Re: new dioxin-like family ID'ed / Chlor-Alk furans

["Jon Campbell" <jon@cqs.com>]

This might be extremely significant with respect to incinerators!

Thanks
Jon
----- Original Message -----
From: Tony Tweedale <ttweed@wildrockies.org>
To: Multiple recipients of list DIOXIN-L <dioxin-l@essential.org>
Sent: Monday, September 13, 1999 3:06 AM
Subject: new dioxin-like family ID'ed / Chlor-Alk furans


> the 3/99 Amer Chem Society meeting and their Preprints of Extended
> Abstracts had a session on POPs.  A couple of the more interesting
extended
> abstracts:
> --
>
> Harun Parlar (Techn U., Munich): Chlorinated DIPHENOQUINOES: a new class
of
> dioxin isomeric compounds' (p. 184-6)
>
> Under oxidative conditions, phenols can couple at the para position,
> leading to a double quinoid system.  Apparantly after going through a
> dihydroxy-biphenyl stage (as in PCBs), the oxidative conditions make the
> C-to-C bond between the 2 phenol rings a double bond--somewhat more stable
> and more planar (less rotation).  The alcolhol groups of the phenols also
> become double bonded oxygens (esters, I thnk).  The 2,3,7,8 equivalent
> positions are the 3,3,5,5 positions.  In oxidative condition tests, the
> diphenoquinnes were created in the same order of magnitude as dioxins! The
> paper describes a new analytical method, so I guess we can assume that
they
> have not been counted as PCDD/F peaks in previous analysis.
> --
>
>
> Y. Xu, W Z Wu et al. (INstitute Hydrobiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences;
> and Institu fur Okologische Chemie)  'Source, Distribution &
> Bioaccumulation of PCDD/F in Ya-Er Lake, China' (p. 175-6)
>
> (This abstract has translation unclarity & typos)  An unamed chlor-alkali
> plant on the Yangtze River that (or where) also produced pesticides until
> '83 had some wastes analyzed, and sediment cores were taken in this lake
on
> the river, as well as liver samples from fish & fowl.  It *reads like* it
> is the sludge from the graphite electrolytic anode that has 200,000 ng/kg
> (ppt, or 0.3 ppm) total furans (the 300,000 is twice written as
'3000,000',
> but in both cases immediatelly followed by a statement that "240,000 ng/kg
> of which was 2,3,7,8-substituted furans", so I think they meant
'300,000').
> It may be they are talking about levels in the sediment cores, but I
> don't think so, even tho the sediment PCDD/F levels aren't mentioned.
They
> do say that only low levels (<50 ng/kg) of PCDD/F were found in the "other
> four [un-named] chloralkali  product samples."  The sediment nearest the
> plant did not have octafuran dominating the profile, as the other sedimet
> cores did.
>
> Anyway, more proof that chlor-alkali plants produce PCDD/F.
>
> Tony Tweedale
>
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> (1711-'76)
>
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