State a year tardy in water standards for rocket fuel

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California
NORTH COUNTY TIMES
State a year tardy in water standards for rocket fuel
By Don Thompson
January 29, 2004

SACRAMENTO -- Two state agencies are violating state law by delaying
adoption of what would be the nation's first drinking water standards
for perchlorate, a component of rocket fuel that is spreading through
the state's groundwater, legislators said Wednesday.

The Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment was required to
develop its public health goal a year ago, while the Department of
Health Services' deadline to set standards was Jan. 1.

"Additional delay is not an alternative" despite concerns by
manufacturers, the defense industry and the military, said state Sen.
Byron Sher, D-Stanford, at a legislative hearing. "It's time to get on
with the job."

Sher called perchlorate "the most widespread and serious public health
problem facing water utilities ... today," one that is rapidly becoming
a concern to agriculture as the tainted water contaminates crops.

Terry Tamminen, new secretary of the Environmental Protection Agency,
said a 2002 court order delayed the setting of an initial public health
goal by his agency until a second review by University of California
experts.

That review was completed Jan. 12, and the EPA's Environmental Health
Hazard Assessment Office now has 60 days to complete its work, Tamminen
said. Once that goal is set, Health Services can set drinking water
standards, he said.

This article can be viewed at:
http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2004/01/29/news/state/1_28_0420_32_21.txt

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