Re: More on Dioxin and PVC Production

[DrBillC@aol.com]

I will not try to match the volume of Charlie Cray’s last posting.  His
original assertion was <<they have yet to produce any data>> my response,
specifically, Organohalogen Compounds 27, 62 (1996), addresses that assertion
explicitly.

The Swedish EPA data was for one ten-year old sample of PVC--8 ppt.  When
twenty-seven samples of current production resin are all below 1 ppt, and 23
are non-detect for all congeners, Charlie says you wouldn’t have expected to
find any there anyway.  Regardless of assertions regarding other sites, we
stand by the wastewater data: all below 6 ppq.

Of course I’ve read Greenpeace’s press release which might otherwise have
been titled <<Our Stolen Samples.>>  No one really knows what Greenpeace
analyzed because the chain of custody isn’t published. One of the four
samples analyzed, alleged to be sediment found RIGHT outside a Geon plant,
had 16 ppt—not that unusual for soil or sediments anywhere in the US,
according to the reassessment—and Greenpeace didn’t bother to investigate
other sediments or sources upstream or downstream.

BFGoodrich’s chlorinated PVC samples were found to be associated with an
imported resin whose use was discontinued.  The data was submitted to EPA
contemporaneously as a filing under TSCA 8(e).

The data on wastewater treatment sludge and combustor stacks is coming.
 Methodologies used will be published with the results

Bill Carroll
Chlorine Chemistry Council