pineda Posted July 23, 2005 Share Posted July 23, 2005 story in the chron.com todayFrom the article:"House and Senate negotiators will consider the proposal over the next few days as they try to reach a compromise on an energy bill. President Bush has called on lawmakers to pass energy legislation before the end of next week.The plan announced Friday is designed to help communities whose water supplies have been fouled by methyl tertiary-butyl ether, or MTBE."What this proposal is all about is cleaning up the water supply," said Rep. Joe Barton, R-Ennis, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. But the measure would also shield the MTBE industry, concentrated in Houston, from an avalanche of lawsuits.Critics contend the provision is a bailout for polluters, with taxpayers footing much of the bill.The industry responded negatively to the plan floated Friday."Who are the MTBE producers, concentrated in Houston, and if they're "concentrated" here, does this necessarily mean that the Houston area water supply has the most concentration of MTBE? Any experts out there care to make a comment? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kjb434 Posted July 26, 2005 Share Posted July 26, 2005 The MTBE producers are the factories that produce the additive to be added to gasoline. It does not mean the Houston is the most polluted.MTBE pollutes water when it leaks from a old gasoline take at a gas station. The reason the companies that produce this stuff are being shielded is because the environmental lobby force the government to mandate the use of MTBE. It when mixed with gasoline produces a much cleaner burning mixture (less air pollution). The problem is the substance is harmful if it leaks into the groundwater supply. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pineda Posted July 26, 2005 Author Share Posted July 26, 2005 The reason the companies that produce this stuff are being shielded is because the environmental lobby force the government to mandate the use of MTBE.Please tell me that you are not defending the manufacturers of MTBE who according to this statement were "forced" to produce this harmful chemical by the "environmental lobby". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
YakuzaIce Posted July 26, 2005 Share Posted July 26, 2005 Please tell me that you are not defending the manufacturers of MTBE who according to this statement were "forced" to produce this harmful chemical by the "environmental lobby".<{POST_SNAPBACK}>It sounds like he is saying they are being defended because this makes gasoline burn cleaner, and is only harmful if it leaks into the groundwater. But I may be wrong. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pineda Posted July 26, 2005 Author Share Posted July 26, 2005 They would make sense, if and only if the producers of MTBE did not know that there was a potentially harmful situation that could develop if the MTBE produced to help cars run cleaner accidentally leaked from underground storage tanks and apparently could not be "cleaned" by ordinary filtration systems. The question I suppose that will remain is what did they know and when did they know it. That will determine fault, unless of course the big money lobbyists are able to persuade legislators otherwise. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kjb434 Posted July 26, 2005 Share Posted July 26, 2005 Couldn't you blame the gas stations for not maintaing their tanks?If the tanks didn't leak we wouldn't have any problems with the substance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kirzania Posted July 26, 2005 Share Posted July 26, 2005 Couldn't you blame the gas stations for not maintaing their tanks?If the tanks didn't leak we wouldn't have any problems with the substance. <{POST_SNAPBACK}>I suppose. But gas tanks are just as susceptible to corrosion as pipelines. In order to prevent any kind of leak, they'd have to replace the tanks every now and again. What gas station owner do you know who wants to pay for that?Just to give you some insight on how much it costs when pipes go bad: Leak States by Cause 2005 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pineda Posted July 26, 2005 Author Share Posted July 26, 2005 a little background on MTBE...and yet another story about MTBE...explanation of the Catch-22 situation...further analysis of MTBE potential costs... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HeightsGuy Posted July 26, 2005 Share Posted July 26, 2005 KJB, there was no government or EPA mandate to use MTBE. The mandate was for gasoline producers to add oxegenates to gasoline to reduce the amount of carbon monoxide. There are many ways to do this. MTBE was the cheapest.The question of who is at fault is easy, all they had to do is look at what this stuff does to the human body. Basically, when you ingest the stuff, your liver turns it into formaldehyde and tertiary butyl alcohol. It's not rocket science, a simple study would have uncovered that. The only questions remaining are the long-term effects of that cocktail in your bloodstream. I am not an alarmist here by the way saying this stuff is as bad as dioxon turned out to be, but this stuff is pretty nasty. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kjb434 Posted July 26, 2005 Share Posted July 26, 2005 Good articles Pineda.Humans would never had to ingest any of this if it was handled correctly. The pollution from this comes from tank leakage at gas stations. If these tanks wouldn't leak we would have this problem at all.This isn't much different than groundwater contamination from old sanitary sewer lines. It occurs in any major city that is over 50-years old and the substances that are getting into our water make MTBE look like child's play. Just picture anything you flush or put down the drain and it is slowly leaching to the groundwater. Luckily the metro area in about 30 years will be almost all on surface water instead of ground water.Really old cities like Boston, Milwaukee, and Chicago have combined systems for sanitary and storm sewers. And when they recieve heavy rains the sanitary mixes in with the stormwater and goes completely untreated. Work is on going to fix this in many cities. Houston luckily does not have this system. Houston is also fixing many sanitary sewer lines because of age and at the same time will prevent harmful chemical leakage.The only reason MTBE is in the news is because of the Erin Brockovich case and the resulting movie thereafter. Oil companies have other options and also the new vehicles today run efficient enough to make the gains from using MTBE useless. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kjb434 Posted July 29, 2005 Share Posted July 29, 2005 UPDATE!!!The energy bill is going into conference is the liability protection for MTBE producers has been removed. SO.....Lawyers, start your engines....Get....Ready.....Your frivolous lawsuits are free to go. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kirzania Posted July 29, 2005 Share Posted July 29, 2005 UPDATE!!!The energy bill is going into conference is the liability protection for MTBE producers has been removed. SO..... Lawyers, start your engines....Get....Ready.....Your frivolous lawsuits are free to go. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Excellent, I've been trying to find a way to finance my wedding. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kjb434 Posted July 29, 2005 Share Posted July 29, 2005 lol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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