Discussion on:

Discovering pollution that is worse than imagined

If "coal ash" is the same thing as "fly ash", there was a series of programs on the PBS station of Southern Illinois University (WSIU) a year or two ago, where they added "fly ash" to the concrete mix they were using. While it did slow the drying/curing process of the concrete, it gave the mix added strength and durability.
How does that sound as an idea for sequestration of the carbon residue?

Contrary to some media reports stemming from an August 19 press conference (and news release associated with it) during the American Chemical Society National Meeting in Washington, the chemical styrene is not a known human carcinogen and polystyrene plastic neither contains, nor does it break down into bisphenol A (BPA).
The press conference focused on new, as-yet-unpublished research led by Katsuhiko Saido of Nihon University, Chiba, Japan, suggesting that plastics ? notably polystyrene -- in the oceans break down, leaving products of their decomposition, including styrene monomer and styrene dimers and trimers. During the press conference, no mention was made of styrene?s potential carcinogenicity, nor was there any mention of a relationship between polystyrene and BPA, although one of the researchers did cite BPA as a potential breakdown product of PET (polyethylene terephthalate) plastic.
Styrene monomer is the building-block chemical from which polystyrene is made. No authoritative body anywhere in the world considers styrene to be a known human carcinogen. Any specific statement concerning the researcher?s findings about polystyrene would be premature at this time since we have not seen and are not familiar with this work. -- Joe Walker for the Styrene Information and Research Center, Arlington, Va.

OHNO, the sky is falling!

Considerable effort has gone into making plastics nontoxic, and it will continue, with or without the scare talk. In Japan, just as here, a lot of folks make a very good living trolling for grants. While they pound on their self serving little drums, the rest of us pay. We should all be a bit more skeptical.

Fly ash is a type of coal ash. The other type is bottom ash. For more, see
Wikipedia's article on fly ash at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fly_ash

I appreciate your note and hope you are right. I merely reported on the
Japanese findings here, and did not do an independent evaluation.

Are you saying that science which disagrees with your own biases should
not be funded? I find that idea silly.

I have no doubt a lot of work is being done on plastic toxicity, and how it
breaks down in the environment.

While I have you on the line, have you seen much work on the use of corn
starch as an ingredient in plastic bags that would help them decompose
more rapidly? That's a story I would love to follow up on.

That's a carefully worded response from Walkercom.

But a quick Internet search indicates that styrene is a suspected
carcinogen, even if it is not yet been proven as the cause of cancer in
humans. Hell, no one is ever 100% sure what causes people to get
sick and die, especially with cancer.

Is not the EPA looking at styrene?

http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/tfacts53.pdf

http://cfpub.epa.gov/ncea/iristrac/index.cfm?
fuseaction=viewChemical.showChemical&sw_id=1051

http://ntp.niehs.nih.gov/index.cfm?objectid=03CA669F-E646-EDBC-
287EFAC0676E8859

There is an EPA-approved in-situ remediation biotechnology that's been proven to destroy a wide range of soil and groundwater contaminants such as chlorinated solvents (like TCE used at dry cleaners), pesticides/herbicides (like Atrazine used on golf courses), heavy metals (like Arsenic found in alot of drinking water wells), organic explosives (like TNT used on military bases), and petroleum hydrocarbons (like MTBE found at gas stations). The firm is called ADVENTUS. Check out their website for case studies at www.AdventusGroup.com

Our whole concept of making something, throwing it away, (into a landfill or the ocean) and expect it to go away is the most nieve thinking in the world and yet this is what the average American thinks, out of sight means out of thinking where it ends up and what the short and long term consequences are....All the landfills we have in the U.S. are like a cancer on the land and eventually on the people..They all leak and end up in our ground water system..A better use is to follow the lead of Europe. They do not allow landfills and thru different processess turn the waste into reusable soil and the balance into energy that is used to create electricity..If we did that same thing we would create enough electricity to power our entire national grid system....

The headline that links to this article is poorly written. It says:

Why pollution is much worse than imagined
Studies we've done on pollution have underestimated our ability to keep it
under wraps. Here's why the mistake is deadly.

Haven't we OVERestimated our ability to keep it under wraps?

Our whole concept of making something, throwing it away, (into a landfill or the ocean) and expect it to go away is the most thinking in the world and yet this is what the average American thinks, out of sight means out of thinking where it ends up and what the short and long term consequences are. All the landfills we have in the U.S. are like a cancer on the land and eventually on the people. They all leak and end up in our ground water system..A better use is to follow the lead of Europe. They do not allow landfills and thru different process turn the waste into reusable soil and the balance into energy that is used to create electricity..If we did that same thing we would create enough electricity to power our entire national grid system.