U.S. and Canadian water pollution jumps 26 percent. (Environmental Intelligence).

The amount of industrial pollution dumped into U.S. and Canadian rivers, lakes, and streams rose 26 percent in the period from 1995 to 1999, according to a report released in May by the Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC). The report also noted that air emissions declined. In 1999, the United States accounted for 90 percent of the toxic pollutants released by the two countries.

The commission, a tri-governmental body established to address regional environmental issues, used national "pollutant release and transfer registers"--the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Toxics Release Inventory and Canada's National Pollutant Release Inventory--to analyze the two countries' toxics releases. Because Mexico's system is voluntary and not all entities report their emissions, it was not included in the compilation.

The number of national pollutant registers worldwide has grown rapidly in recent years, fueled by public demands for the right to know about the hazardous substances produced by local industries. Organizations from grassroots groups to the World Bank now encourage public dissemination of information as a means to empower citizens, particularly in poor communities. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, a trade-promoting body representing 30 industrial countries, directed its member countries to develop pollution registers in 1996. Eleven of these countries now have registers, and eight more are developing systems.

Although pollution registers are becoming more common, different methods of reporting make comparisons arduous and even inaccurate. The United States, for example, reports 643 chemicals to Canada's 245. However, one of the chemicals not included in the U.S. list, hydrogen sulfide, represents almost 70 percent of the Canadian releases in 1999. CEC member governments recently resolved to further standardize the collection and reporting of information. The U.S. 2000 Toxics Release Inventory, also released in May, showed that total releases of toxic chemicals had declined to 7.1 billion pounds, 8 percent less than in 1999. Hard-rock mining companies, manufacturing, and electric utilities were the top polluters in 2000, accounting for 95 percent of releases. Mining was by far the largest culprit, accounting for 47 percent of the toxic releases.