expense and problems of availability, that option surely would cause some facilities to close. Other alternatives are to lower the scope of coverage, authorize different financial responsibility mechanisms such as corporate guarantees, issue case-by-case waivers of the current requirements, and suspend or withdraw the insurance requirements altogether. EPA says that only 10 states still have to follow EPA rules on insurance requirements. Other states have their own financial regulations. If the requirements are changed, however, states may adopt similar alternatives subject to EPA approval. Whatever happens, waste facility operators must follow the requirements approved in their state. D
Carbide sued over Institute chemical leak A group of attorneys last week filed lawsuits against Union Carbide on behalf of victims of the Aug. 11 toxic gas leak at the company's Institute, W.Va., chemical facility. The lawyers, all of whom are also involved in the multibillion-dollar, Bhopal-related litigation consolidated in Federal District Court in Manhattan, filed the suits in the Manhattan court and in the Kanawha County Circuit Court in Charleston, W.Va. In total, the suits seek about $88 million in compensatory and punitive damages on charges that Carbide failed to warn the public adequately of the danger of leaks and failed to m a i n t a i n an effective warning system. Although the chemicals involved in the Institute leak were completely different from those in the December 1984 Bhopal disaster, it is thought that lawyers may be able to obtain information in pretrial examination of company witnesses in the Institute case that could be useful to them in the Bhopal case. Pretrial questioning in the Bhopal suits has been limited by the federal court (C&EN,Aug. 19, page 4). In a press briefing, Carbide chairman Warren M. Anderson said the company is changing its emergency response procedures to remove
from plant managers the responsibility of deciding when a leak is serious enough to warrant a community alert. The company also appointed William D. Ruckelshaus, former administrator of EPA, to be special counsel to head a board-ofdirectors-level committee that will conduct an independent investigation of the Institute release. That study will be separate from the company's internal investigation, results of which were scheduled to be disclosed last Friday. Meanwhile, information on the possible toxicity of the released chemicals—methylene chloride and aldicarb oxime—continued to surface. Carbide questioned preliminary findings of a University of Wisconsin study showing that low-level aldicarb oxime residues may affect the immune systems of mice. "[The study] will doubtless be debated both as to its methodology and its conclusions/' said Eugene J. Boros, vice president of R&D of Carbide's agricultural products operation. Various initiatives on methylene
chloride are under way by government agencies, following the results of a study by the National Toxicology Program reported in March. A bioassay of m e t h y l e n e chloride administered to rats and mice by inhalation led to a finding that there is enough evidence to conclude that the substance is carcinogenic in animals and that for practical purposes it could be regarded as presenting a carcinogenic risk to humans. Among government agencies considering action is the Consumer Product Safety Commission. A briefing paper by the CPSC staff notes that preliminary exposure information indicates that the carcinogenic risks for consumer uses of paint strippers containing methylene chloride may be as high as three in 1000. Also, for aerosol spray painting operations using products containing methylene chloride, individual lifetime risks as high as 170 in a million were calculated. These risks, the CPSC staff says, are among the highest ever calculated for chemicals from consumer products. D
Pact signed for first industrial space unit A small Houston-based firm will construct and operate the first privately owned industrial facility in space. Under an agreement signed last week between the National Aeronautics & Space Administration and Space Industries Inc., NASA will launch two modular units to be built by SII—which will make space in
them available to manufacturers— on space-shuttle missions in 1989 and 1990. The facility, orbiting at an altitude of 265 miles, will be based initially on use of one modular unit and then on two linked units. The cylindrical units each measure 35 X 14.5 feet, have a volume of 2500 cu
Space Industries'president Faget holds model of industrial space facility August 26, 1985 C&EN
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News of the Week ft, and weigh about 30,000 lb. Two huge winglike solar panels will power each module. Two persons can work comfortably in a module, which contains no living quarters. For servicing, the module will be docked with the space shuttle or the permanent space station NASA plans to build, providing a "shirt sleeve" work environment for astronauts, without need for space suits. The facility will enable industrial firms to use the gravity-free environment of space for research and manufacturing in the areas of pharmaceuticals and biological products, pure and exotic crystals, ceramics, glasses, optical fibers, and new metals and alloys, according to Max
Faget, president of SII. Chemical and pharmaceutical firms have indicated serious interest. SII, which is still in a startup phase, so far has raised about $2.5 million for the project, which may cost more than $500 million. Under the agreement, when the space platform starts producing revenue, SII will give NASA 12% of its annual income until it has reimbursed NASA for the cost of launching from the space shuttle and other services. SII also agreed to exchange data from its facility with scientists working on NASA's space station. NASA views the commercial facility as complementary to its plans for a permanently manned space station in the early 1990s. D
Alleged Soviet tracer chemical may be mutagen Last week the State Department accused the Soviet Union of using tracer chemicals to track the activities of U.S. citizens in that country. The State Department says that such chemicals have been used for several years, and one in particular, 5-(4-nitrophenyl)-2,4-pentadienal, or NPPD, has been identified and analyzed by an unnamed laboratory and has been found to be mutagenic in the Ames test. Because NPPD was found to be a mutagen, a department spokesman says there is the possibility it may also be a cancer-causing agent. Charles E. Redman, a State Department spokesman, suggests that the levels of NPPD and other compounds to which U.S. embassy personnel may have been exposed "is very low." He also says that there is no evidence of ill effects from exposure to these tracking agents. But he adds that a special task force of scientists from the National Institutes of Health and the Environmental Protection Agency will go to Moscow for an initial investigation. The National Toxicology Program (NTP), however, is expected to conduct the scientific investigation to determine the long-term health effects from exposure to NPPD and other tracking agents. This latest U.S. charge of Soviet perfidy comes during the intense confrontational period leading to the 6
August 26, 1985 C&EN
November Geneva summit. It appears to be based on slim scientific evidence. Little is known about NPPD. No scientist or spokesman at EPA, the National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences, NTP, or the nongovernment Chemical Industry Institute of Toxicology had heard of the compound before the State Department's announcement. None of these organizations had tested NPPD for mutagenicity for the State Department. In fact, the head of EPA's chemical activities coordination group, Arnold Edelman, says NPPD is not even on the chemical inventory mandated by the Toxic Substances Control Act. A literature search by C&EN uncovered a reference to only one paper specifically on NPPD. That paper, by Soviet scientists, apparently details the compound's synthesis. No English abstract is available. NIEHS and NTP had similarly limited success in their literature searches. Press reports of seven Soviet papers and one Australian paper on NPPD, may, in fact, be studies on related compounds but not NPPD specifically. Herbert S. Rosenkranz, chairman of Case Western Reserve University's department of environmental health sciences, who has extensively tested nitrophenol compounds for their mutagenicity, says he "is not
the least bit surprised" NPPD was found to be positive in the shortterm mutagenicity assay. "There is a very good probability—an 80% chance—of it being a carcinogen," he adds. But he also says that he "had not heard of NPPD before," nor has his department "put the compound through our computer simulation" that can predict mutagenicity based on chemical structure and activity data stored in computer programs. H o w e v e r , at C&EN's request, chemist Manton R. Frierson of Case Western's chemistry department ran the structure of NPPD against two databases containing nitro aromatic compounds that have been tested for mutagenicity against two strains of Salmonella typhimurium bacteria, TA-100 and TA-98, without the S-9 liver activation system. "NPPD is predicted to be a mutagen in the TA-100 strain," Frierson says. From his experience with similar compounds, Rosenkranz says he would expect NPPD "to be highly UV absorbent and slightly yellow in color. The State Department has said that the tracer NPPD is not detected by fluorescence and is colorless. Walter F. Rowe, a forensic scientist at George Washington University, says that as far as he knows NPPD has never been used as a tracer agent. Typically, police agencies for investigational purposes would want an agent "that is easy to detect. Why resort to laboratory analysis?" Rowe asks. From State Department and press reports, he says, it is obvious that the compound is not readily available and would "require sensitive analytical techniques for detection." Besides, Rowe says, tracing materials are traditionally used by police agencies to track assets—money or documents—not people. Though Rowe says the Soviets admittedly "have done some strange things at times," he remains "dubious" about these recent State Department claims. Especially so, he says, after "yellow rain turned out to be bee feces," not toxin warfare as the U.S. government had claimed. "I'm afraid this may be another embarrassment for the State Department," Rowe adds. •
