One in a million
Ed Soph and Adam Briggle never use the word “benzene” without the prefix “cancer causing.” The chance of getting cancer in Denton is no more than one in a million.
From the EPA, “if an individual were to continuously breathe the air containing benzene at an average of 1.3 x 10-4 to 4.5 x 10-4 mg/m3 over his or her lifetime, that person would theoretically have no more than a 1 in a million increased chance of developing cancer.”
The level of benzene from the airport Texas Commission on Enviromental Quality monitoring station (and there are plenty of gas wells out there) is near the 1.3 x 10-4 level. It is near the same level as a monitoring station in Dallas where there is no fracking.
Benzene is an occupational risk, not an environmental risk.
I believe Soph and Briggle know this because they never mention the concentration. If the concentration were in their favor, they would be screaming it from the rooftops. Their strategy in this issue is to “exaggerate” or twist facts to mislead the voters. They scream cancer!, cancer! cancer! when both the EPA and TCEQ say there is no danger.
Both the EPA and TCEQ are comprised of scientists. Soph is a musician, Briggle teaches ethics in the department of religion and philosophy at UNT. I choose to believe scientists.
Mike Drury,
Denton
