Chemical world This week sumers are exposed to much lower enzyme levels than are industrial Allergists score enzymes workers. Sensitivity to allergens Enzyme detergents were dealt a varies over much wider ranges than heavy body blow at last week's the differences between industrial meeting of the American Academy and consumer exposure, the allerof Allergy in Chicago. The highly gists note. negative consensus voiced by AAA scientists will almost certainly in- SOLID WASTE: crease the gloom among detergent makers and may well serve to ex- Old process, new use pedite the retreat from enzyme use A seven-year-old, once-abandoned now gaining momentum (C&EN, process for degrading cotton is beFeb. 22, page 12). ing resurrected in a new applicaThough the research-based con- tion: use of solid waste materials. clusions presented by Dr. I. Gillette Co. Research Institute Leonard Bernstein, Dr. Raymond G. (GCRI), Rockville, Md„ last week Slavin, Dr. Jerry Dolovich, and signed a $50,000 contract with the others fell short of recommending Environmental Protection Agency an outright, immediate ban on detergent enzymes, they did constitute—in the words of Dr. Slavin— "an urgent plea for a consumer study'' and, in the interim, clear labeling of enzyme products. Both occupational and consumer health is cause for concern, the allergists report. Dr. Slavin has found 68 workers out of 249 detergent factory employees with clearcut symptoms associated with enzyme dust exposure in one St. Louis plant. Preventive measures at manufacturing sites can and have cut down the occupational hazards associated with producing enzyme products, but consumer sensitization is more difficult to verify and Gillette's Menkart to control. Dr. Bernstein's skin test survey to examine the feasibility of applyof allergy clinic outpatients revealed ing its sensitized photodegradation positive reactions to crude deter- process to cellulosic wastes. A gent enzyme on the part of nearly unique feature of the contract is one third of the 214 atopic (allergic) that GCRI will provide $49,000 for individuals tested. the research, even though the reDr. Dolovich points out that per- sults will have no application in its haps 20% of the U.S. population is corporate activities. atopic. A "conservative" estimate The company originally disrecently released by the National In- covered the process in 1964 while stitute of Allergy and Infectious Dis- doing research for its corporate eases puts this number at about parent, Gillette Co., Boston, Mass. 15% or 31 million Americans. GCRI scientists found that the phoAAA has formed an ad hoc com- todegradation of cotton could be mittee which has prepared a re- speeded greatly by addition of insearch protocol designed to deter- organic salts. If cotton cloth, for mine how hazardous detergent en- example, is irradiated for 30 hours zymes may be to consumer health. with a carbon arc lamp, the average In an editorial in the January Jour- number of sugar residues in the nal of Allergy signed by Dr. Bern- cotton's cellulose chains is destein, Dr. Slavin, Dr. Dolovich, and creased from 3200 to 2700. Irradiseven others, the allergists note that ation of the cloth in the presence of patients are becoming sensitized to 0.7% by weight of sodium nitrite, multiple proteins in the extracts however, causes the average numfrom crude Bacillus subtilis used in ber of residues to drop from 3200 detergents and not to the enzyme to 240 in 15 hours. But Gillette had no immediate application for the alone. Apparently little consolation can process, so it was patented and be taken from the fact that con- shelved. DETERGENTS:
6 C&EN MARCH 1, 1971
Under the new contract, the company will try to find out if the process can be used to treat the more than 150 million tons of cellulosic wastes generated in the U.S. every year. GCRI president John Menkart thinks the project could develop the first effective, economical process for degrading cellulose to smaller, more starch- or sugarlike molecules. This material could then be further processed into such products as animal foods, sugars, and other chemicals. Gillette *.s financing this new research, Dr. Menkart says, because the company feels that industry has an obligation to contribute to preserving the quality of the environment, and because GCRI has unique skills in this area. The company chose to sign a formal contract with EPA to ensure that the project would fit into the Government's overall program for waste recycling. By submitting its proposal to the normal technical review and evaluation, he adds, the company is also assured that the project is directed to problems that the Government considers among the most important. Dr. Menkart emphasizes that the results of the investigation will be published and that any resulting patents or technology will be placed in the public domain. He also states firmly that the company will continue work on—and support for—the project until a successful process has been developed or until he is convinced that the process is totally unworkable. WATER POLLUTION:
What Lake Michigan needs The Administration's program to issue permits under the Refuse Act of 1899 for discharging industrial wastes into navigable waterways "will sound the death knell for Lake Michigan/' Chicago attorney Alexander Polikoff told the Environment Subcommittee of the Senate Commerce Committee last week. Mr. Polikoff is executive director of Businessmen for the Public Interest, an Illinois-based nonprofit organization that bills itself as "a combination watchdog, research center, law firm, and ombudsman." He said that the permit program would subordinate the Refuse Act to the "inadequate water quality standards" of the Federal Water Pollution Control Act. What Lake Michigan needs, Mr.
