EDF Health

For children’s food, heavy metals require more attention and better standards

By Tom Neltner, Senior Director, Safer Chemicals Initiative / Published: June 12, 2018

Tom Neltner is Chemicals Policy Director and Michelle Harvey and Maricel Maffini are consultants

In June 2017, EDF released Lead in Food: A Hidden Health Threat. The report examined a decade’s worth of data from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and found lead detected in 20% of baby food samples compared to 14% for other foods. Eight types of baby foods, including fruit juices, root vegetables, and teething biscuits, had detectable lead in more than 40% of the samples. We closed the report with the following recommendation:

In the meantime, parents should consult with their pediatrician to learn about how to reduce lead exposure. They should also check with their favorite brands and ask whether the company regularly tests their products for lead, and ensures that, especially for baby food, there is less than 1 ppb of lead in the food and juices they sell.

As described below, we have reason to believe it will take more focused effort on the part of both FDA and food companies to ensure consistently low levels of heavy metals – lead, arsenic, and cadmium in particular – in infant’s and toddler’s diets.

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Also posted in FDA, Food, Lead, Regulation / Tagged , , , , , | Read 1 Response

Pruitt EPA Illegally and Dramatically Undermines Authority to Limit Dangerous Chemicals under Reformed Chemical Safety Law

By / Published: June 1, 2018

EPA today revealed its severely flawed approach to reviewing the risks to health and the environment posed by the first 10 chemicals being evaluated under the newly reformed chemical safety law, the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA).  These chemicals were selected in 2016 because of their potential dangers to the health of American families, but the Pruitt EPA has chosen to ignore many sources of exposure to the chemicals and, in doing so, will severely underestimate their actual risks.

“EPA is both ignoring the law and endangering public health.  The approach it is taking – designed by an appointee who came straight from the chemical industry’s lobbying arm – ignores millions of pounds of toxic pollution,” said Dr. Richard Denison, EDF lead senior scientist.  “Pruitt’s EPA won’t examine the real extent of exposures to these chemicals – and that will put at risk the lives and health of Americans.”

An analysis by Environmental Defense Fund reveals that EPA will ignore more than 68 million pounds of seven of these 10 chemicals released to the nation’s air, water, and land every year.  Among the chemicals are known killers such as asbestos and other toxic chemicals such as trichloroethylene (TCE) that cause cancer and are linked to developmental and neurological disorders.

Download or view the above table at this link.   Read More »

Also posted in TSCA reform / Tagged , | Comments are closed

EPA sets interim limits on hypochlorite bleach to reduce degradation to perchlorate

By Tom Neltner, Senior Director, Safer Chemicals Initiative / Published: May 31, 2018

Tom Neltner, J.D., is Chemicals Policy Director and Maricel Maffini, Ph.D., Consultant

On May 1, 2018, Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Pesticide Programs (OPP) made an interim pesticide registration decision[1] for hypochlorite bleach used to disinfect drinking water. The office decided to require the “Precautionary Statements” section of the bleach’s pesticide label to include advisory best management practices to minimize the formation of chlorate and perchlorate. The new label will state:

“The following practices help to minimize degradant formation in drinking water disinfection:

  • It is recommended to minimize storage time.
  • It is recommended that the pH solution be in the range of 11-13.
  • It is recommended to minimize sunlight exposure by storing in opaque containers and / or in a covered area. Solutions should be stored at lower temperatures. Every 5º C reduction in storage temperature will reduce degradant formation by a factor of two.
  • Dilution significantly reduces degradant formation. For products with higher concentrations, it is recommended to dilute hypochlorite solutions with cool, softened water upon delivery, if practical for the application.”

EDF submitted comments in November 2017 supporting OPP’s proposed label changes and requesting specific changes to the language including making the advice to users mandatory. We also asked the agency to extend the changes to hypochlorite bleach used to treat produce and to disinfect food handling equipment.

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Also posted in Drinking water, FDA, Food, Health science, Perchlorate, Public health / Tagged , , , | Comments are closed

Sensors and electronic health records reveal block-by-block traffic air pollution health disparities among the elderly in Oakland

By EDF Blogs / Published: May 30, 2018

Dr. Ananya Roy is a Health Scientist

Many public heath efforts, thankfully, focus on the youngest among us. We fight for a clean environment and healthy future for our kids. However, it is easy to forget that pollution affects us in every stage of life and its insidious health effects accumulate over time and can result in disease and disability.

Older people already have higher rates of disease and are highly vulnerable to air pollution, because they have been breathing for 70, 80, or 90 years. The effects of air pollution among the elderly provide insights that help us solve problems that can benefit the whole population.

Senior citizens have become the largest and fastest-growing segment of the population. By 2030 one in five Americans will be 65 and older, a demographic shift that influences everything from consumer behavior to health-care costs. Further, grandparents play a critical role in the success of families and the next generation – both emotionally and physically. It is estimated that for approximately 4.9 million families with children, the grandparent is the main breadwinner.

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Also posted in Air pollution, Emerging science, Emerging testing methods, Environment, Health science / Tagged , | Comments are closed

EPA seriously underestimates its costs under TSCA and lowballs industry fees as a result

By / Published: May 25, 2018

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist.  Stephanie Schwarz, J.D., is a Legal Fellow.

Yesterday EDF filed extensive comments on the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) proposal for the last of the so-called “framework rules” called for under the 2016 amendments to the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA).  This rule, once finalized, will establish the “user fees” Congress authorized EPA to collect from chemical manufacturers and processors to help defray EPA’s costs for implementing TSCA.

The 2016 Lautenberg Act amendments to TSCA greatly expanded both EPA authorities and responsibilities under TSCA.  These extended to chemical testing; conducting risk reviews of new chemicals and prioritizing and conducting risk evaluations of existing chemicals; managing potential or identified risks of both new and existing chemicals; collecting, reviewing and providing access to chemical information; and reviewing confidential business information (CBI) claims asserted by companies when submitting information to EPA.

To determine the level of user fees, EPA is first required to determine its full costs to exercise these authorities and carry out these responsibilities.  Fees are then to be set so as to recoup 25% of those costs or $25 million annually, whichever is lower.  Separate fees are to be collected to cover EPA’s costs to conduct risk evaluations of chemicals companies request, apart from risk evaluations EPA initiates.

So it is vital that EPA fully and as accurately as possible account for its costs, and that it set fees that meet the intent and letter of the law.

Unfortunately, EPA’s proposed rule falls far short of the mark.  EPA has severely underestimated its baseline program costs, both by omitting costs for some relevant activities altogether and by understating the extent or actual cost of other activities.  In some cases EPA set fees at a low level based only on industry’s request that it do so or by invoking factors that are not consistent with the law.  In the proposal and supporting documents, EPA has provided scant detail or conflicting information on how it calculated many of its costs, making it difficult or impossible for stakeholders to know whether EPA’s estimates are at all accurate.

As a result of these flaws, EPA has set some fees at levels below those required by TSCA and the resulting funds will not be sufficient to recoup the costs TSCA authorized EPA to defray through user fees.

This post will highlight some of the many concerns and questions we discuss in detail in the comments we have submitted.   Read More »

Also posted in Industry influence, TSCA reform / Tagged , , | Comments are closed

Paper mills as a significant source of PFAS contamination, but who’s watching?

By Tom Neltner, Senior Director, Safer Chemicals Initiative / Published: May 21, 2018

Tom Neltner, J.D., Chemicals Policy Director, and Maricel Maffini, Ph.D., Independent Consultant

Update: See June 21, 2018 Q&A blog on PFAS at textile mills and environmental permits

Across the country, communities are grappling with how to manage contamination of drinking water by perfluorinated alkyl substances (PFASs), a class of chemicals widely used in consumer products, industrial processes, and firefighting foams. Concern over the chemicals grew with the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) 2016 release of a 70 parts per trillion (ppt) drinking water health advisory for PFOA and PFOS, two common and well-studied forms of PFASs.

One challenge to effectively evaluating the potential impacts of PFASs as well as cleaning up priority sites is that there is very little information on where these chemicals are being used. Through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to FDA, EDF obtained documents previously not made public that show that paper mills using PFASs may be a significant source of contamination to water and potentially to air and compost.

In the nearly 900 documents we received from FDA, we found environmental assessments in four Food Contact Substance Notifications (FCNs) submitted in 2009-2010 by two companies, Daikin America and Chemours.[1] FDA approved each notice, allowing the companies to sell their PFASs to make paper and paperboard repel oil and grease in food packaging such as pizza boxes, sandwich wrappers, and microwave popcorn bags. All four assessments based their estimates on what they called a “typical” paper mill that produces 825 tons of PFAS-coated paper per day and discharges 26 million gallons of water per day.[2]

  • Chemours FCN 885 estimated 95 pounds/day of its PFAS[3] in the wastewater discharge at 43,000 ppt.
  • Chemours FCN 1027 – a notification for the same PFAS – increased the amount in paper from 0.42% to 0.8% resulting in 183 pounds per day in the wastewater discharge at 83,000 ppt.
  • Daikin FCN 933 estimated 180 pounds/day of its PFAS[4] in the wastewater discharge at 83,000 ppt.
  • Daikin FCN 1044 estimated 225 pounds/day of a similar PFAS[5] in the wastewater discharge at 103,000 ppt.

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