA issued a similar report on pesticides containing carbaryl, carbofuran, and methomyl. They’re on a wide variety of crops such as fruits, vegetables, nuts and grains. NOAA says exposure to these chemicals can kill salmon, or damage their central nervous systems.

The Merkley/Blumenauer press release takes things a step further.

“The Columbia River is contaminated with dangerous pollutants, such as PCBs and other chemicals, that are detrimental to fish and wildlife, including thirteen species of salmon and steelhead listed under the Endangered Species Act. Other pesticides and pollutants, such as pharmaceutical and personal care products, have been found in the river.  According to EPA and tribal surveys, contaminated fish are consumed in large quantities, threatening the people who depend on them.”

One goal of the legislation is to build upon the work that’s been done by the Lower Columbia River Partnership. This group has restored 2,600 acres of habitat along the Columbia River and opened up an additional 42 miles of habitat along streams.

But Merkley and Blumenauer say what’s needed now a bigger and more comprehensive approach with a lot more money behind it. The EPA’s role will be to coordinate regional efforts to reduce pollution in the Columbia and fund a variety of projects.

Lehman reports on his Capitol Currents blog that the latest revival of a BPA ban died today in House Rules Committee. He says the committee chair didn’t bother bringing up HB 3703 for a vote today, so the bill missed a deadline to get out of committee.

The first attempt to protect Oregon’s children from bisphenol A made it as far as a vote on the Senate floor last week. But the tally came in at 15-15, and in the legislature, a tie counts as a defeat.

This is the latest version of the bisphenol A ban, the one the Senate voted down earlier this week. But rather than accepting defeat, supporters found a new home for it before the Rules Committee. It’s been sitting on the agenda for three days now. It’s scheduled for a work session today at 3pm in Hearing Room C, which means they could be taking a vote.

But before that, the Senate Finance and Revenue Committee takes another look at a bill designed to update Oregon’s Business Energy Tax Credits. At 1pm in Hearing Room A, the committee considers HB 3680, the BETC rewrite. The bill slowly phases out tax credits for large wind farms, and puts a cap on how much credits can be handed out for all renewable energy projects.

While BETC has been given credit for creating a renewable energy boom in Oregon, as well as hundreds of new jobs, the costs have spiraled out of control over the past couple of years.

The Senate Finance and Revenue Committee begins what could be two days of hearings on HB 3680, an update of Oregon’s famed Business Energy Tax Credit. BETC provides tax breaks for companies developing renewable energy project. But the costs of the program have grown faster than anyone anticipated. This new bill caps overall BETC spending, phases out credits for large wind farms, and closes some loopholes. This hearing begins at 1pm in Hearing Room A.

The Rules Committee has scheduled a hearing Wednesday afternoon on HB 3703, which among other things, contains language banning BPA.

The BPA issue appeared dead for the season Tuesday morning when the Senate voted down SB 1032.

But some things have a way of finding a new life when the legislature is in session. As Lehman notes, the Rules Committee plays by different rules than other committees. It can consider new legislation even after the deadline has passed for most other committees.

HB 3703 is the BPA ban with a new spin. It doesn’t outright prohibit BPA lined containers. But it does outlaw using them if the food or drinks inside the containers are meant for young children.

In other words, a can with soda inside might be okay. But a container for children’s formula probably isn’t.

The House Rules Committee hearings begins at 3:30pm in Hearing Room F

The vote on SB 1032 was 15-15.

The bill was one of the top goals of the special session for the environmental movement in Oregon. We are waiting for a statement from the Oregon Environmental Council, which worked hard in favor of the bill.

The three Democrats who voted “no” are Besty Johnson of Scapoose, Martha Schrader of Canby and Joanne Verger of North Bend.

SB 1032 would have banned the manufacture and sale of plastic baby bottles and cups if they contained BPA. It had been weakened considerably from the original version, which also called for banning BPA lined glass and metal containers, and the sale of food or drinks that were stored in containers made with BPA. All these restrictions were aimed at protecting children under the age of three.

BPA has been used to line the interior of hard plastic bottles and cans that store food and drinks since the 1960s. Concerns about the health impacts of BPA took on new importance in early January. The FDA issued a statement saying that because of new research, it has “some concern” about the potential effects of BPA on the brain, behavior, and prostate gland in fetuses, infants, and young children – even at current low levels.

But just before the Senate opens for business, OPB’s Think Out Loud program features a discussion about BPA, the new concerns about its health impacts on young children, and if regulating the chemical should be up to the states, or to the federal government. The program begins at 9am and features speakers from the Oregon Environment Council, Northwest Grocery Association, the Safer Chemicals Healthy Families Coalition, and Eden Foods.

This afternoon, the Senate Environment and Natural Resources Committee holds its first hearing on HB 3613. The bill calls for a ten-year ban on offshore oil and natural gas drilling in Oregon’s territorial waters along the coast. The bill picked up nearly unanimous votes in the House, so we’ll see if it fares as well in the Senate.

The hearing starts at 1:15pm in Hearing Room B.