02:13 AM EDT on Thursday, May 25, 2006

Associated Press

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Environmentalists are trying to have the discharge of mercury into the Ohio River blocked as an eight-state agency takes a look at proposed standards.

The Ohio River Valley Water Sanitation Commission proposal focuses on loosening the recreational "body contact" standard for bacteria from sewage and animal waste in the river.

But Kentucky and West Virginia environmental gropus have found that a PPG Industries plant that produces chlorine in West Virginia would be allowed to keep discharging about 30 pounds of mercury into the water each year.

Companies that had "mixing zones" in the river have been allowed to keep using them for pollutants such as mercury for another 10 years under commission rules adopted three years ago.

The PPG plant has been seeking an approved mixing zone from West Virginia authorities, but so far have not won approval. A mixing zone is a designated area where a water quality standard wouldn't apply because of anticipated dilution of a pollutant.

Peter Tennant, deputy executive director of the Ohio River agency, said the 10-year grandfather provision established three years ago is intended to apply to mercury discharges regardless of whether a plant had obtained a designated mixing zone. But he acknowledged the language in the current rules does not reflect that.

Mercury builds up in fish and in the people and animals who eat them. It can cause damage to the human nervous system.

The commission's proposed standards were being discussed at a public hearing Thursday in Louisville.

"The rule revision proposed by (the commission) simply clarifies an ambiguity in the existing mixing-zone language," said Jeff Worden, PPG spokesman, who added that the company is working on a plan to meet the stricter standard by 2013.

But environmentalists with the West Virginia Rivers Coalition and the Kentucky Waterways Alliance contend that, with mercury, which can spread far beyond any designated mixing zone through the food chain, the commission should not grandfather any additional plants.

The Kentucky group also opposes the proposal because it "threatens the whole Ohio River," said Judy Petersen, its executive director.

In 2004, the West Virginia plant north of New Martinsville reported discharging 32 pounds of mercury into the water, which was the largest amount of mercury put into any waterway in the United States, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.