PCB Incineration: A Risk to Community Health and the Environment
Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) are a dangerous class of chemicals which bioaccumulate in the body and cause a range of adverse health effects, including cancer, immune suppression, reproductive damage, birth defects, and fetal death. PCBs also accumulate in the environment and move toward the top of the food chain, contaminating fish, birds, and mammals, including humans. Because of the extreme toxicity of PCBs and their persistence in the environment, the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) was passed by Congress in 1974; it outlawed the manufacture and import of PCBs and developed a plan for the phaseout of PCBs in industrial processes.
The Clinton Administration recently lifted the ban on the importation of PCBs, giving the faltering incineration industry new PCB fodder for its flames. Now, unlimited quantities of PCBs can be imported and burned from any country in the world. This PCB importation is occurring just as new, promising non-incineration technologies for PCBs are becoming available and as the United States is in negotiation with other countries to reduce the production, formation, and release of persistent organic pollutants into the global commons.
In the U.S., PCBs have been disposed of primarily by incineration. When PCBs are burned, they create dioxin, a potent toxic chemical with a wide variety of adverse health effects. A recent EPA report states that the average body burdens of dioxins and PCBs among U.S. citizens are already sufficient to place all of use at or near those levels at which human health effects are known to occur. Because of their danger, PCBs are incinerated at facilities that can purportedly achieve a 99.9999% destruction removal equivalence (DRE). However, this DRE is not measured during daily, routine operations when actual PCBs are being burned, instead they are measured during a one-time-only "trial burn" of selected substitute chemicals under carefully controlled conditions.
The Environmental Protection Agency's Science Advisory Board expressed concern about this saying: "Research on (incinerator) performance has occurred only under optimal burn conditions and sampling has, on occasion, been discontinued during upset conditions, which take place with unknown frequency. Even relatively short-term operation of incinerators in upset conditions can greatly increase the total incinerator emitted loadings to the environment."
There are five incinerators permitted under TSCA to burn PCBs. They are Aptus, Inc. in Coffeyville, Kansas and Aragonite, Utah, Chemical Waste management in Port Arthur, Texas, Rollins, Inc. in Deer Park, Texas and Weston, Inc. in West Chester, Pennsylvania. The health threats to the local communities surrounding these incinerators are great, but other areas of the country are threatened as well. A report released last year by the Center for the Biology of Natural Systems concludes that emissions from incinerators in Texas, Florida, Utah, and Louisiana are migrating long distances and contaminating the Great Lakes. Indeed, scientists have found that dioxin and PCBs are found at extremely high levels in the breast milk of Inuit women of northern Quebec, hundreds of miles from the nearest known source.
While incinerator stack emissions are a dire concern, fugitive emissions, chemicals which escape during transportation, storage, and processing, may be an even greater problem. The EPA Science Advisory Board cautions that "...fugitive emissions and accidental spills may release as much or more toxic material to the environment than the direct emissions from incomplete waste incineration." These emissions emanate from leaky valves, vented storage tanks, tank transfers, and spills. For example, in Canada, one PCB incineration facility is estimated to have released 75 pounds of PCBs into the environment during 1994. Fugitive emissions account for more than 98 percent of this total PCB release.
By their very nature, PCBs are difficult to burn. They are thermally stable, resistant to oxidation, acids, bases and other chemical agents and have excellent heat conducting properties. This is why they are used in electric transformers and capacitors.
There are viable alternatives to PCB incineration. In fact, some countries have rejected incineration altogether as a means of hazardous waste disposal. For example Australia relies on the Eli Eco-Logic hydrogenation process, which was developed in Canada, and on base-catalyzed dechlorination, which was developed in the U.S. In the non-incineration remediation methods which are also in use include base-catalytic dechlorination, super-critical water oxidation, and mediated electro-chemical oxidation. In fact, EPA just approved the first portable, non-incineration PCB remediation technology for use anywhere in the U.S. in mid-March.
PCBs, dioxin, and DDT are long-lived toxic chemicals known as persistent organic pollutants (POPs). Because of their toxicity and persistence in the environment, they have become the subject of international negotiations. In October 1995, Mexico, Canada, and the U.S. agreed to work jointly to address POPs. PCBs were the first selected chemical by the Commission on Environmental Cooperation (CEC). In January 1996, the list was expanded to include mercury, DDT, and chlordane. In the future, the CEC will extend the action plan to include all priority pollutants targeted by the United Nations Environment Program. Last November, more than 100 countries agreed to take international action to develop a global, legally binding instrument to ban the manufacture, use, and trade of POPs, which include dioxin and PCBs. That commitment was reaffirmed at a recent meeting in Canberra, Australia where countries called for immediate action, stating that no additional research is necessary.
Action does not mean incineration, or other technologies that increase the release of dioxin and PCBs. Therefore, the U.S. should not be encouraging policies which promote the release of dioxin and PCBs into the environment.
The importation and incineration of PCBs will result in higher PCB and dioxin exposures for the U.S. population, which is already overburdened. Importation will inevitably lead to greater exposures for the communities along the transport routes and those living near the incinerators. Appropriate on-site disposal, using non-incineration technologies, can minimize, to the greater extent possible, exposures for everyone.
KEY FACTS ABOUT IMPORTING PCBs FOR INCINERATION
* Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) are a dangerous class of chemicals that bioaccumulate in the body and cause a range of adverse health effects including cancer, immune suppression, reproductive damage, birth defects, and fetal death.
* PCBs accumulate in the environment and move toward the top of the food chain, contaminating fish, birds, and mammals, including humans.
* PCBs are the only chemical that Congress singled out for phase-out under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) of 1976.
* TSCA requires that "no person may manufacture any polychlorinated biphenyl after two years after January 1, 1977." "Manufacture" is defined to include "import into the customs territory of the United States."
* Incinerators permitted under TSCA to burn PCBs are located at:
Coffeyville, Kansas (Aptus, Inc.)
Aragonite, Utah (Aptus, Inc.)
Port Arthur, Texas (Chemical Waste Management)
Deer Park, Texas (Rollins, Inc.)
West Chester, Pennsylvania (Weston, Inc.)
* PCBs, when incinerated, release dioxin (including the most deadly dioxin called 2,3,7,8 - tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin, or TCDD) and dioxin-like chemicals, the most toxic chemicals known.
* Like PCBs, dioxins cause a range of adverse health effects and bioaccumulate.
* The EPA's recent Dioxin Reassessment indicates that dioxin levels in the bodies and breast milk of the average American are already at levels of concern.
* Several alternative methods of PCB disposal that do not produce dioxins are under active development and are showing promise.