Cement Industry Fighting Mercury Cleanup

Mercury is a potent neurotoxin. It's especially harmful to developing babies. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), mercury can harm a baby's growing brain and nervous system while in the mother's womb.

According to EPA toxic release inventory data, or TRI data, cement kilns are a large source of mercury pollution in the Rocky Mountain region. Unfortunately, as Clean Air Watch reports, the cement industry is fighting efforts to clean up mercury pollution from cement kilns.

The amount of mercury released by cement plants in the states of Colorado, South Dakota, Utah, and Wyoming is equivalent to the amount in approximately 193,505 household thermometers. The amount of mercury in one household thermometer is enough to contaminate all of the fish in a body of water with a surface area of 15 acres. The amount of mercury released by cement plnats in the Rocky Mountain region is enough to contaminate all the fish in a body of water with a surface area of 2,602,775 acres.

Plant	Location (county/state)	Mercury Releases (in pounds, based on 2004 EPA TRI data)	Size of Body of Water that Could be Contaminated
Holcim Portland plant	Florence County, CO	31	299,925 acres
CEMEX Lyons plant	Boulder County, CO	53	512,775
GCC Dacotah plant	Pennington County, SD	17	164,675
Mountain Cement plant	Albany County, WY	106	1,025,250
Holcim Devil’s Slide plant	Morgan, UT	93	899,775

Given that only 371 square miles of surface water exists in the state of Colorado, this amount of mercury could contaminate all the fish in Colorado tenfold.

The EPA is set to decide whether to clean up mercury from cement plants in the United states. The cement industry, including CEMEX, GCC Dacotah, and Mountain Cement should be taking responsibility for the poisons they release into communities, not fighting clean up efforts. Do these companies feel that our children's health should be sacrificed for their profits? We'll soon find out.