Toxic waste sites

To provide risk assessment of toxic waste sites ... 

In 1977, PCB production was banned in the United States, and its release to the Hudson was stopped. Since 1976, the State of New York has banned aU hshing on the river between Bakers Fall in the Village of Hudson Fall and the Federal Dam at Troy. Most affected has been the commercial striped bass hshery, which once earned New Yorkers 40 million a year. Now the river is no longer suitable for swimming or any water contact sports, and of course, dehnitely not suitable for domestic water supply. The loss of its recreation and water supply revenues is simply too high to be priced. In 1983, the USEPA declared the Hudson River, from Hudson Falls to New York City, one of the Nahon s largest and most complicated Superfund toxic-waste sites. 

Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liabihty Act of 1980, designed to find and remediate toxic waste sites in the United States, syndet An abbreviation for the term synthetic detergent. synthetic detergent A cleaning product made of synthetic materials rather than natural soaps. 

Acute- and chronic-duration inhalation exposure MRLs for diazinon were not derived because of a lack of suitable studies in the literature. Since diazinon is not volatile, inhalation exposure near toxic waste sites is probably less likely than oral or dermal exposure. However, the potential risk of adverse health effects from inhalation exposure to diazinon cannot be assessed without information on the levels actually present in the air around the site. The MRL level of 0.009 mg diazinon/m3 should be protective for individuals living near waste sites. NIOSH has recommended a Permissible Exposure Level (PEL) of 0.1 mg diazinon/m3 to protect the health of individuals who regularly use diazinon in their work the MRL level of... 

Cezeaus, A. East Meets West (Germany) to Look for Toxic Waste Sites. Science, 620 (February 8, 1991). 

In 1980, President Carter pushed hard for the CERCLA to be passed — mainly in response to various environmental tragedies in the news, such as the Love Canal toxic waste site near Niagara Falls and the valley of drums in Kentucky. People wanted someone to be held accountable for the toxic waste sites that littered the country. The CERCLA focuses on two issues responding to existing uncontrolled hazardous waste sites and preventing... 

Superfund sites are the United State s worst toxic waste sites and are regulated under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA). 

Nonrandom samples, such as judgmental and spot samples, are useful in some situations—for example, in the preliminary assessment of a toxic waste site. Probabilistic and random samples, however, are fundamental to obtaining unbiased estimates if the true average value is being sought. A very basic idea, yet one that is often overlooked, is that to get a random sample, every part of the lot to be characterized must have an equal chance of being in the sample. 

In 1991, the National Academy of Sciences studied the health effects attributable to toxic waste sites and concluded, [W]e find that the health of some members of the public is in danger, but We are currently unable to answer the question of the overall impact on public health of hazardous wastes. The Academy pointed out that Millions of tons of hazardous materials are slowly migrating into groundwater in areas where they could pose problems in the future, even though current risks could be negligible. The Academy concluded, ...the committee does find sufficient evidence that hazardous wastes have produced health effects in some populations. We are concerned that populations may be at risk that have not been adequately identified, because of the inadequate program of site identification and assessment. ... 

By 1990, risk assessment had been used for more than 20 years to establish allowable residues of pesticides on food to assess the dangers of living near toxic waste sites to determine acceptable levels of air and water pollution to decide how to prioritize expenditures on environment-related government programs, and on and on. 

It is also often possible to reduce the number of animals used in the evaluation of a chemical or toxic waste site by carefully designing the experiment to maximize the data acquired or by accepting a compromise in the statistical significance and power. Often a slight decrease in the statistical power can result in a large reduction in the number of animals required in a toxicity test. 

Superfund sites are sites that emit numerous neurotoxins into the air and water environments. Love Canal studies have shown nervous system effects that can be attributed to living near a toxic waste site. I36 Elevated neural tube defects in offspring were identified with mothers residing proximate to hazardous waste sites. I49 50 It has also been shown that people residing close to industrial facilities that emit solvents or metals have offspring with increased CNS defects J51l... 

A Texas study found significant additional risk for congenital heart disease in children whose mothers lived close to hazardous waste sites than in children whose mothers did not live near toxic waste sites J43l... 

A large number of chemicals have been shown to precipitate MCS. The sources of these chemicals include industrial chemicals, off-gassing in tightly sealed buildings, polluted air and water in areas contaminated by industrial discharges, and toxic waste site releases, and those from the use of consumer products, including pharmaceuticals, personal care products, paints, adhesives, pesticides, and other chemical products used around the home. Table 26.2 lists some of the individual compounds that have been associated with MCSJ12 161... 

Toxic waste sites emit a multitude of lipophilic and hydrophilic compounds to the water and air around them. Health effects from toxic waste... 

The perfect high-level waste repository (or toxic-waste site) is one in which individual waste components are at thermodynamic equilibrium with the host water-rock system. For such conditions there is no tendency for the waste components to dissolve and be transported from the site to the accessible environment. It was shown earlier that low-Eh crystalline-rock groundwaters are often near saturation with respect to UO2 (Section 13.2.3). Spent fuel UO2 in such a system should have little or no tendency to dissolve and release other radionuclides to the groundwater. An appropriate first task in characterizing a potential repository site should, therefore, be to obtain accurate groundwater analyses to determine if the groundwater is saturated with respect to UO2. 

Stehr-Green PA, Burse VW, Welty E. 1988. Human exposure to polychlorinated biphenyls at toxic waste sites Investigations in the United States. Arch Environ Health 43 420-424. 

Wood Creosote. No information was located pertaining to adverse health effects in children or young animals from wood creosote. There are very few data on human exposure to wood creosote. Ingestion of beechwood creosote exacerbates chronic nephrosis in rats (Miyazato et al. 1984b), and dermal exposure to beechwood creosote may cause skin irritation (Attalla 1968). These studies suggest that dermal contact with creosote from toxic waste sites could cause skin irritation. 

However, the developmental risk to humans of exposure to coal tar is less clear. The doses that produced developmental toxicity in animals were relatively high and are unlikely to be attained through environmental exposure in the vicinity of toxic waste sites. However, some evidence for species sensitivity exists and the possibility of developmental toxicity in humans from coal tar exposure cannot be discounted. 

Foreign travel in certain countries Residence near toxic waste site... 

Kohlhase, J. E. (1991). The impact of toxic waste sites on housing values./oMrwa/ of Urban Economics, 30,1-26. 

In cases when the potential toxicity of a specific mixture is of eoneem (for example, at a specific toxic waste site), the complete mixture is often tested... 

Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB), are a family of toxic, oily, non-flammable chemicals. They are man-made products and were first commercialised in 1929 (by Monsanto). They were mainly used in electrical equipment (e.g., transformers and capacitors), as heat transfer and hydraulic fluids, and as plasticisers from World War I until recently, mainly due to their exceptional thermal and chemical stabilities. Although their production in the USA was stopped in 1977 (they were banned worldwide), some production still continues, and it is believed that large quantities of PCB may still be present in some old transformer and capacitor systems. PCB are certainly still present in the USA in some electrical equipment and are frequently found at toxic waste sites and in contaminated sediments worldwide. The sealants based on polysulfhide polymers that were used in buildings some 20-40 years ago contained PCB, which has been shown still to exist at alarming levels in some houses in Sweden, [24]. 

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