GOVERNMENT
Debate Over Phaseout of Chlorine, Chlorinated Organics Continues ditional evidence that at current levels found in the environment, some organochlorines have hormonal effects and may contribute to the increasing incidence of breast cancer. And the Chlorine Chemistry Council (CCC), an industry group organized to defend the use of chlorine and chlorinated organics, held a series of press conferences in the Midwest during October to publicize the Bette Hileman, C&EN Washington idea that phasing out the use of chlorine uring the past two months, the would cause enormous job losses. A few days before the IJC meeting, the debate over whether to phase out the use and production of U.S. and Canadian governments submitchlorine and chlorinated organics as a ted their responses to the IJCs recommenbroad class of chemicals has continued dations in its sixth Biennial Report. They supported most of the recommendations, on a number of fronts. This question was the major focus of but disagreed strongly with the proposal discussion at the recent biennial meet- that the two governments develop timetaing in Windsor, Ontario, of the Interna- bles to phase out the use of chlorine and tional Joint Commission (IJC)—a bina- chlorine-containing compounds as industional group that oversees implementa- trial feedstocks. Both governments said tion of the Great Lakes Water Quality they do not support "sunsetting" all uses Agreement. Just prior to the meeting, of chlorine and organochlorines. Both also the governments of the U.S. and Cana- said, however, that they favored banning, da presented their views on this issue, canceling, and suspending specific chloriand it was the topic most of the speak- nated compounds, especially persistent ers discussed during the organized ses- ones, that have deleterious and widespread effects. sions and public hearings. About 1,900 people attended the IJC Testimony given at an October hearing held in Washington, D.C., by Rep. meeting, far exceeding the number at Henry Waxman (D.-Calif.) included ad- any other biennial meeting. Three hundred industry representa| tives attended, nearly 10 times the number at the 1 1991 gathering. What mainVi ly drew such a large crowd s was the IJCs highly visible recommendation on phasing out chlorine. The meeting had the atmosphere of a political rally. During the entire industry presentation, a huge banner stretching around the auditorium was held up by activists. Environmental groups from many parts of the Great Lakes Basin had created the banner, which Durnil: eliminate some substances by some certain datedepicted various environ-
• Meeting of binational group provides forum for perspectives from government, industry, environmental groups
D
mental problems they attribute to chemical pollution. After the industry speeches, schoolchildren sang songs and read poems about their concern over chemical pollution of the environment. At the meeting, various industry representatives described problems that would be caused by a phaseout of chlorine. William F. Patient, chairman of the board of the Vinyl Institute, said that closing the 112 polyvinyl chloride (PVC) plants in the Great Lakes region, which have already reduced their emissions greatly, would cause major economic disruption because they now provide work for 72,000 people. Furthermore, if PVC waste pipe were replaced with iron pipe, emissions from the manufacture of the pipe would cause more serious environmental problems than those created by PVC production, he said. Melvin J. Visser, divisional vice president of Upjohn, said one of the major problems in pharmaceutical production is that 31 lb of source material are required on average to produce 1 lb of product. Chlorine solvents and intermediates help pharmaceutical companies reduce waste, he argued. K. Linn Macdonald, president of Noranda Forest Inc., told the meeting that though the pulp and paper industry has not phased out its use of chlorine for bleaching, it could now declare victory in the war against dioxin, which can no longer be measured in pulp mill effluent (concentrations are so low they can't be measured with standard techniques). He also pointed out that Canada now recycles more paper than it consumes. Adverse health effects from chlorinated organics are minimal, according to Paul Tippett, chairman of the Council of Great Lakes Industries. "With the exception of a few persistent bioaccumulative chlorinated organic chemicals in localized areas, there is no evidence that current concentrations of chlorine or chlorine-containing compounds are associated with ... adverse effects in humans or the environment," Tippett said. DECEMBER 6,1993 C&EN 31
GOVERNMENT
Schoolchildren demonstrate concern over chemical pollution at meeting. He called the IJCs chlorine phaseout recommendation //premature,, and said the commission should more carefully consider the social and economic implications of its proposals before dropping "a potential economic bombshell." Richard Miller of the Oil, Chemical & Atomic Workers International Union proposed a "worker's superfund" that would provide full pay and benefits for any workers losing jobs because of a phaseout in the use of chlorine and chlorinated organics. Monies to support the program would be collected from industries that produce chemicals targeted for elimination. Environmental groups, on the other hand, presented arguments supporting a chlorine phaseout. Paul Muldoon of Pollution Probe in Toronto said that industry and government are using arguments that they need "good science as an excuse for inaction." The chemical industry prediction of economic disaster from a chlorine phaseout is based on false premises, said Jean Jabanoski of Great Lakes United, a Canadian-US. group with offices in Buffalo and Toronto. "The dire disasters predicted in the report [on the economic benefits of chlorine] prepared by Charles River Associates would happen only if chlorine were banned suddenly by edict," she said. The report makes the "absurd assumption" that all chlorinated medicines would be removed from the market, she explained, when in fact IJC advocates exceptions for chlorine use in pharmaceutical products (C&EN, May 10, page 11). On the eve of the IJC meeting, the op32
DECEMBER 6,1993 C&EN
posing groups' arguments for and against phasing out chlorine were presented cogently in a debate between Greenpeace toxicology researcher Joe Thornton and CCC's managing director Brad Lienhart. "We need to treat organochlorines as a class," Thornton said. "There are 11,000 in commerce plus thousands more that are produced as byproducts. It would be truly impractical to regulate them one by one. Those that have been tested have overwhelmingly turned out to show persistence, toxicity, or bioaccumulation. There is no reason to continue to suppose that the chemicals not tested would turn out to be safe. It makes sense to treat organochlorines as guilty until proven innocent." 'The stakes are high in this discussion," Lienhart responded. "We must balance the risks of chlorine chemistry against not having access to chlorine and look carefully at the alternatives where they do exist because they may have adverse impacts of their own. If we act wrongly or prematurely, we could hurt the very natural resources that we're trying to protect." Many of the public comments at the IJC meeting related to studies showing an apparent association between chlorinated pesticides and breast cancer. New evidence linking pesticides to breast cancer had been presented just a day before the IJC meeting at a hearing held by the House Energy & Commerce Committee's Subcommittee on Health & the Environment, which is chaired by Waxman. At the hearing, Ana M. Soto of the Center for Reproductive Research at Tufts University testified that endosul-
fan, a chlorinated insecticide used commonly on fruits and vegetables, behaves like estrogen on cultured human breast cancer cells, causing them to multiply faster. Estrogens, whether natural or synthetic, are believed to play a role in breast cancer. Mary Wolff of Mt. Sinai School of Medicine in New York City testified that women with the highest levels of DDT in blood samples were four times as likely to have breast cancer. DDT also behaves like estrogen when tested on breast cancer cells in culture. Gordon Durnil, U.S. IJC commissioner and section chairman, pointed out that "if virtual elimination [of persistent toxic substances] has meaning, it means eliminate some substances, somewhere in the Great Lakes, by some certain date." (In the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement, both governments have agreed to virtual elimination of persistent toxic substances.) Durnil believes that despite the governments' initial rejection of a chlorine phaseout, it will inevitably be accepted some time in the future. Currently, the governments are in a state of denial, he said. In contrast, CCC's Lienhart said, "I am encouraged that the governments thought this through and decided the chlorine phaseout recommendation is not well founded." IJC is working on its seventh Biennial Report, which will be completed shortly after the first of the year. The very large comprehensive study on the health and environmental effects of chlorinated organics being prepared by CanTox, a consulting group in Mississauga, Ontario, for CCC and the Chlorine Institute was originally scheduled to be published in June. It is now slated for release sometime in early 1994. And the conference on the health and environmental effects of chlorinated organics that was to be sponsored by CCC and held in September of this year was canceled and has not been rescheduled. Reasons for the delays aren't clear. The movement to phase out chlorine also may be gathering momentum in Europe. On Oct. 15, the 21 nations party to the Barcelona Convention on pollution of the Mediterranean recommended that their governments phase out toxic, persistent, and bioaccumulative substances, especially organohalogens (which include organochlorines), by 2005. This action is similar to proposals made in September 1992 by the Paris Commission, which oversees discharges of pollutants in the northeast Atlantic Ocean. •
