News of the Week
MORE PCB DESTRUCTION METHODS DEVELOPED A new process to remove polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB's) from electrical transformer and capacitor fluids has been developed by Sunohio, a joint venture of Sun Co. and Ohio Transformer Co. The Cantonbased firm plans to demonstrate the process to Environmental Protection Agency officials next month in Massillon, Ohio. Current EPA regulations prescribe that substances contaminated with more than 500 ppm of PCB's are to be destroyed by burning in special incinerators. Materials containing 50 to 500 ppm instead may be buried in chemical waste landfills or burned in special high-efficiency boilers. However, according to William Gunter, EPA's PCB regulations team leader, the regulations also allow the approval of new technology if it's just as effective, and if it presents no hazards of its own. The Sunohio process, which its promoters call PCBX, is one candidate for such approval. According to Sunohio chairman Norman E. Jackson, a prototype commercial unit has been built and tested. The prototype unit is completely self-contained and mounted on a tractor-trailer that can be moved to the decontamination site. "Compared to another recently announced chemical method, PCBX is less complex, works faster and more completely, and will be more practical, convenient, and economical in actual applications," Jackson says. He doesn't elaborate; however, Goodyear recently revealed that it has developed a process using sodium naphthalide to convert PCB's to sodium chloride and polyphenylene (C&EN, Sept. 1, page 9). Other new PCB destruction technology is under study, EPA's Gunter notes. For example, Peerless Cement Co. of Detroit wants to burn PCBcontaminated oils in its cement kilns, and has tentative approval for a four-month test burn of oils containing low (less than 500 ppm) concentrations of PCB's. If those tests are successful, further tests will be made with more heavily contaminated oils. And EOI, a Washington, D.C.-based company, is exploring the use of another chemical disposal system that it has licensed from a Canadian firm. EOI says that the system has been 6
C&EN Sept. 22, 1980
compounds believed to be harmless and environmentally safe. Chemical reactions are followed by selective filtration, dehydration, and degassing. An important advantage of the process is that valuable transformer oils contaminated with PCB's needn't be burned up and wasted, Jackson says. A large utility substation transformer may contain several thousand gallons of oil. With PCBX, the oil is cleaned up and restored to like-new condition for reuse, free of PCB's. It may prove possible to carry out the process under "energized" conditions, so that transformers won't have to be taken out of service to be decontaminated. The process can accommodate both high and low concentrations of Jackson: valuable oils aren't wasted PCB's. Gas chromatographic analyses of the reprocessed oils show them to tested in Canada and that it meets contain very little or no detectable residual contamination. Canadian standards. Jackson adds that PCBX probably Patents have been applied for, but Sunohio refuses, for proprietary rea- is safer than incineration, since the sons, to reveal the details of the pro- process is carried out in a closed liqcess. The company does say that uid system at a much lower temperPCBX is a chemical disposal method ature and pressure. Also, it doesn't that uses a commercially available require transportation or further reagent that strips chlorine atoms unnecessary handling of the toxic D from PCB molecules and forms other PCB's.
Chemical weapons gain Congressional support It has been more than a decade since the U.S. has produced any new chemical weapons. However, pushed by reports that the Soviets have used such weapons in Afghanistan, Congress is well on its way to authorizing production of binary chemical weapons. Congress is taking this posture despite opposition from the White House, which believes such action is premature. Last June the House passed the military construction appropriations bill for fiscal 1981, which included $3.15 million to start construction of a binary munitions production facility at Pine Bluff Arsenal, Ark. There was no debate on binary chemical weapons. Early this month the House again approved the $3.15 million in the military construction authorization bill, which by House rules should have been passed before the appropriations bill. Although there was
some debate on the provision, no amendment was offered to delete the funding from the bill. Perhaps this was because members who opposed construction felt sure that the funding would not be approved by the Senate, since the money had not been included in the military construction authorization bill reported by the Senate Armed Services Committee. However, directly after the House vote, the Senate committee approved an amendment to its bill to be offered on the floor adding the $3.15 million. Last week the full Senate approved the amendment by a vote of 52 to 36, after rejecting by one vote a compromise amendment offered by Sen. Gary Hart (D.-Colo.). The Hart amendment would have postponed Congressional action on the question until March 1. Meanwhile, the House in voting on the second Department of Defense appropriations bill rejected 276 to 125
