2012-10-04 Windward Transcript PD yagong & blas

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pioneers in that effort and he is now deceased. Dr. Kilburn, now age 81, was an associate of Dr. Legator and is still working in the realm of community low-level exposure to hydrogen sulfide. He probably has more experience in that field than anyone else. So this has been going on a long time and you know, everybody agrees that high levels of hydrogen sulfide are a real problem, real health concern. The conflict is low levels, and it is not, they’re not, nobody is saying that there is no impact from low-level exposures. What they’ve been saying for all these years is we don't know, and now that has started to change. The EPA, I'll go through this a little more. That is starting to change now because it has finally been studied. One of the reasons is people like Dr. Kilburn have not been able to get funding. You know, the low level studies haven't really been able to get the kind of fundings that are necessary to establish that. The issue reaches, and the reason for that is the issue reaches beyond Hawai‘i and Puna Geothermal concerns. H2S is one of the most ubiquitous gasses in the industry, if I pronounced that right. And it is produced by major industrial process all over the world. If the toxicity of chronic exposure to low levels of hydrogen sulfide is established, then those industrial sources fear requirements to take remediation measures at great expense. The company line on this issue has been that H2S is well known to be highly toxic at high exposures, but it is not yet known whether long-term, low-level exposure to this gas causes any health effects. For H2S fearing industries, long-term delaying tactics offer the best possible potential profit results. The desire to keep the community line, company line afloat is economically and politically motivated as it stands between industry and costly remediation requirements. However, last year, after 10 years of being delayed by industry lobbyists, the federal EPA has “determined that hydrogen sulfide can reasonably be anticipated to cause serious or irreversible chronic human health effects at relatively low doses and thus is considered to have moderately high to high chronic toxicity.” Now that's, you can confirm that in the documents, there are links to all that document that I gave you, so you can see that for yourself. The finding was published in the Federal Register, 76 FR 64027. Funds from the government, institutional and industry sources have not been readily available to researchers likely to find H2S can cause serious or irreversible chronic health effects at relatively low doses. One such person not knowing, not kowtowing to company line propaganda is Dr. Kilburn. Keeping him out of the health studied in Puna would hardly be an appropriate, an approach devoid of a political agenda. It would, in fact, to the contrary, show the community the health study is going to be echo industry’s company line and not rock the boat on the so-called “unknown health impacts of long- term, low-level exposures.” Arranging for consensus is not the point of the health study. Obtaining the best measurements for toxic exposure is the point. So, you know, that’s what we want to do. We’re trying to, it’s not about consensus. It’s about getting the best study. You know, we need this thing to be real. And suddenly, if it’s not causing any problems, that should be what PGV wants, too, right? I mean we need to establish that. If there’s no problem, let’s prove it. And let’s do it right this time, because we’ve had a lot of shots at this, and we haven’t done it yet. So Dr., we believe Dr. Kilburn is the best qualified person from the community standpoint. He cannot be said to be biased based on the fact that his previous studies have found that H2S can be anticipated to cause serious or reversible chronic human health effects at relatively low doses - the same chronic human health, the same finding last year 8 EXHIBIT C