Elfstrom fireworks displays must end
Fireworks displays at Elfstrom Stadium must stop. Concerns over air quality, ground water quality and noise pollution make the case for cessation overwhelming.
First and most urgent, an immediate threat to human life is created by the PM2.5 particulate matter and other air pollution created by these displays.
Neighbors are exposed about 35 times a year, but even a spectator attending a single display is put at risk. In Texas this year stagnant conditions allowed smoke from fireworks to accumulate in the San Antonio, Houston, Brownsville and McAllen areas from the evening of Dec. 31 into the morning of Jan. 1.
The highest daily average PM2.5 measurement during the event was 67.6 micrograms per cubic meter (ug/m3) at the Old Highway 90 Continuous Air Monitoring Station (CAMS) 677 in San Antonio for Jan. 1. Palo Alto CAMS 676 in San Antonio also measured a daily average of 47.6 up/m3 on Jan. 1. Both of these measurements exceeded the new 24-hour PM2.5 standard of 35 ug/md, according to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.
A recent cardiovascular study appearing in the nation's premiere medical publication, the New England Journal of Medicine found: "the association between PM2.5 and mortality has no apparent threshold and is evident below current air-quality standards." These finds relate even to brief, single exposure events. Death from childhood asthma has also been reported from a single exposure to fireworks smoke, according to the National Center for Biotechnology Information.
Tens of thousands of Chinese-made fireworks have been recalled because of faulty manufacture this year alone (most fireworks come from China). But even if properly manufactured, fireworks explosions put dioxins, heavy metals and other harmful pollution into our air, according to the Cox Newspapers Washington Bureau.
Second, Kane's groundwater is put at risk. Fireworks release large quantities of perchlorate, heavy metals and dioxins into the air and ultimately in the groundwater. A community in Iowa was forced to drink bottled water due to perchlorate contaminating, according to the EPA. Kane relies on the Fox River and its shallow aquifers for its safe, low radium water (much of DuPage gets Lake Michigan water). Sea World in San Diego ceased fireworks as some feared pollution of the Pacific Ocean, according to a story last year in the San Diego Union-Tribune.
Permitting dozens of fireworks displays from one source yearly and then continuing them over decades can only be viewed as reckless. Then consider that this pollution source is adjacent to a landfill, which also is a long term threat to our water that must be monitored. Fireworks next door can only confound any valid landfill monitoring scheme.
Third, the fireworks violate Kane County's Noise Nuisance Ordinance. County officials invoke "balancing" of the enjoyment of the spectators with the nuisance for neighbors (and harm to pets and wildlife) when confronted with this violation. The noise ordinance contains no language that allows the "balancing" of violator's enjoyment with nuisance.
The county chairman must not sign another fireworks permit for Elfstrom Stadium. If she does, the Geneva fire chief must not sign off on the dangerous permit to make it valid. Continued displays put citizens at risk and expose those officials and the entire county to bottomless moral and legal liability. If we can sanely protect citizens from the smoke of burning leaves, surely we can protect them from the madness of potentially lethal fireworks pollution.
Dr. Rodney Nelson
Geneva