CHEMICAL & ENGINEERING
NEWS
JULY
6,
1964
USPHS Insists Endrin Is Fish Killer Public Health's Stein and USDA'S Anderson deny investigative conferences were "kangaroo courts"
Since dieldrin is a stereoisomer of endrin, it is almost impossible to make endrin without producing some dieldrin, he says. Regardless of what the Velsicol process is, USPHS found dieldrin in the waste from the plant, he stresses. USPHS submitted IR spectrograms of a control containing dieldrin and of two samples obtained from VelsicoFs waste to the National Bureau of Standards for analysis. Last week NBS reported, "There are no significant differences among the spectra. The evidence is extremely strong that the compound is dieldrin." Kangaroo Court? Mr. Stein denied that there was anything unusual about the New Orleans conference held in May to consider the fish kills. Conferences of this type are not adversary
There is no doubt in the minds of officials of the U.S. Public Health Service that the pesticide endrin was responsible for the massive fish kills in the lower Mississippi River last winter.
conclusions reached, and by the enforcement administrative staff for legal sufficiency of the findings, Mr. Stein told the committee. Analyses of extracts from mud taken from the
The findings of the interstate conference held in New Orleans in May
fish kill areas, from dead fish in Louisiana, and from fish killed under simu-
proceedings or hearings of a judicial
(C&EN, May IS, page 28)
naming
lated conditions in t h e l a b o r a t o r y w e r e
n a t u r e , h e says.
endrin as the killer corroborate the results of USPHS scientists and investigators. That's what Murray Stein, chief enforcement officer of USPHS's division of water supply and pollution control, told the Senate Subcommittee on Reorganization. "Our scientific staff believes the cumulative evidence of endrin poisoning is incontrovertible," he says. The subcommittee, headed by Sen. Abraham Ribicoff (D.-Conn.), is investigating charges that USPHS and the Department of Agriculture mishandled the fish kill investigations and erred in naming endrin as the cause. Both Mr. Stein and Robert J. Anderson of USDA denied charges that the agencies' investigative conferences and hearings were conducted as "kangaroo courts." These proceedings were not carried out in any unusual way; they operated under the normal ground rules in effect for many years, they said. Velsicol Chemical, which had charged that USPHS made a mistake in identifying endrin as the cause of the fish kills, did not testify at the hearing. Representatives of Velsicol, whose endrin plant at Memphis, Term., has been identified as a substantial source of endrin contamination in the Mississippi River, will have a chance to present their case to the committee at hearings scheduled to be held late this month. Endrin Guilty. The technical and scientific evidence in the fish kill case was rigidly scrutinized by USPHS supervising scientists and senior scientists for validity of procedures and the
made independently by five teams of investigators. These studies used combinations of gas chromatography, thin-layer chromatography, infrared spectrophotometry, and bio-assay. All of the analyses established the presence of endrin in all extracts, he said. In earlier charges, Velsicol cast doubt on the validity of all USPHS analyses because USPHS found dieldrin in a sample taken at VelsicoFs Memphis plant. Velsicol says it has made only endrin, never dieldrin, at this plant. Mr. Stein refutes VelsicoFs charges.
sworn, cross examination is not permitted, and only conferees may take part. At the end of the statements, the law requires the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare to give a summary of the proceedings. Sen. Ribicoff said that USPHS seemed to be in a great hurry to wind up the New Orleans conference, giving the impression that it was trying to force the conferees to adopt its views. He asked why the summary of the conference was agreed on in the early evening of the second day instead of postponing this action until
W i t n e s s e s are
not
EVIDENCE. At hearings before the Senate Subcommittee on Reorganization, Murray Stein (right), chief enforcement officer of USPHS's division of water supply and pollution control, shows spectrograms obtained during analysis of waste from Velsicol plant JULY
6, 1 9 6 4
C&EN
25
the next morning to give the conferees a chance to digest their conclusions. USPHS had nothing to do with continuing the conference on the second day, Mr. Stein says. Given the choice of continuing or taking final action the next morning, the state delegates voted unanimously to wind up the proceedings the second day. After the conference, H E W sent the summary in draft form to the four state delegations. The fact that three states made no changes in the draft and the fourth made minor changes is proof that the original findings announced at the conference were not arrived at hastily, Mr. Stein says. USDA's hearings on whether to withdraw the registration of endrin were not unusual either, Robert J. Anderson, deputy administrator of the Agricultural Research Service, told the committee. Hearings of this type are not trials and no conclusions are reached at the hearings. Cross examination of witnesses is not permitted to save time. Since the hearings are only to develop information, all interested persons are asked to submit their views for the record. The final decision on a registration problem is made by USDA officials, he says. Pollution Sources. According to USPHS estimates, discharges from the Velsicol plant account for about one third of the amount of endrin found in the Mississippi River. Mr. Anderson believes that waste disposal from pesticide-formulating plants may account for a large part of the chemicals found in the river. Early in April, USDA, in conjunction with USPHS, surveyed 51 formulating plants handling endrin in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee. The survey showed that in all plants some operating practices were being followed which could contribute to contamination of the river. For example, waste materials were moved to dumps from which drainage emptied into nearby streams; used fiber chemical cartons were burned at dumps located near streams; at cooperages reconditioning pesticide drums for resale, solution or wash water from the drums entered streams emptying into the Mississippi. In all but one plant, no attempt was being made to neutralize plant effluent which might contain pesticides, Mr. Anderson says. Meanwhile, USPHS is stepping up its investigation of the Mississippi River basin to detect other sources of endrin contamination. 26
C&EN
JULY
6,
1964
ICI and Phillips Petroleum To Build Refinery in U.K. Phillips Petroleum Co. and Imperial Chemical Industries, Ltd., have set up a joint company to build and operate a 5 million ton-a-year oil refinery in England. It will be Phillips' first refinery in Europe and its first venture in the U.K. Due for start-up early in 1966, the refinery will be located at the mouth of the River Tees on England's northeast coast. Phillips will supply crude from North Africa and will sell the refinery products other than naphtha. ICI's heavy organic chemicals division will take the naphtha and use it as feedstock for its petrochemical operations at nearby Wilton and Billingham, which face one another across the Tees estuary. Total cost of the project will be $28 million. The name of the operating company hasn't yet been made public. An ICI spokesman says one reason for linking up with Phillips is that Phillips has a ready supply of North African light crude which has a high naphtha-fraction content. ICI's move into oil refining is not its first. The company started up a 1 million ton-ayear refinery, also on the Tees, just a year ago. The new refinery will go up aside the existing one, but it will be an entirely separate operation. Giants. The start-up of the new refinery will coincide with the scheduled completion of the heavy organic chemicals division's giant naphtha cracker at Wilton. This will have an ethylene capacity of 200,000 tons annually and will raise ICI's total ethylene capacity to 340,000 tons a year. Annual propylene capacity will jump from the current level of about 95,000 tons to 230,000 tons. It's possible, however, that the company will mothball at least one of its present crackers when the large unit comes on stream. In addition, 1966 will see the completion of the ICI division's 400,000 ton-a-year aromatics complex on the Tees. Using naphtha feedstock, it will be almost twice the size of Esso Nederland's aromatics complex that recently came on stream near Rotterdam. ICI will be able to vary the ratio of its output of benzene, toluene, and mixed xylenes. It will also have a unit for making cyclohexane. Nineteen sixty-six will be a key year in ICI's current expansion plans. During that year the company's lowdensity polyethylene capacity will
reach 200,000 tons a year from the current 140,000 ton-a-year level. A 30,000 ton-a-year ethylene-to-vinyl acetate unit will also be completed then. Cyclohexane will be converted to adipic acid and hexamethylenediamine, raw materials for nylon 66 polymer. Capacity for the polymer will be boosted to about 250,000 tons a year from the present 170,000 tons. British Nylon Spinners, which will soon be a wholly owned subsidiary of ICI (C&EN, May 4, page 25), will take the major share of the polymer for its expanded nylon 66 fiber production (more than 200 million pounds a year in spinning capacity by 1966). The sharp increase in ICI's captive naphtha capacity is all slated for the heavy organic chemicals division's use. The company's agricultural chemicals division will continue to buy naphtha on the open market. Since 1962, the agricultural chemicals division has been using the ICI-developed naphtha-steam reforming process to make synthesis gas for ammonia production. The division is building a 190,000 ton-a-year ammonia plant at Immingham, Lincolnshire. This will raise ICI's ammonia capacity to nearly 2 million tons a year. Stake. Phillips' stake in European operations is steadily growing. Earlier this year the company increased its share in Belgium's Petrochim to 40%. Other partners in Petrochim (short for Société Chimique des Dérives du Pétrole) are Petrofina, S.A. ( 4 0 % ) , and Société Générale de Belgique ( 1 5 % ) ; private interests own the balance. Petrochim has units at Antwerp for isolating 16,000 tons a year of ethylene and propylene from refinery streams. The company makes ethylene oxide and glycol, cumene, and propylene tri- and tetramer. Through its 3 1 % interest in Calatrava, S.A., Phillips is getting in on the ground floor of Spanish petrochemical development (C&EN, May 18, page 7 6 ) . In Italy, Phillips and Azienda Nazionale Idrogenazione Combustibili, S.p.A., jointly own Phillips Carbon Black Italiana, S.p.A., at Ravenna. In France, Phillips and Continental Carbon Co. own Cie. Française du Carbon Black, which operates a plant at Bordeaux. Phillips is also active in liquid petroleum gas sales in Europe. Last November, the company signed a 15year contract with Eastern Gas Board of the U.K. to supply 40,000 tons a year of liquid propane.
