ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD

August 9, 1990

TOWN OF CORTLAND,

Petitioner,

PCB 90—43

V.

)

(Variance)

ILLINOIS ENVIRONMENTAL

PROTECTION AGENCY,

Respondent.

DISSENTING OPINION (by J.D. Dumelle):

The Town of Cortland and the IEPA in their filings give both

inconsistent and incorrect statements.

Cortland states, “The Petitioner does not consider the

radiological quality of this community water supply to be a

significant short term health risk”. (Petition, P. 7). Yet

attached to the Petition are pages from the USEPA’s Office of

Drinking Water (January, 1989) titled “Status of the

Radionuclides Proposal” which state:

All radionuclides considered in this proposal

have been verified as belonging to Group A,

known human carcinogens. Therefore, the MCLG

(Maximum Contaminant Level Goals) for each

radionuclide will be proposed as zero.

A carcinogen is considered by most medical and scientific

experts to have no threshold. That means any amount can induce

cancer. Thus the presence of radium in Cortland’s water is a

short term health risk. Radium admittedly causes head and bone

cancer and may also cause leukemia.

What are the risks in drinking Cortland’s water? They are

quite high. Using the data placed into the Braidwood case, PCB

89—212, by Dr. William Hallenbeck, (and inexplicably not

referenced in IEPA’s Recommendation in the instant case) the risk

from drinking Cortland water at 8.1 pCi/l is l-in—8,850 over a

lifetime. This is far higher than the usual l—in—l,000,000 risk

used to regulate pesticide residues. It is 113 times higher!

The IEPA in its Recommendation discusses water softening

using salt (pp. 6—7). It points out that, if salt is used., the

sodium content of the drinking water will be increased and “may

create a significant risk to persons who are hypertensive or who

have heart problems...” Yet in its 20 years of existence the IEPA

has never proposed to the Pollution Control Board a limit on the

1 14—59

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sodium content of public drinking water supplies. If sodium is

in fact a health hazard why is not the public protected from it?

For these reasons, I dissent-

I, Dorothy M. Gunn, Clerk\.-o’f the Illinois Pollution Control

Board hereby certify that the above Dissenting Opinion was

submitted on the

______________

day of

_____________,

1990.

Dorothy M. 9~nn, Clerk

Illinois Pollution Control Board

:cob D. DumelLe

ard Member

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