#295: As The Story Of PCBs Unfolds...

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RACHEL'S HAZARDOUS WASTE NEWS #295
---July 22, 1992---
News and resources for environmental justice.
------
Environmental Research Foundation
P.O. Box 5036, Annapolis, MD 21403
Fax (410) 263-8944; Internet: erf@igc.apc.org ========== RACHEL-4CM = DIOXIN FOCUSED DIRECTORY Remote Access Chemical Hazards Electronic Library. Dioxinnz.com
================== Original Source ==================

As the scientific reassessment of dioxin unfolds inside EPA [U.S. Environmental Protection Agency], one of the stickiest issues is how to deal with PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls). PCBs are a family of 209 separate chemicals, some of which have the same unpleasant characteristics as dioxins--they interfere in growth and reproduction, they damage the immune system, they cause cancer, and they cause these effects in fish, birds, mice, rats, mink, seals, sea lions, whales, humans and other forms of life. One key difference between PCBs and dioxins is that there are much larger quantities of PCBs in the environment, compared to dioxins. And many major industrial firms have a long track record of exposing their workers and their neighbors to PCBs. Therefore, the potential for PCB-related lawsuits and liability is large. And therefore the political visibility of PCBs inside EPA is also large.

There is now considerable evidence that humans WITHOUT OCCUPATIONAL EXPOSURES are being adversely affected by PCBs. Humans are exposed mainly through food, especially meat and most especially fish. Two groups of U.S. children have been studied from birth to age four, looking for effects from the PCBs we all carry in our bodies. In Michigan, 313 newborns have been studied; 242 of their mothers had eaten PCB-contaminated sportfish from Lake Michigan. Higher PCB levels in umbilical cords have been correlated with smaller birth size (including reduced head size, diminished girth in the chest) and shorter gestation, an effect also seen in children whose mothers had occupational exposure.[1] On standardized tests for infant development, higher PCB levels in the Michigan children were correlated with abnormally weak reflexes, less responsiveness to stimulation, more jerky, unbalanced movement, and more startles.

In North Carolina, 912 infants have been followed from birth. Their mothers had no unusual PCB exposures but, like all Americans, they carry PCBs in their body tissues. Among 866 North Carolina infants tested, higher PCBs in mother's milk was correlated with hypotonicity [loss of muscle tone] and more abnormally weak reflexes. Subsequent studies of 802 of the North Carolina children at ages 6 months and 12 months revealed those with higher levels of PCBs had poorer performance in tests requiring fine motor coordination. At seven months, a test of 123 of the Michigan children showed higher PCB levels were related to poorer visual memory. Researchers reviewing the history of these children conclude, "There is thus consistent evidence that prenatal exposure to levels of PCBs commonly encountered in the U.S. produce detectable effects on motor maturation and some evidence of impaired infant learning."[2] In North Carolina, about 5% of the children have so far shown measurable effects related to PCB exposure, and in Michigan somewhat more than 5% of the children are showing effects.

At age 4, children in the Michigan group with higher PCBs levels weighed 10% (4 pounds) less than children with lower PCB levels. The effect was particularly significant in girls. In addition, the Michigan children were ranked according to an "activity" index, and higher PCB levels were correlated with children who were unusually "quiet and inactive." These effects on growth and behavior were specifically correlated with exposure to PCBs before birth and not with exposure after birth. This leads researchers to conclude that PCBs attack the central nervous system more successfully during its earlier developmental stages.[3]

The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) has identified human populations with potentially high exposures as: individuals exposed in the workplace, breast-fed infants of mothers who consume more than 6 pounds (12 meals) of fish per year, and "people who live in the vicinity of incinerators and PCB disposal facilities."[4]

How did this situation develop? The Westinghouse story helps us understand how we got where we are today.

In 1957 Westinghouse began operating a large transformer factory in Bloomington, Indiana, processing large quantities of PCBs, which they purchased from Monsanto, the inventor of PCBs. PCBs don't conduct electricity, but they conduct heat well, and they are very stable (they don't break down readily) so they make a nearly ideal fluid for insulating electrical transformers and capacitors.

PCBs came to the attention of the scientific world in 1966 when a Swedish scientist revealed that damage to birds that he had attributed to DDT was actually being caused by PCBs.

In 1968, PCBs came to public attention when it was reported that 1300 Japanese people had become ill from eating PCB-contaminated rice oil. Many of the PCB-exposed women subsequently gave birth to children with birth defects. Workers at the Westinghouse plant in Bloomington say they were never told of any health hazards from PCBs. On the contrary, when they began to ask questions after the mass poisoning in Japan, they say, Westinghouse officials led them to believe PCBs were entirely safe. Jason Morrow, a former union local president at the plant, recalls employee meetings in which then-plant manager Donald M. Sauter "washed his hands and face in what he told workers was liquid PCBs to convince them not to worry." A Westinghouse spokesman, Christopher C. Newton, confirmed for BUSINESS WEEK magazine that Sauter "dipped his hands" into PCBs at a meeting.

Westinghouse and Monsanto insist that they have always told the world what they knew about PCB toxicity as soon as they knew it. However, in a letter dated September 15, 1947, E.C. Barnes of Westinghouse's medical department wrote that long-term exposure to PCBs "may produce bodily injury which may be disabling or could be fatal." According to workers now suing Westinghouse for injuries they say are PCB-related, this information was never passed along to the people Westinghouse exposed to PCBs day in and day out for 25 years.

In 1971, fearing lawsuits, Monsanto began requiring its customers like Westinghouse to sign a waiver relieving it of financial liability for improper uses of the chemical, thus putting buyers on notice of possible dangers. That same year a Westinghouse biochemist named Thomas O. Munson says he received instructions directly from then-chief executive officer Donald C. Burnham to study PCB contamination around four Westinghouse plants. In 1972 Munson submitted his report to Westinghouse officials, urging them to tell the local communities of the massive contamination he had found and to take remedial action. Instead Westinghouse kept the Munson report secret and continued to dump liquid PCBs directly into the local environments, Munson says.[5]

What does the future hold?

Between 1929 and today, Monsanto made, or licensed someone else to make, a total of 1.2 million tons of PCBs.[6] Of this total, 31% (370,000 tons) has so far escaped into the general environment. An estimated 4% of original production has been fed into incinerators, in hopes of destroying it. However, 780,000 tons of PCBs are still in use in transformers and capacitors, or have been sent to landfills where they are waiting patiently to escape. Thus the amount waiting to be released into the environment is approximately twice as large as the amount that has already been released.

Almost all PCBs released into the environment end up in the oceans eventually. Because PCBs are not water-soluble but are fat soluble, they have a marked tendency to accumulate in living organisms. Marine mammals at the top of the oceanic food chain are likely to have up to 10 million times more PCBs in their fat, compared to the concentration of PCBs in the water they live in.

Once they enter the oceans, PCBs build up in the bodies of fish and then in fish-eating birds and mam-mals. Fish-eating birds and mammals (seals, sea lions, some whales, and dolphins) have a distinct inability to metabolize PCBs--they lack certain enzyme systems that land-based mammals (such as humans) have that speed the breakdown of PCBs. As a consequence, ocean birds and mammals accumulate unusually high levels of PCBs in their bodies and pass the PCBs to their offspring via eggs (birds) and milk (mammals). Since PCBs released into the environment move into the oceans readily, in coming decades ocean birds and mammals seem likely to experience a continuing buildup of PCBs in their flesh. There is good evidence that PCBs in marine mammals and birds are already causing major reproductive failure.[7] Therefore, it seems likely that ocean mammals (whales, seals, sea lions, and dolphins) will experience increasing reproductive failure and will become extinct unless substantial efforts are made to prevent the release of PCBs that are still in use or are stored in landfills. (See RHWN #144.) At present, no such efforts are under way or even under discussion.

--Peter Montague, Ph.D.

===============
[1] Hugh A. Tilson and others, "Polychlorinated Biphenyls and the Developing Nervous System: Cross-Species Comparisons," NEUROTOXICOLOGY AND TERATOLOGY Vol. 12 (1990), pgs. 239-248.

[2] Tilson, cited above, pg. 245. Some of the human data are also reviewed on pgs. 53-54 of Syracuse Research Corporation, DRAFT TOXICOLOGICAL PROFILE FOR POLYCHLORINATED BIPHENYLS (Atlanta, GA: Division of Toxicology, Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, Public Health Service, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, October, 1991.) See also, Anthony B. Miller and others, ENVIRONMENTAL EPIDEMIOLOGY. VOL. 1. PUBLIC HEALTH AND HAZARDOUS WASTES (Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 1991). pgs. 204-205, [207,] 208-210; and see Joseph L. Jacobson and others, "Effects of in utero exposure to polychlorinated biphenyls and related contaminants on cognitive functioning in young children," JOURNAL OF PEDIATRICS Vol. 116 (January, 1990), pgs. 38-45.

[3] Joseph L. Jacobson and others, "Effects of Exposure to PCBs and Related Compounds on Growth and Activity in Children," NEUROTOXICOLOGY AND TERATOLOGY Vol. 12 (1990), pgs. [319-326.]319-326.

[4] Syracuse Research Corporation, cited above, pg. 140.

[5] Michael Schroeder, "Did Westinghouse Keep Mum on PCBs?" BUSINESS WEEK August 12, 1991, pgs. 68-70.

[6] Shinsuke Tanabe, "PCB Problems in the Future: Foresight from Current Knowledge," ENVIRONMENTAL POLLUTION Vol. 50 (1988), pgs. 5-28.

[7] See, for example, Robert L. DeLong and others, "Premature Births in California Sea Lions: Association With High Organochlorine Pollutant Residue Levels," SCIENCE Vol. 181 (Sept. 21, 1973), pgs. 1168-1170; and Peter J. H. Reijnders, "Reproductive failure in common seals feeding on fish from polluted coastal waters," NATURE Vol. 304 (Dec. 4, 1986), pgs. [456-457.]456-457.

Descriptor terms: pcbs; epa; lake michigan; nc; prenatal exposure; atsdr; westinghouse; donald suater; monsanto; munson report; ocean mammals; bioaccumulation; mi; health; studies;

#284: A Breakthrough in Control of Toxics, PCBs (dioxin)

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RACHEL'S HAZARDOUS WASTE NEWS #284
---May 6, 1992---
News and resources for environmental justice.
------
Environmental Research Foundation
P.O. Box 5036, Annapolis, MD 21403
Fax (410) 263-8944; Internet: erf@igc.apc.org ==========
RACHEL-4CM = DIOXIN FOCUSED DIRECTORY Remote Access Chemical Hazards Electronic Library. Dioxinnz.com =================================Original Source========================

An important breakthrough in control of toxics occurred during April. The International Joint Commission (IJC), a government body with responsibility for environmental quality of the Great Lakes, made far-reaching official recommendations which, for the first time, embody a truly modern approach to the identification and control of toxic chemicals. It appears to be a real first step toward a sustainable world. In a nutshell, the IJC now recommends[1] that the U.S. and Canada:

a) Ban incineration in certain areas near the Great Lakes; 

b) Phase out the use of chlorine in manufacturing; 

c) Adopt a "weight of the evidence" approach, not waiting for scientific certainty to be established but taking action to protect against toxics as soon as the "weight of the evidence" indicates the need for action. 

d) Define many chemicals as "persistent toxic substances" and then ELIMINATE them because recent history tells us persistent toxics cannot be safely managed.

Although the first two recommendations--ban incineration and phase out chlorine--are the most startling, it is really the last two recommendations that constitute a radical departure from the past.

In recommending a "weight of the evidence" approach and in recommending the elimination of all persistent toxic substances, the IJC has turned its back on risk assessment and numerical standards. Today risk assessment and numerical standards form the backbone of the U.S. regulatory system for controlling toxic substances. The IJC says the traditional regulatory system has failed and must be abandoned.

In their joint 1978 Water Quality Agreement, the U.S. and Canada defined a "toxic substance" as "a substance which can cause death, disease, behavioral abnormalities, cancer, genetic mutations, physiological or reproductive malfunctions or physical deformities in any organism or its offspring, or which can become poisonous after concentration in the food chain or in combination with other substances."

The IJC now recommends defining a class of chemicals called "persistent toxic substances," which should then be ELIMINATED because they cannot be managed safely.

The IJC recommends that a persistent toxic substance be defined as any toxic chemical that bioaccumulates, or any toxic chemical that has a half-life greater than eight weeks in any medium (water, air, sediment, soil, or living things). Substances with either of these characteristics should be ELIMINATED, the IJC says.

The "half life" of a substance is the time it takes for half of it to disappear. For example, DDT has a "half-life" of about 20 years in soil; if a pound of DDT is released into soil today, half of it will still exist 20 years from now. The IJC recommends that any toxic substance with a half-life greater than 8 weeks be considered too dangerous to be released and should be ELIMINATED.

A substance bioaccumulates if its concentration increases as it moves through the food chain. For example, DDT may be found at one ppm (part per million) in fish and at 10 ppm in fish-eating birds. Thus DDT bioaccumulates. The IJC says any toxic substance that bioaccumulates should be ELIMINATED.

What is the IJC?

The IJC was created in 1909 by the governments of Canada and the U.S. to oversee the Boundary Waters Treaty, which guides Great Lakes-related behavior of the two nations. Starting in 1912, and again in 1945 and 1964 the IJC was asked by the two governments to report on water quality of the lakes. The studies revealed progressive deterioration. In 1972 and again in 1978 the two nations signed Water Quality Agreements aimed specifically at improving water quality in the lakes. The goal of the 1978 Agreement was broad: "to restore and maintain the chemical, physical and biological integrity of the waters of the Great Lakes Basin Ecosystem." It is up to the IJC to manage and monitor efforts to achieve the goals of the 1978 Agreement. In 1981, the IJC began issuing a report every two years, describing the condition of the lakes in relation to the goals of the 1978 Agreement. The 6th biennial report from the IJC, released in April, 1992, contains these far-reaching recommendations.

U.S. EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) and its Canadian counterpart, Environment Canada, must respond to the IJC recommendations within six months. In the past, many IJC recommendations have been adopted by the governments of the U.S. and Canada because IJC recommendations are typically buttressed by many studies and much data. That is the case with the present recommendations.

Regarding the Great Lakes environment, the IJC report says, "The principal problem is the presence and impact of persistent toxic substances on all sectors of the ecosystem." The report says the old way of protecting ourselves against these toxic materials has failed: "...the Commission concludes that attempts to regulate persistent toxic substances have not resulted in an efficient or successful set of programs." The IJC report says, "Surely it is time to ask whether we really want to MANAGE persistent toxic substances after they have been produced, or whether we want to ELIMINATE and PREVENT their existence in the ecosystem in the first place."

The report goes on, "It is clear to us that persistent toxic substances have caused widespread injury to the environment and to human health. As a society we can no longer afford to tolerate their presence in our environment and in our bodies.... Hence, if a chemical or group of chemicals is persistent, toxic and bioaccumulative, we should immediately begin a process to eliminate it. Since it seems impossible to eliminate discharges of these chemicals through other means, a policy of banning or sunsetting their manufacture, distribution, storage, use and disposal appears to be the only alternative." The IJC defines "sunsetting" as "a comprehensive process to restrict, phase out, and eventually ban the manufacture, generation, use and disposal of a persistent toxic substance."

The IJC says, "Such a strategy should recognize that all persistent toxic substances are dangerous to the environment, deleterious to the human condition, and can no longer be tolerated in the ecosystem, whether or not unassailable scientific proof of acute or chronic damage is universally accepted.... Therefore the focus must be on preventing the generation of persistent toxic substances in the first place, rather than trying to control their use, release, and disposal after they are produced."

This is a very important point. The IJC is urging adoption of a "weight of the evidence" approach to controlling toxics, not waiting until absolute scientific proof is available because by then it may be too late. On this point the IJC says:

The Commission Recognizes That Scientific Data Are Open To Interpretation And That, Notwithstanding The Confirmed Cause-And-Effect Link In Some Cases, Unequivocal Conclusions May Be Difficult To Reach In Others, Especially If Individual Studies Are Considered In Isolation. With Low Contaminant Concentrations, Subtle Effects And Potentially Confounding Factors, Unequivocal Evidence Of Injury To Humans By Persistent Toxic Substances May Be Difficult Or Impossible To Obtain.

Critics Have Attempted To Find Flaws With Individual Studies In Order To Discredit Findings And Conclusions About Persistent Toxic Substances. While Limitations To Study Design May Exist, This Does Not Necessarily Invalidate The Findings And Conclusions When Considered In A Weight-Of-The-Evidence Context. At Some Point The Emerging Mass Of Data And Information Must Be Accepted As Sufficient To Prompt... Action Against Environmental Contaminants.

There is abundant evidence that wildlife in the Great Lakes are being harmed by persistent chemicals, the IJC says. But "Most troubling of all is the experts' conclusion that humans are being affected as well. Indeed, they estimate that levels of some of these chemicals measured in the human population are in the same range, and in some cases even greater, than those found in adversely affected wildlife populations."

The IJC report points to evidence that fish, birds, and mammals around the Great Lakes are suffering from thyroid dysfunction, decreased fertility, decreased hatching success, gross birth defects, metabolic abnormalities, behavioral abnormalities, demasculinization/feminization, defeminization/masculinization, and compromised immune systems. (See RHWN #146, #263, #264.)

The report attributes these diseases and abnormal conditions to persistent toxic substances like lead, mercury, DDT, PCBs, PAHs [polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons] and a broad spectrum of persistent chlorinated hydrocarbons such as hexachlorobenzene, pentachlorophenol, furans, and dioxins.

The 1978 Water Quality Agreement adopted "zero discharge" language as a philosophy, but now the IJC seems bent on turning it into a workable program. The Commission says "Zero discharge does not mean less than detectable. It also does not mean the use of controls based on best available technology, best management practices, or similar means of treatment that continue to allow the release of residual chemicals." Zero means zero, and ZERO DISCHARGE means ELIMINATION.

--Peter Montague, Ph.D.

===============

[1] The recommendation to ban incineration was included in the International Joint Commission's report, AIR QUALITY IN THE DETROIT-WINDSOR/PORT HURON-SARNIA REGION (Ottawa, Canada, and Washington, DC: International Joint Commission, February, [1992).] All other recommendations that we discuss appear in the IJC's SIXTH BIENNIAL REPORT ON GREAT LAKES WATER QUALITY (Ottawa, Canada, and Washington, DC: International Joint Commission, April, 1992). Both reports are available free from the IJC office at 1250 23rd St., NW, Suite 100, Washington, DC 20440. Telephone: (202) 736-9000. In Canada, phone (519) 256-7821.

Descriptor terms: ijc; great lakes; canada; persistant toxic substances; regulations; sunsetting; water quality agreement; bans; zero discharge; us; health; epa; environment canada;
 

#234: Push Comes To Shove. PCBs, (dioxin)

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RACHEL'S HAZARDOUS WASTE NEWS #234
---May 22, 1991---
News and resources for environmental justice.
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Environmental Research Foundation
P.O. Box 5036, Annapolis, MD 21403
Fax (410) 263-8944; Internet: erf@igc.apc.org ==========
RACHEL-4CM = DIOXIN FOCUSED DIRECTORY Remote Access Chemical Hazards Electronic Library. Dioxinnz.com =================================Original Source========================

Two researchers from Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), Curtis Travis and Sheri Hester, have just published a new study of chemical contamination of planet Earth and have confirmed what many people already knew: the entire surface is polluted. What separates Travis and Hester from other U.S. government researchers before them is their stated belief that all this pollution is taking its toll on human health: "We maintain that ambient [normal, everyday] levels of pollution have risen to the point where human health is being affected on a global scale." Furthermore, they conclude that planet-wide contamination seems certain to increase because U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) does not even try to prevent the spread of low levels of chemicals through air, water, and soil. EPA's regulatory programs have other goals.

EPA's regulatory programs are aimed at protecting the most-exposed individual near any given facility. Whether it's mercury released from a municipal solid waste incinerator or radioactivity released into water from a low-level radioactive waste dump, EPA's regulations say, "Our goal is to protect the individual who may be getting the biggest exposure." EPA therefore picks a spot where they believe the greatest exposure will occur, then EPA establishes the concentration (in parts per million) that they believe the individual can "safely" receive during a lifetime of exposure. They define "safe" as "an exposure that will kill no more than one in every million individuals so exposed." EPA then figures out, as best they can, how much dilution will occur from the point of release to the place where the most-exposed individual resides. Based on these goals (and assumptions about dilution), EPA then issues a permit for a particular polluter to release a certain amount of mercury (or radioactivity, or other toxin) into air or water continuously. Since the allowable release is set to protect the maximally-exposed individual, EPA assumes all is well, never considering the combined consequences of many "safe" releases.

One could raise doubts about many aspects of this approach to pollution control, but the ORNL researchers highlighted only one key problem: continuous releases of mercury (or radioactivity, or other toxin), although they may protect the most-exposed individual, do nevertheless allow toxic materials to enter the environment continuously. Toxics released from thousands, or perhaps millions, of different sources add up. Additional "adding up" occurs in the food chain. A low concentration of mercury in water turns into a slightly higher concentration in plants living in that water, an even higher concentration in animals eating those plants, and so on up the food chain. You may start off with a small dose in air or water, but large predators at the top of the food chain (big fish, big birds, wolves, humans, bears, etc.) get a large dose.

Once they are released into the environment, chemicals seek out the environmental medium (air, water, soil, or living things) in which they are most soluble. Trichloroethylene (TCE) and benzene are most soluble in air, so they tend to be found in air. DDT and PCBs are most soluble in the fatty tissues of living things, so they tend to move into the food chain and concentrate in living things.

Transport through the atmosphere is the main way chemicals spread around the globe; even fat-soluble chemicals initially move via the atmosphere, then they enter food chains and concentrate in animals (including humans). So most pollutants travel via the atmosphere, but food is the main source of pollutants for humans.

Travis and Hester focus on PCBs, dioxins, benzene, mercury, and lead, showing how "ambient" (normal, everyday background) levels of these contaminants are high enough to make people sick. They make the point--worth emphasizing--that they chose these chemicals only because data exist for these chemicals. For the vast majority of the 65,000 chemicals we dump into our air and water routinely via incinerators, landfills, and intentional releases from factory pipes and stacks, no data exist on how much is dumped, where it goes, or what effects it may be having. EPA has spent 20 years not gathering the necessary data.

PCBs. Although Congress banned PCBs in 1976 and EPA banned them in 1977, an estimated 900 tons of PCBs cycle through the U.S. atmosphere each year. Somewhere between 60% and 90% of the PCBs entering the Great Lakes come from the atmosphere, according to Travis and Hester. The average PCB concentration in breast milk in the U.S. is 89 micrograms per kilogram. They calculate that the background level of PCBs in the U.S. food supply creates a cancer risk of 110 per million (using EPA's method for calculating cancer risks). That is to say, among every group of one-million U.S. citizens [and there are 245 such groups in our population of 245 million people], 110 individuals can be expected to get cancer from normal, background PCB exposures.

Dioxins. Background dioxin levels in the American people are lower than PCB levels, but dioxins are more potent carcinogens than PCBs. The "background" cancer risk from dioxins, according to Travis and Hester using EPA's methods, is 210 per million.

Benzene. The background cancer risk from routine exposure to benzene in the U.S. is 100 per million (or one in 10,000).

Mercury. Travis and Hester do not calculate a cancer risk for mercury. However, they make the important point that mercury released by coal combustion, by the chlor-alkali industry (which produces chlorine and caustic soda), and by municipal waste incinerators has introduced mercury into enormous areas far distant from the places where the mercury was released. In remote lakes in Michigan, 15% of the fish contain mercury concentrations in excess of that state's health advisory of 0.5 parts per million (ppm). Approximately 30% of Wisconsin's lakes and 50% of Florida's lakes contain fish with mercury levels that exceed state health standards. Mercury seems to be becoming a global problem, not limited to areas near point-sources.

Lead. Travis and Hester report that lead is affecting between 3 and 4 million U.S. children adversely (chiefly impaired cognitive development--stunted mental growth) because of "our mismanagement and heavy use of this toxic material." An additional 400,000 fetuses in the U.S. are probably harmed by lead each year before they are born, Travis and Hester report.

Travis and Hester calculated the total background cancer risk from 11 chemicals, using data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (which samples the U.S. food supply for chemicals occasionally), using EPA's method for calculating cancer risks. They conclude that these 11 chemicals create a background cancer risk of 1000 in a million, or one in a thousand. And of course this does not consider consequences besides cancer. It omits consideration of respiratory problems, reproductive and developmental illnesses, nervous system disorders, damage to the immune system, the increasing occurrence of multiple chemical sensitivity (see RHWN #165, #220) and much more.

Travis and Hester's cancer analysis is based on a tiny part of the full picture. They say, "The true extent of human exposure to environmental pollution has never been quantified. For example, the [EPA's] human adipose [fatty] tissue survey has identified only a very small fraction of the chemical mass found in human adipose tissue." In other words, no data exist for the vast majority of chemical exposures that occur routinely. EPA has studiously avoided gathering the data.

As for solving this problem, don't look to EPA. Travis and Hester say, "The only way to diminish global cycling of contaminants is to decrease production of pollutants or to destroy pollutants before they are released into the environment.... At present, the most commonly used method to destroy pollutants is incineration. However, emissions from incinerator stacks tend to release pollutants directly into the atmosphere." EPA has placed all its eggs in the incineration basket and is aggressively trying to force all states to site incinerators (see RHWN #142)--a strategy guaranteed to make the problem of global contamination worse. As for the suggestion to "decrease production of pollutants," this would require governmental intrusion into the manufacturing place, compelling factory owners to avoid certain chemicals, or to use less of them. Travis and Hester argue this is the only way to prevent global contamination, with its attendant human health damage. Thus it seems to come down to this: the health of humans in general vs. the right of American manufacturers to call the shots inside their own factories. Push really has come to shove. Fireworks ahead.

Get: Curtis C. Travis and Sheri T. Hester, "Global Chemical Pollution," ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY Vol. 25, No. 5 (May, 1991), pgs. 814-819.

#225: Real Hope for the Great Lakes: Local Groups Form 'Zero Discharge Alliance' PCBs, (dioxin)

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RACHEL'S HAZARDOUS WASTE NEWS #225
---March 20, 1991---
News and resources for environmental justice.
------
Environmental Research Foundation
P.O. Box 5036, Annapolis, MD 21403
Fax (410) 263-8944; Internet: erf@igc.apc.org ==========
RACHEL-4CM = DIOXIN FOCUSED DIRECTORY Remote Access Chemical Hazards Electronic Library. Dioxinnz.com ========================Original Source========================

The environmental movement is taking a historic step forward as we speak. Dozens of local groups calling themselves the Zero Discharge Alliance have banded together around the Great Lakes pushing a platform that is simple, yet powerful, far-reaching, and seemingly achievable: they demand an end to the discharge of persistent and/or bioaccumulative toxic substances into the Lakes, starting with a ban on chlorine in the pulp and paper industry. The slogan "zero discharge" is thus transformed from a theoretical idea developed by scientists like Pat Costner, Ted Taylor and John Gofman (see RHWN #155) into a workable program that citizens can campaign to achieve. It seems like an idea ready to take form and substance in the real world: ban the discharge of persistent and/or bioaccumulative toxins. But what do these words mean?

Examples of persistent chemicals are heavy metals such as mercury, lead, arsenic and cadmium which never break down or degrade because they are, themselves, elements; they can never turn into anything else and their poisonous characteristics endure forever. Other examples of persistent chemicals would include DDT, which has a half-life of roughly 20 years in the environment. (A substance's "half-life" is the time it takes for half of that substance to disappear. After 10 half-lives, approximately one one-thousandth [actually 1/1024] of a substance remains, so scientists say, as a rule of thumb, that chemicals persist in the environment for 10 half-lives. Thus DDT, with a half-life of 20 years, takes 200 years (10 half-lives) to disappear after it has entered the environment. There are thousands of persistent toxic chemicals and they are dangerous because they remain available for such a long time to poison plants, animals and humans.

A bioaccumulative chemical is one that moves from the non-living environment (air, water, soil) into living things with an increase in concentration. For example, a chemical like DDT may appear in air or water at levels that seem harmless (a few parts per trillion) yet may end up in living things at concentrations that cause cancer or interfere with reproduction. See Figure 1, which shows how the concentration of DDT is magnified 10 million times between water and birds in Long Island Sound. Three parts per trillion (ppt) in water produces 25 parts per million, a toxic concentration, in fish-eating birds (ospreys).

[Omitted from this version: Figure 1. An example of bioaccumulation: The concentration of DDT in living organisms is magnified approximately 10 million times in a food chain of Long Island Sound. Dots represent DDT and arrows show small losses through respiration and excretion. From: G. Tyler Miller Jr., LIVING IN THE ENVIRONMENT Third Edition (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing Co., 1982), pg. 93.

Bioaccumulative toxins are dangerous because amounts that seem harmless are multiplied as they pass through the food chain; often the result is environmental destruction. The adverse consequences of bioaccumulative toxins may become understood only after it is too late. For example, human breast milk is now contaminated with hundreds of persistent, bioaccumulative toxins (see RHWN #193), but the effects of these poisons upon breast-fed infants is not known except in rare cases. Such dousing of infant children with persistent, bioaccumulative toxins is a massive experiment; the full results may become known in the future, but one thing is known beyond any doubt today: it cannot help the human species to expose it from birth onward to a constant bath of industrial toxins. (People who are tempted to think that the human species might be improved by random meddling with our genetic structure should remind themselves that a human is something like a TV set [though of course much more complex] and the hope of improving a human by randomly introducing poisons into its diet at an early age is like splashing hot solder into a TV set's electronic circuits hoping to improve the picture.)

It is important to note that many of the most toxic, persistent, and bioaccumulative chemicals are formed by the use of the element chlorine. DDT, PCBs, dioxins, CFCs, and many pesticides are chlorine compounds. Most people know of chlorine because it disinfects their drinking water, kills germs in the local swimming pool, or bleaches their clothes in the washing machine. Unfortunately, when it is used by industry, chlorine produces a broad spectrum of toxins that persist in the environment and bioaccumulate. In a very real sense, chlorine lies at the heart of the toxics problem, world-wide.

For two decades, government has tried to control toxic pollutants one at a time, by establishing the exact amount that could be safely released into the environment, issuing "permits" giving industry permission to discharge toxics into air and water, then trying to police the polluters to force compliance with the permitted limits. The entire effort was foolish from the start: there are over 40,000 chemicals in use today and 1000 to 2000 new ones enter commercial channels each year. Meanwhile during its 20-year effort, government has managed to establish "safe" limits for fewer than 100 chemicals. Meanwhile, government has gone ahead and issued permits that ignored most chemicals entirely (because there was no basis for saying how much was safe). Finally, government never showed any real interest (or ability) in enforcing these silly per-mits. A classic house of cards. This wrong-headed effort at pollution control (instead of pollution prevention) has led to massive damage to wildlife throughout the Great Lakes (see RHWN #146) and, worldwide, a dangerous accumulation of toxics in creatures that eat at the top of the food chain, like large birds, large fish, bears, and humans.

It is now crystal clear that the old way has been a complete failure, which, if it is continued, can only lead to the extinction of humans.

The alternative to chemical-by-chemical regulation is zero discharge, a sweeping ban on the release of persistent, bioaccumulative toxins.

How could such a sweeping ban become politically acceptable? That is the nut the Zero Discharge Alliance seems to have cracked.

The Alliance has a three-point Great Lakes program they say is the first step toward a total ban on discharges of persistent, bioaccumulative toxins.

Point 1: Ban the use of chlorine in the pulp and paper industry around the Great Lakes. 

Point 2: Because incinerators are the fastest-growing technology that spews persistent, bioaccumulative toxics into the environment, ban all new incinerators that affect the Great Lakes. 

Point 3: All new discharge permits that government issues to industry (for chemical-by-chemical control) must contain "sunset" provisions that establish fixed dates for the phase-out of toxic chemical discharges and for changing those industrial processes that contribute to persistent toxic pollution. No industry has a right to pollute.

The Alliance is working in the Great Lakes but these ideas will surely spread. (More on this later.)

For further information, contact: Zero Discharge Alliance (ZDA), P.O. Box 32246, Detroit, MI 48232, or ZDA, P.O. Box 7243, Windsor, Ontario N9C 3Z1.

#219: Dioxin--Part 4: New Study Links Dioxin to Human Cancer. (dioxin)

=======================Electronic Edition========================
RACHEL'S HAZARDOUS WASTE NEWS #219
---February 6, 1991---
News and resources for environmental justice.
------
Environmental Research Foundation
P.O. Box 5036, Annapolis, MD 21403
Fax (410) 263-8944; Internet: erf@igc.apc.org ==========
RACHEL-4CM = DIOXIN FOCUSED DIRECTORY Remote Access Chemical Hazards Electronic Library. Dioxinnz.com =======================ORIGINAL SOURCE========================

A new study published last month provides fresh evidence that dioxin [TCDD] causes cancer in humans. Dioxin is not a commercial product but is created as an unwanted byproduct of many industrial processes; significant quantities of dioxin are released from the smoke stacks (and the ash landfills) of incinerators that burn chlorine-containing items--such as medical wastes (RHWN #179), sewage sludge, and municipal solid wastes. Once it is released into the environment dioxin persists for a very long time, enters food chains, and accumulates; when humans eat dioxin contaminated food, such as milk or fish, the humans themselves accumulate dioxin in their blood and fatty tissues. [1]

Scientists have known since the mid-1960s that dioxin is an extremely powerful promoter of cancer in laboratory animals, but industry researchers have recently been claiming that humans somehow are exempt from the dioxin danger. The question of dioxin's hazard to humans took on real urgency in the early '80s when 15,000 veterans sued Dow chemical and other producers of Agent Orange (a dioxin-contaminated herbicide widely used to defoliate the jungle in Vietnam from 1962 to 1971); the vets sought money damages for health effects (cancer, defective offspring, and so forth) they said they were experiencing. Lawyers for the Vietnam vets offered documentary evidence that Dow chemists convened a private meeting of their competitors in 1965 to share new information that impurities [dioxins] in the herbicide 2,4,5-T (principal component of Agent Orange) caused severe liver damage in rabbits. According to court records, a chemist at Hercules Powder Company who attended the private Dow meeting in 1965, received a phone call from a Dow executive who "warned him to keep the findings away from the federal government," according to a reporter for Nature, the British science journal. [2] If this is true, it would not be the first time, nor the last, that money has influenced the outcomes, and the uses, of scientific studies.

In any case, as a result of these lawsuits, during the 1980s the question of dioxin's effects on humans became subject of bitter controversy--with enormous sums of money riding on the outcome of the debate. As the 1980s drew to a close and it became known that all incinerators create and release dioxin into the local environment, industry felt enormous pressure to "prove" that dioxin was harmless to humans. From 1980 onward, industry researchers published several studies of dioxin-exposed workers, claiming to show that they suffered no more cancer than the general public. Last year, however, evidence began to accumulate indicating that the industry-funded studies of dioxin dangers to humans were badly flawed or were simply fraudulent (see RHWN #171, #173, #175).

The latest study is not by industry researchers but by Dr. Marilyn Fingerhut of the federal National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH); Fingerhut looked at the health of 5172 workers at 12 chemical plants that manufacture (or formerly manufactured) products contaminated with dioxin such as the herbicides 2,4,5-T, Silvex, Ronnel, Erbon, and pentachlorophenol (which has also been used as a fungicide, algicide, and wood preservative for telephone poles and pilings), and the bacterial cleansing agent, hexachlorophene--until the 1970s, a leading bactericide in hospitals.

Of the 5172 exposed workers (all of whom were male), 1520 met two key conditions: they had been exposed for at least a year, and their exposure had begun at least 20 years previously. The onset of cancer is always delayed by 7 to 40 years (or more) between the time of initial exposure and the time disease appears; therefore, the "latency" period of at least 20 years is important in studying cancer that may be related to a particular chemical exposure. This group ("cohort," to use the language of medical researchers) had nine times (900%) the normal amount of soft tissue sarcoma--malignant cancer of the soft connective tissues. The same group also had 42% more cancers of the respiratory tract (trachea, bronchus and lung) than would be expected among males in the general public; by various means, Dr. Fingerhut examined and tried to eliminate the possibility that tobacco smoking explained the increase in respiratory cancers.

Among the entire cohort of 5172 men, the occurrence of all cancers was significantly increased, by 15%; in the high-exposure group of 1520 men, the "all cancers combined" increase was even more pronounced--46%; furthermore "all cancers combined" were increased among workers at nine of the 12 plants studied. Even when cancers of the respiratory tract were omitted in an attempt to eliminate smoking as a possible the cause, "all cancers combined" was increased among the 5172 and even more so among the high-exposure 1520.

Dr. Fingerhut says correctly that her results do not prove that dioxin causes cancer in exposed workers. The workers she studied were exposed to many other chemicals, in addition to dioxin, on the job, and these other chemicals could explain the cancer increases she observed.

Nevertheless, the Fingerhut study makes it ever more difficult for the purveyors of dioxin-creating machines (such as incinerators for solid waste, hazardous waste, or sewage sludge) to claim that their dioxin emissions are negligible or harmless. Because dioxin accumulates in the food chain, even small amounts can build up to significant levels as time passes.

An editorial in the NEW ENGLAND JOURNAL OF MEDICINE tried to shed light on the meaning of the Fingerhut study the day it appeared. [3] The well-known Canadian biostatistician, John Bailar, wrote, "This evidence is short of proof, as the authors explain, but it must be taken seriously as a flag of a probable human risk. If one accepts the best estimate of excess risk given here (3 deaths observed among the 1520 workers minus 0.3 expected deaths equals 2.7), the lifetime risk of death from TCDD-related soft-tissue sarcoma is already approaching 2 per 1000 workers, and it may increase with additional follow-up study. This estimate falls in a range that is widely considered unacceptable for occupational hazards, and it is far in excess of the usual limits for lifetime risk to the public of 1 per 100,000 or 1 per million. "Despite the problems, which Fingerhut et al. carefully note, this work is a model of its kind. Occupational cohort studies are inherently difficult and uncertain, and we are likely to wait a long time for appreciably better or broader evidence of the effects of TCDD [dioxin] on human health....

"The hypothesis that low exposures [to dioxin] are entirely safe is distinctly less tenable now than before," Dr. Bailar said.

--Peter Montague, Ph.D.

===============

[1] Bengt-g"ran Svensson and others, "exposure to Dioxins and Dibenzofurans Through the Consumption of Fish." NEW ENGLAND JOURNAL OF MEDICINE Vol. 324 (Jan. 3, 1991), pgs. 8-12.."

[2] Peter David, "Dioxin--When was the Danger Known?" NATURE Vol. 303 (May 12, 1983), pg. 104.

[3] John C. Bailar III, "How Dangerous is Dioxin?" NEW ENGLAND JOURNAL OF MEDICINE Vol. 324 (Jan. 24, 1991), pgs. 260-262.

And get: Marilyn A. Fingerhut and others, "Cancer Mortality in Workers Exposed to 2,3,7,8-Tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin," NEW ENGLAND JOURNAL OF MEDICINE Vol. 324 (Jan. 24, 1991), pgs. 212-218. Reprints free from Dr. Fingerhut at: Industrywide Studies Branch, Division of Surveillance, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, Centers for Disease Control, 4676 Columbia Parkway, Cincinnati, OH 45226.

A more complete report of this research is available under the title MORTALITY AMONG U.S. WORKERS EMPLOYED IN THE PRODUCTION OF CHEMICALS CONTAMINATED WITH 2,3,7,8-TETRACHLORODIBENZO-P-DIOXIN (TCDD). Springfield, VA: National Technical Information Service (NTIS), Dec., 1990. Available from NTIS, 5285 Port Royal Rd., Springfield, VA 22161; phone (703) 4874650); NTIS number PB91-125971. $15.00 + shipping.