Toxic Chemicals

While delighted to learn from Michael Hawthorne's article ("Pediatricians Seek Change in Lax Toxic Chemicals Law," April 25) that the American Academy of Pediatrics has joined a national campaign to revise the 1976 Toxic Substance Control Act (TSCA), such reform is long overdue. The current TSCA regulatory system especially fails to protect our children, who face higher risks of exposure to toxic chemicals. Because of TSCA, the "innocent until proven guilty" status quo of assessing chemical safety implies that some level of bodily damage, if not an outright tragedy, must occur before chemicals are declared unsafe.

Though assured by health officials that chemicals found in the home of a man who died here three weeks ago pose little risk, neighbors reacted angrily to the news and remain concerned that the materials contaminated their own properties.County and state health officials told more than 50 residents at a Wednesday meeting in the Sykesville-Freedom District Fire Hall that they have seen no evidence of any radiation hazards or any leakage or dumping of chemicals kept by PhillipSmall in his Patapsco Road basement and shed.

Harford health officials say new test results from samples taken at an Abingdon rubble fill confirm that two chemical compounds, including one suspected of causing cancer, are present at the site.The test, conducted in March, measured levels of trichloroethylene at 99 parts per billion in one of seven test sites at the Spencer Sand & Gravel Inc. rubble fill.Another compound, dichloroethene, measured at 107 parts per billion (ppb) on the same test site, which is on the east side of the rubble fill.

A pair of Baltimore residents filed suit Monday accusing the city of breaking the law by allowing toxic chemicals to leach into the Patapsco River from the South Baltimore site where a casino is now under construction. The lawsuit is the second to raise environmental concerns about development of the Horseshoe casino on Russell Street. It contends that the city's deal with CBAC Gaming, a coalition led by Caeser's Entertainment, exposes city taxpayers to having to pay for cleaning up contamination from the site.

A Carroll County cement manufacturing plant that has drawn harsh criticism on air quality from its neighbors has cleaner and safer emissions than it has had for decades, company officials said yesterday. Test results on emissions from Lehigh Cement Co. in Union Bridge show a reduction in toxic chemical emissions that are common to cement manufacturing. Toxic emissions dropped from more than 400,000 pounds a year to less than 300 pounds, the results show. Lehigh plant manager Peter Lukas said he was ecstatic about the test results because they confirm that the $300 million technology added to the plant in the past few years is working.

Marylanders are more likely to be exposed to toxic chemicals in their houses and on their jobs than in the environment, two advocacy groups said in a report released yesterday.The report, by the National Environmental Law Center and the U.S. Public Interest Research Group, estimates that U.S. manufacturers produce and use 50 times more pounds of chemicals than they emit into the air and water or dispose of as waste.The environmentalists made that case yesterday at a news conference called to urge Congress to require industries to report the quantities and types of chemicals they produce each year.

Commercial watermen digging for clams in the Patapsco River are stirring up bottom sediments and waterfront residents.Since the clamming boats, which employ hydraulic digging equipment and conveyor belts to harvest soft-shell clams, sailed into the river this spring, residents in Bayside Beach and other waterfront communities have worried that they could be churning up toxic chemicals that have been lying dormant on the river bottom.Marvin Kelbaugh, a retired printing plant supervisor and Bayside Beach resident, said many of the same toxic, industrial chemicals that have fouled the Inner Harbor and Port of Baltimore have washed down the Patapsco and settled off their beaches.

Largemouth bass and bluegill from two northern Carroll County farm ponds hold important clues to whether toxic chemicals from a nearby Pennsylvania Superfund site are flowing south through underground streams.About 40 fish were collected from the ponds near Keystone Sanitation Landfill yesterday, wrapped in aluminum foil and packed in dry ice.The fish are on their way to a Seattle laboratory, where they will be tested to determine whether their bodies contain levels of mercury that would be dangerous to humans or predators who consume the fish.

Aerospace giant Lockheed Martin Corp. has found toxic chemicals, including PCBs, solvents and metals, in the soil and groundwater of the company's sprawling Middle River property, including an undeveloped parcel envisioned as the keystone to Baltimore County's waterfront renaissance. Since last year, Lockheed Martin officials have been measuring official and community reaction to a proposed land and water destination on 97 acres near Dark Head Cove. Mentioned in those plans were a 200-room hotel, townhouses, condominiums, shops and a lagoon-front boardwalk.

The fumes that waft from top-selling air fresheners and laundry products contain dozens of chemicals, including several classified as toxic or hazardous, says a University of Washington study published yesterday. None of the chemicals was listed on product labels, nor does the federal government require companies to disclose ingredients in fragrances, said study author Anne Steinemann. "I was surprised by both the number and the potential toxicity of the chemicals that were found," said Steinemann, a professor of civil and environmental engineering and public affairs.