Intel's Bogus Permit

Following is a letter written by one of Intel's neighbors:

To All Concerned:

Intel's "Technical Revision" of its permit was approved January 14, 2010. A signed and dated copy of the final revision by NMED Air Quality Bureau is available at the following website:

http://www.nmenv.state.nm.us/aqb/permit/ApplicationsPermitswithPublicInterest.htm


We, who live closest to Intel and are subjected daily to the increased quantity and probable synergistic reaction of Intel's many new chemicals, are hard pressed to comprehend the rationale behind the current regulations which allow Intel to get what it wants with every request for a "technical" revision.

The toxic effects of these increased emissions have reached far beyond the pocket of entrapment which is downhill from the escarpment. Residents from a wider circle in all directions from Intel are complaining of the caustic manner in which these chemicals are affecting the tissue in our throats, noses, eyes, skin, and central nervous system, to mention only a few.



Both Intel and New Mexico regulatory agencies vow that everything that is regulated in the state is being regulated according to the state statutes and according to accepted protocol for modeling and calculating emission factors.



The more I listen to Intel’s PR rhetoric the more I wonder to what extent New Mexico regulatory agencies are holding Intel Rio Rancho to the laws of our state?



We are dealing with the largest microchip manufacturing plant in the U.S., if not in the world, yet it seems the Rio Rancho Site is using the boiler-plate statistics formulated at sea level, in a flat terrain, on the assumption that all tools and processes have to be run in the same manner, with the same equipment, in all of their plants for production to be successful.



My house is about a quarter mile from Intel’s emission stacks, the way the crow flies and was built in1973 when everything west of the Main Canal was vacant mesa land in the sand hills. Intel arrived in the 1980s, was issued a Major Source Pollution Permit and began polluting with the beginning of, what was then considered to be small production.



I have been involved with Corrales Residents for Clean Air and Water (CRCAW) in making every effort to get Intel to clean up their emissions because the chemicals in use then were affecting our respiratory systems and skin.



I have also attended all the public meetings Intel held to let the residents know what they were doing during the years we were complaining. I continue to attend all the Community Environmental Working Group meetings sponsored by Intel and designed by them to convince the public that Intel is a good neighbor concerned with environmental issues.



Intel’s Community Environmental Working Group (CEWG) which meets the 3rd Wednesday of the month at the Corrales Senior Center from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m. is currently trying to work out a way to test for Silica because residents have believed for years that harmful particulate matter comes from Intel. Intel, of course, has denied the possibility of crystalline silica.



There have been too many human deaths in our area due to pulmonary fibrosis to dismiss Intel’s claims of not emitting crystalline silica. My dog’s post mortem suggests the possibility of that and also substantiates the presence of 3 of Intel’s toxic chemicals in her lung tissue.



Perhaps the approach to verify the validity of Intel’s calculated emission factors, their modeling results, and all the other “evidence” they present to the Air Quality Bureau of NMED needs to focus on whether or not these measurements are set at the Corporate level under entirely different circumstances than are present at the Intel Rio Rancho Site.



Measurements at the corporate level could look like apples while the measurements in New Mexico resemble oranges. How could any regulatory agency make sense out of that mix-up?



I am encouraged that U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has released its final version of the long, comprehensive study of Pulmonary Fibrosis. Please don’t leave any stone unturned to find the culprit that plagues us.



Respectfully,





Roberta H. King, Concerned Corrales Resident

Member of Corrales Residents for Clean Air and Water

P.O. Box 503

Corrales, NM 87048

Letter to State EPA Official Jay Stimmel

Dear Mr. Stimmel,

Thank you for letting me know about the forthcoming meeting on January 7, 2010 to discuss Intel's latest request for revisions in its emission factors for VOCs and HAPs.

Until the State of New Mexico recognizes the need to completely revise Intel's Minor Source Permit, changing it to a more truthful Major Source permit, these periodical changes (always rubber stamped) are the equivalent of switching around deck chairs on a sinking Titanic.

The pollution from Intel, especially of late, has been noticeable and noxious, both here at my home, two miles from the plant, and whenever I venture forth into Rio Rancho. I don't bother to make reports to NMED or Intel because you don't pay any attention to them. The stench appears to be solvents. These are not simply "odors;" these are olfactory alarm bells that together with headaches, sinus problems, coughing, skin rashes, etc., tell us that the air we're breathing is seriously polluted with extremely harmful contaminants, including known carcinogens, that Intel continually releases on our unsuspecting population, often without abatement from its faulty pollution abatement equipment.

It is my fervent hope that our new administration in Washington, as well as the EPA, and perhaps even the ineffectual lame duck Richardson administration's NMED, will recognize that the time for allowing large, politically powerful, wealthy, arrogant manufacturers to pollute at will and cause irreparable harm nearby living beings is over.

Sincerely,

Martha J. Egan
Village Representative, EPA Study Group, 2002-2004
Corrales, NM

Report from an Intel Whistleblower

The following is an email I received from a former Intel employee who actually 'walked the walk' that the hypocrites at Intel claim to do, but in fact punish severely any employee who tries to live up to their corporate credo of 'openness.'

"I met with Peter (Kowalski) and his (ATSDR) team when they were in Rio Rancho last year. If his group or anyone else believes what the Intel community spokespersons or Safety managers are saying I have some land for sale, LOL. What bothers me the most is the ABQ Journal and Rio Rancho Observer newspapers have NO interest in these stories. If you read my whistleblower story you'll be blown away by the obvious inconsistancies at Intel. The worst part is they are probably the safest semiconductor plants in the world and this issue isn't exclusive to New Mexico. I personally worked at 2 other wafer fabs that were much more dangerous.

Do you think it was a coincidence that 2 close friends (of opposite sexes) who both worked around the same machine at Intel Fab 9 (with experimental high power RF generators) both got brain tumors in the same area of their heads? One was an engineering manager insider who is retired and to this day denies the RF exposure affected him. On another toolset I busted a fellow tech for leaving RF shields off of a machine and defeating the safety interlocks which exposed pregnant workers to RF energy. His church elder was the fab manager, guess what happened? Nothing, they transferred him to Arizona. Intel Safety refused to even investigate the potential RF exposure.

When I was a Safety Team Leader and Control of Hazardous Energy certifier I busted fellow workers for violating lockout/tagout and received a Written Warning from my managers (for being a bad team player) which is when I knew it was time to leave the madness. Since I have a box full of Corporate and Site Achievement Awards it's obvious I wasn't a mediocre worker but I also wasn't a YES man and spoke my mind when it came to safety.

As I stated in my Corrales Comment article there is a place for Semiconductor fabs but NOT in the middle of communities! It's too bad local and federal government officials are either incompetent, on the take, or getting smoke blown up their backsides."

Report from Intel Neighbors

Following is an email sent to Intel's new point man on neighborly relations (sender name has been removed to protect privacy)

Thom,

I know you're new here...You probably haven't had time to review years of history from 1989 until now.
We are serious about what's happening to us.
Get ready for what's going to happen in this community in the future because there are people too sick to send in reports. We, and others are livid that rather than improving the situation, things have become worse with this new technology.There is continued damage to the health of residents on an almost "daily/nightly" basis plus damage already done to our health in the past.

Since I last reported, the skin on my eyelids is peeling. All around the eyes it is inflamed aburning since
the last exposure Neighbors are coughing, skin on hands burning and itching, heaviness of breathing noticed also sinuse and nausea problems and it's not the swine flu. At 8:52 p.m.today I stepped outside to turn off the water and started coughing until I got back into the house. This is in no way tolerable for us and it wouldn't be for you or anyone in your company.
Please understand that the new chemicals that are being used up there are causing illnesses as serious as we had in the 1990s. Vison is blurred, eyes are burning and skin is peeling off the eylids. One breath of the toxic air causes choking, coughing and in Patricia's case gasping for air. The toxins collect in her west side patio and in her house. With me it settles all around my property and comes in the house. This morning my eyes were swollen shut and inflamed I could hardly see. Each day my vision seems to be getting worse. Bunny lives at the top of Pueblo Los Cerros and gets blasted there (read the attached report).

The processes and chemicals your company is now using are drasticallly deteriorating air quality
downwind and downhill from your facility. There was was a period of time when we were happy not
to have had to report, so you can see the dramatic change that has occurred in this air shed in the last
several weeks.

We need help and we need it now. Who's going to be effective in bringing this about?
Although serious damage has already been done, we have a right to live here and not be more
injured. This level of toxicity in intolerable, action needs to be taken now and we will continue to
report to Intel and NMED until something is done.

Please call us with your solutions,
J.



Date: Fri, 16 Oct 2009 15:08:53 -0600

HI J, JUST WANTED TO TELL YOU, HOW SICK I FEEL TODAY. I HAVE BEEN NAUSEAS, HEADACHE, EYES, STOMACH AND TIRED TODAY SOMETHING AWFUL.
I SPOKE WITH PAT, WHO IS ALSO ILL TODAY.
PLEASE SEND A REPORT.TOM LITTLE NEVER RETURNED MY DETAILED MESSAGR.
THANK YOU,
B

Newsweek 's Green Awards

Newsweek's rankings ignore emission toxicity, but only consider contributions to greenhouse warming while ignoring all other VOCs and HAPs.

By Newsweek standards, it's okay to poison nearby residents as long as it doesn't contribute to global warming! But even on that basis, the article documented that Intel releases the most greenhouse gases of Newsweek's 25 "greenest" companies.

Pointing out these important facts may be the way to respond to the touting of another "green award" for a major polluter.

Newsweek's high ranking of Intel (one of their advertisers) is as phony and political as the Green Zia awards that the State of New Mexico gave to Intel.

Fred Marsh

Newsweek Awards Intel Environmental Kudos

In a recent Newsweek article, Intel was listed #4 among US companies for green contributions. Here's two letters sent to Newsweek in response:

Dear Editor:

Intel Corporation's behavior in the communities where it makes its chips is far from green. In New Mexico, Arizona and Oregon, community protest groups have formed in response to the toxic emissions the people in Intel neighborhoods are forced to breathe. In Corrales, New Mexico there have been three deaths from pulmonary fibrosis among individuals living close to the plant.

While it's commendable that Intel is producing a chip that uses less energy and thus contributes less to greenhouse warming, any "green" award should certainly take into account the toxicity of the emissions being vented into the environment and doing real harm to real people.

Barbara Rockwell
Author of "Boiling Frogs - Intel vs. the Village," IUniverse 2005

Dear Editor,

Living downwind from Intel's Rio Rancho, New Mexico plant, I find Newsweek's naming Intel a "green" corporation ludicrous. Compliant state and federal regulators allow Intel to "calculate" rather than measure its tons of hazardous and toxic air emissions. Intel's own consultant, TRC, reports that Intel releases carbon tetrachloride, nitric acid, fluor-phosgene and other carcinogens in quantities many times above safe levels.

Sincerely,

Martha J. Egan
Village of Corrales Representative
EPA Toxic Air Pollutants Task Force 2002-2004

New York Times Editorial

Editorial
Intel and Competition


Published: May 21, 2009

As American regulators slept through the past eight years, several authorities overseas decided that the Intel Corporation has been abusing its near monopoly position in the microchip market to squeeze out its smaller rival Advanced Micro Devices, constraining consumers’ choice.

It is now the United States’ turn. The Federal Trade Commission, which opened a formal investigation into Intel’s business a year ago, should decide without delay whether to pursue the company in court. The issue is not just whether Intel’s tactics against A.M.D. amount to illicit behavior. The larger question is whether Washington is willing to pursue monopolies vigorously for predatory practices and foster an environment where competition and innovation can thrive.

Since 2005, regulators in Japan and South Korea have ruled against Intel. This month the European Commission slapped the company with a $1.44 billion fine. It found that Intel has been giving hidden rebates to computer makers that bought all or virtually all of their chips from Intel and paying some to delay or hinder the introduction of products that had A.M.D. microprocessors.

Intel denies those accusations, arguing that the volume rebates it offers never carried the alleged quid pro quos. The company appealed the Korean fine and said it would appeal the European decision.

For much of the Bush administration, regulators declined to look formally into the charges against Intel. That reluctance was the product of an extremely narrow reading of antitrust law, validated by a conservative Supreme Court that has become increasingly hostile to antitrust enforcement.

In the Bush administration’s view, to get in trouble a monopolist must do worse than use unfair methods to undermine a competitor. Regulators must usually prove that consumers were directly hurt, typically through high prices. When the wrongdoing is to offer a client conditional rebates — meaning lower prices — that can be especially hard to prove.

That view of consumer harm is too restrictive. It often seems to ignore the fact that a dominant firm that uses unfair tactics to marginalize its rivals deprives consumers of choice, another form of harm. Without competitors there is no competition. Without competition there is no incentive for innovation, or to reduce prices.

The Obama administration has a different view. The Justice Department’s antitrust division has rescinded Bush administration guidelines intended to shield monopolies from antitrust accusations. The F.T.C. is also likely to be more active under its new chairman, Jon Leibowitz. He is already considering pursuing future antitrust cases with a little-used provision of antitrust law that directly outlaws unfair methods of competition. The American economy cannot thrive without antitrust laws. It is time to start enforcing them.