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GOVERNMENT CONCENTRATES Helium conservation
Promote jobs At press time President Nixon was meeting in San Clemente, Calif., with 16 leaders of the aerospace industry to promote jobs for unemployed scientists and engineers. Presidential science adviser Edward E. David, Jr., and Labor Secretary James D. Hodgson were also present at the meeting. The meeting is a followup to Dr. David's unemployment conference early last month (C&EN, March 8, page 9j. •
Lake Michigan The Lake Michigan Enforcement Conference in Chicago ended this month with Wisconsin, Indiana, and Michigan tentatively adopting the strict federal thermal pollution standards. Illinois did not. The standards would require fitting all existing and future power plants with costly cooling towers to lower the amount of waste heat dumped into the lake. David P. Currie of the Illinois delegation, however, says the real issue is to stop the proliferation of power plants on the lake. He contends there is insufficient evidence of ecological damage to warr rant ant spending large amounts of money for the cooling towers. •
Pollution controls All new contact sulfuric acid plants and nitric acid plants will be required to install the most advanced air pollution control systems that have been demonstrated, under a proposal by the Environmental Protection Agency. The two categories, along with fossil-fuel-fired steam power plants, cement plants, and incinerators, are the first of a total of about 30 categories for which federal air pollution performance standards are to be set within two years. •
Tax endorsement Taxes on sulfur oxides and on lead used in gasoline, both backed by the Nixon Administration, get the endorsement of majority and minority members of the Joint Economic Committee of Congress in the committee's annual reports. The committee also "strongly supports" a system of environmental user charges for industry and would require polluters to control pollution according to a fixed timetable with the best available technology. Committee recommendations include a permanent incomes-price board and an economic conversion program. •
The March 27 cancellation of the Helium Conservation Program has been halted by an injunction. The U.S. District Court of Kansas ordered the Government to continue purchases of helium from three of the four helium suppliers until further notice. The three are National Helium Co., Phillips Petroleum Co., and Cities Service Helex, Inc. The injunction doesn't apply to Northern Helex, which had filed suit against the government for breach of contract prior to cancellation of the program. •
Hazardous substances
A National Advisory Commission on Health Science and Society has been proposed in a joint resolution introduced by Sen. Walter F. Mondale (D.-Minn.) and cosponsored by 17 other Senators. The 15member commission would study the ethical, social, and legal implications of advances in biomedical science and technology in such areas as genetic engineering, psychopharmacology, and organ transplantation. •
A Transportation Department report sent to Congress by the White House calls for legislation to control hazardous polluting substances. The report asks for a national reporting system for discharges of such substances, with penalties up to $10,000 for failure to give notice of a spill. The report concludes that there should be no liability limitations imposed for the cost of removing spills. The report also recommends extending present hazardous materials regulatory programs to include these substances, m
Heavy metal contamination
Human Resources Board
Seven heavy metals occur in small amounts in many U.S. surface waters, the U.S. Geological Survey finds, but there is no widespread occurrence of the metals in amounts exceeding U.S. Public Health Service (PHS) drinking water standards. Of 720 samples taken, 4% contained cadmium in excess of the PHS standard and 2% contained arsenic in excess of the PHS standard. A few samples contained lead and mercury concentrations exceeding the standards. No excesses above mandatory limits for chromium (hexavalent), cobalt, and zinc were found. •
The National Research Council has set up a Human Resources Board to make a broad survey of national education and manpower problems and to select specific areas for in-depth study. The board expects to consider such questions as: How do American society and economy benefit from the increasingly more costly investment in higher education? Are the beneficiaries of education— the individual, the employer, and society—sharing fairly in education costs? •
Advisory commission
APRIL 5, 1971 C&EN
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