Video #8: Fair Nature - Inequities of Preservation and NIMBYism
We as humans face many new environmental problems these days. An important issue in particular is where we are going to put our waste. Do we dump it in the ocean? Should we dump it where our ancestors did? It has to go somewhere. What about waste treatment plants or waste incinerators? They can contribute even more pollution to the earth. Incinerators burn acidic gases and toxins and release them into the air. Waste treatment plants have to filter all of the gunk and sludge out of our water which in turn go to the incinerators to be burned. Would you want these buildings or dumps to be near your neighborhood? Because of these issues, clean renewable energy is becoming a bigger part of today’s society. One of these alternative ways of creating energy is producing clean wind power with large wind turbines. But would you be ok with having one in your backyard? This leads us to the acronym NIMBYism, or “Not in my backyard.”
The issues of NIMYism raise a lot of questions as to where sites such as waste dumps and sources for alternative energy will go. The government has found it convenient to put them in locations of lower income as these citizens have less power to do anything about it. This is called environmental inequality, or inequities of preservation. In many cases people have protested and conducted research attempting to create awareness about the detrimental effects of having a dump or incinerator near their homes. Some effects include a dangerous increase of iron in the blood, birth defects, lung cancer (among other cancers), and high infant mortality rates. These are reasons enough to do something about the problem, but it has proved extremely difficult to get the government to do anything about these issues.
On the opposite end of the spectrum of NIMBYism, sometimes it is not only the poor who deal with detrimental effects of the choices the government makes. In 2007, the inhabitants of a neighborhood called Windsor Manor of Mars, Pennsylvania, had their property values jeopardized by a pornographic distribution company planning to build a 2,000 ft warehouse. The mothers and fathers of the neighborhood were outraged by the effects this warehouse would have not only on their children, but their homes’ property values.
The NIMBY principle, tries to be considerate of all people; however, this principle prevents the construction of waste facilities and other pollutant facilities on new, environmentally sound sites. In turn, this forces Hazardous Waste facilities to be built upon pre-existing, already contaminated sites that are usually located in lower income neighborhoods. Most hazardous waste sites are located on land that was previously used as a disposal site. The communities around these sites are typically economically depressed. This is a result of the past activity from the waste sites that caused many businesses in the area to close down. The economy has caused many constraints on the people in the United States. In particular, it may have forced these poorer people to stay in these areas where hazardous waste sites are located.
If we lived in an ideal environment, there would not be hazardous waste facilities. Unfortunately we do not live in an ideal world and our society has not come up with the technology to avoid placing these facilities in neighborhoods. We are all living on the land that we inherited from our ancestors. Over the years hazardous material has been buried repeatedly, and because we now hold the responsibility for the land that has been passed down, the waste is now our problem. Also, over the years our society has become more industrialized. We all drive motorized vehicles and hardly carpool, live in homes that were constructed from wood, use cleaning products that can harm the earth, and wear clothes made of materials processed in factories. We cannot escape our dependency on the facilities that not only provide our daily needs, but pollute our planet and neighboring communities as well. “All humans who play a part in producing hazardous wastes must share the burden of our society’s waste, not just the poor minorities” or underdeveloped countries (Barbalace).
There are several examples throughout history of poor communities taking the entire burden of the waste that we all produce. For instance, in Chester, Pennsylvania a company known as Russell, Rea & Zappala (and now Gomulka), has continued to build several toxic and hazardous waste treatment facilities in the community. This community is now the home of a total of four toxic and hazardous waste treatment plants. “These facilities include the nation's largest infectious medical waste treatment facility, the nation's fourth largest trash-to-steam incinerator, (a waste-water treatment plant which in turn, incinerates the hazardous resulting sludge), and currently under development, a processing incinerator to treat contaminated soil” (Environmental). “The toxic and hazardous waste facilities in Chester currently handle more than 67% of the county's total waste, and also harbor medical waste from five other states including Ohio, Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, New York, and New Jersey” (Environmental). In 1994, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) did a 6 month study on the citizens in Chester, Pennsylvania. “The results of their six month risk assessment study found that Chester has the highest percentage of low-weight births in the state, nearly double the rate for the entire county, and a mortality and lung cancer rate that is 60% higher than the rest of Delaware County” (Environmental). The children of Chester had the highest concentration of lead in their bloodstream when compared to the rest of the state as well as the highest infant mortality rate. Even though the EPA found results which supported the complaints of the Chester community, the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) continues to grant permits to RR&Z. The residents of Chester have to rely on each other by forming numerous grass-roots organizations and pulling together what little resources they have to stop the environmental injustice currently taking place.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, issues of NIMBY arise in areas of economic wealth as well. In such cases, people of higher incomes and even the wealthy have had to fight in order to preserve their “backyards.” An example of such a case occurred in Main on the island of Nantucket. An area inhabited mostly by wealthy homeowners with extravagant seasonal homes, the island has been forced to join together in opposition of the building of a wind farm. Large wind turbines would be placed 5 miles off the shore in order to generate power. This wind farm, deemed Cape Wind, would provide clean, renewable energy to 75% of the region (www.capewind.org).
There exists much concern that the motives behind the preventative actions of the public are due to fear of the rich homeowners sustaining a decrease in their property value once the aesthetics of the horizon are no longer pristine. This has lead to the belief that opposition to the project is purely shallow and materialistic. However, the Wampanoags, a Native American tribe dwelling on the island, have also joined the cause to stave off the building of the wind turbines. They make the claim that the view of the turbines will be a desecration to the sacred view of the ocean’s horizon and will therefore take away from the religious rituals which are deeply engrained in their ancient culture (www.capewind.org).
Fortunately, there is hope for the future. Current research is under way which will determine better methods of establishing the wind farms and turbines. The wind turbines of the future will float above the surface of the water and therefore will not require a location so close to the shore. They will be place deeper in the ocean where people will be unable to see them from the shore. In fact, these floating turbines will be even more efficient than those placed near the beach, as the wind in these areas of deep water is stronger and more constant, allowing for even more productive generation by this clean, renewable energy source (www.isa.org).
When reading about the topic of NIMYism and ecological inequalities in the class book, there was a brief description of the theories involved in the theme. There was not, however, very much information, making up less than 2 pages of text and no examples or definitions were provided. Because of this, we had a general knowledge of the subject of our video but very little to go off of, allowing us the freedom to depict our topic in any way we chose. In order to depict these vast inequalities surrounding hazardous waste facilities, we showed powerful images of children standing amidst a seemingly endless mound of trash. We also had pictures of the waste facilities themselves including the incinerator grossly emitting a stream of pollution into the air from its smokestack. The pictures of the wind turbines along the coast allow viewers to visualize what the wealthy are fighting against in Nantucket. We end with a beautiful scene of the shore at present- a pristine beach and place of Native American worship in the absence of the view of the turbines in the distance. We also chose a song by Marvin Gaye about the sorrows of our current environmental state.
References
www.capewind.org
This is the main website for the Cape Wind Project. It provides pretty much any information you would ever want to know about the issues surrounding this project including anything from projected pictures of the wind turbines to the underlying issues with the stakeholders.
Barbalace, Roberta C. "Environmental Justice and the NIMBY Principle." Environmental Chemistry. 2009. Web. 2 Dec. 2009.
Environmental Case Study: Toxic Waste in Chester Pennsylvania. 1997. Web. 2 Dec.
2009.
