maintain that the accident is the first 3f its kind, but rumors persist that a 1957 nuclear accident caused injuries and deaths in the southern Ural Mountains.
onge: Dedicated rain forest preserve
In April, President Luis Albertn Mnnge of Costa Rica dedicated a 24,7Wacre reserve to protect an area of rain forest and preserve many plant and animal species. The reserve, known as La Selva Zona Protectora, links the mountainous Braulio Carillo Park with La Selva Research Station and provides a continuous area of forest from sea level up to an altitude of 10,OOO ft. The Zona Protectora is a passageway through which animals can migrate seasonally. Its research station is a primary site for training tropical biologists from around the world. The land purchase was funded in part hy a grant from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. A nuclear power plant in Chernnbyl, Ukraine, USSR, failed in late April. Chernobyl is about 130 km north of Kiev and 640 km southwest of Moscow. Radioactive material, including cesium, cobalt, and iodine, from the 1ooO-MW facility has been detected in the air over Finland, Sweden, and Denmark and in rain over Sweden at levels 10 to 100 times normal background. Scientists in the United States say that the Chernobyl nuclear reactors are not enclosed in thick concrete containment buildings as are reactors in the United States and most other countries. Thus, if a failure occurs, there is little to stop a plume of radioactive material from spreadiig over large areas. Soviet authorities say that “those in need are being given aid”; however, numerous injuries and at least six fatalities are reported to have occurred. Soviet spokesmen W13936Xf86109200535501.%IO
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) Ls considering impnsing tighter limits on occupational exposure to 1.3butadiene, which is used a5 a feedstock in the production of synthetic rubber, hoses. and automobile parts. OSHA officials acknowlcdged in an April ann~~uncement that scientific data about link bctween the cheniical and human cancer are inconclusive, but they 5a) that it causes cancer in animals. The agency estimates that 6ooo workers are expused to the chemical, of which 3.5 billion Ib ix p r o d u d a ~ u a l l y The . current limit on I,)-butadiene in air is IOOO ppm. EPA had planned to regulate the substance but has deferred tu OSHA. Et‘A has annnunced a final maximum contaminant level of 4 mg/L for fluoride in drinking water. This level is expected to protect consumers from skeletal damage cauxd by intake of excess fluoride. EPA also has established that the best ways to remove fluonde from drinking water are reaction with activated alumina and passige through a reverse-osmosis system. The ruling will atfwt about 280 water suppliers serving small communities. It docs not affect fluoridation of ~ a t e at r a level 01 1-2 mg/L, which is the aniount addcd to retard tnith deca). Rep. Henry Waxman (DCalif.) has introduced a bill reduee annual emissions of SO2 by ahout I O million t by 1997. In addition. the acid rain abatement measure ( H . U . 4567) would require that NO, emissions from puwer plants, factories. and automobiles be reduced b) 2-3 million t each year. lienacted into law. the bill wuuld cu5t between $4.3 billion and $5.6 hillion annually. The brunt of this uould he borne b) midwebtern utilities that burn highsulfur coal. Cosb in turn would likely be passed on to consumer, To lessen the economic blon, one provisiun uf the hill would pruvide federal
@ 1986 American Chemical Sociely
grants to keep electricity rates from increasing by more than 10%in any area. Officials of the congressional Office of Technology Assessment calculate that only in Indiana, Kcntucky, and West Virginia would utilities have to raise their rates by more than 10%.
EPA should lower the primary nzone standard from its current level of 0.12 ppm, based on a I-h averaging time, to at least 0.08 ppm, according to a paper prepared by the staff of the agency’s Office of Air and Radiation. The paper also recommends consideration of a reduction in the secondary standard, now also set at 0.12 ppm, to 0.04-0.06 ppm. Staff members believe that a tighter primary standard would help to protect persons prone to asthma, allergies, and congestive lung disease. The lower secondary standard would protect crops, trees, and other vegetation. Short-term exposure to ozone at levels at or near the current standard has been found to decrease lung function, especially if individuals exercise outdoors, according to studies comDleted late in 1985.
Evans: Vetoed weakened standards
Idaho Gnv. John Evans has vetoed a measure that would have liberalized water quality standards for nonpoint source pollution caused by silt released by the logging and forest products industries. The state’s logging industry supported the bill, which would have violated federal antidegradation rules. Pollution could have resulted from activities such as road building and felling and loading timber, which cause erosion that Environ. SEI. Technol., Vol. 20, NO.6 , 1986 5:
salmon fishinp, according to Winsor Watson IU and Carl Royce-Malm-
and kidney damage. The plant was closed after the explosion. residents' livers have been affected, although not necessarily damaged. he scmtists discerned no differgroup. They also declined to predict whether the subclinical immune condition of the exposed persons would disappr, remain static, or develop into some sort of illness. The scientists add that the findings offer reason for concern but not for panic and that testing of the exposed perwns is not n-wary.
TL___UOL
in domestic water pplies is a chief source of indoor radon pollution and a possible cause of lung cancer. The NBS standard is a radon generator consisting of a sealed SOurce of radium-226 in a
TaeVirginiaBuresu
residents of northern Virginia since the results of a survey of 46 homes the Washington metropolitan area showed that about half had radon contamination levels well above the level at which EF'A recommends
536 Environ
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6.1986
ers are PCB contaminated. The process involves four extractions of PCBs andcantakebetween7and15 months. Replacement of transformers, however, can be more expensive than conversion and does not relieve owners of liability in case of leaks of PCBs from old transformers.
Some electric ntility rates could rise more than 30% if H.R. 4567
Faster coagulation enhances clarijication
A chemical precipitation prmss can compensate for overloading in wastewater treatment plants. The clarification process rapidly precipitates fine particles, thereby increasing the removal of contanunants in the primary treatment step. This step is accomplished with a coagulant that forms a quickly settling floc. Other coagulants and particle size modifiers may be added, as necessary, to speed up removal of biological oxygen demand (BOD) and enhance solids separation efficiency. Spokesmen for Nalco Chemical (Naperville, Ill.), the developer of the process, say that a secondary wastewater treatment plant in the midwest was able to increase BOD removal efficiency by 60%. They add that removal efficiencies for suspended solids, turbidity, ammonia, and phosphate are improved by WHO%.
‘‘Wetfands are among the most productive eeosystenls in the world, but they are being destroyed because of ignorance and fear,” Edward Maltby of the University of Exeter O].K)told a press conference held by Eanhscan (Washington, D.C.) in April. Maltby says that some wetlands can produce “up to eight times as much plant matter as the average wheat field and yield large food harvests if they are prop erly managed.” Aquaculture is one example of the source of such high food yields. Because of their biochemical ecology, wetlands also can decontaminate municipal and industrial wastewater efficiently. Maltby says that wetlands are destroyed because of the need for land for farming and development and because wetlands are wrongly regarded
‘damp, dangerous, useless, and idden with disease.”
BO% decrease in productinn costs, says Raymond Young of the University of Wisconsin (Madison, Wis.). Young uses a mixture of water, acetic acid, and ethyl acetate to dissolve wood‘s lignin to produce the pulp wond. The chemicals can be movered through diiilling towers. Wood is usually processed to pulpwood by being cooked with highly polluting sulfites. Building a typical paper mill costs $500 million; pollution m m l systems cost between $2 million and $3 million more. Young estimates that fitting a paper mill with the ester-pulping process costs about $50 million with a 10-20-year payback. Biodyne Chemicals (Neenah, Wis.) is building a I0-15-t/d pilot plant in Nee& to test the ester-pulping process, which Young says is the first major change in paper a century.
Unison Bansformer Seniees panbury, Conn.) is converting 300 eteetric transfnrmers that contain polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) to non-PCB transformers. Company chairman Ted Lower says that Unison, a subsidiary of U formers is classifd &s non-PCB if it contains less than 50 ppm of PCBs. About 150,000 transfomrs in the United States still use PCBs in keeping with applicable regulations; oth-
becomes law, according to the E!dison Electric In&tute (Washington, D.C.). Executive Vice-President Thomas Kuhn said on April 21 !hat the 10% rate increase l i t in H.R. 4567, the Acid Deposition Control Act of 1986, is unworkable. He predicts that at least 30 utilities will experience rate increases of more than 10%.One reason is that passing on the cost of abating acid rain by switching fuel to low-sulfur coal is not held to the 10%limit in the bill. Much of the cost of instaumg and operating equipment such as Sq scrubbers is not limited and will be borne by consumers. Quoting an economic analysis, Kuhn predicted costs of $9.2 billion annually for the fmt five years the act would be in effect and cumnlative costs of $1 10 billion over the first 15 years. Those costs would be in addition to the $10 billion he says utilities are spending eacb year to control acid deposition.
Ftmigon: Addressing a large market
FinnigmCnrpnratinn (Sen Jose,
Calif.) has formed an environmental marketing gronp to address the environmental marketplace in the United States and abroad. Senior Vice-President Robert Finnigan explains that the group will act “as a bridge between Finnigan MAT,government regulatory agencies, and the private sector.’’ Finnigan MAT is a manufacturer of gas chromatography-~pectromevy(GCIMS) systems and equipment that does 40%of its business in environmental monitoring applications. Figan says his company supplies most of the GCIMS systems used by contract l a b t o r i e s for environmental analysis. Environ S a Techno!, Vol. 20, No. 6. 1886 537
