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3M Might Just Escape Its Toxic Chemical Legacy
The Command strip is one of those quintessential 3M products. Released in 1996, it was simple yet revolutionary, strong enough to hold items without stripping paint when removed. Soon it was fastening framed photos, bathroom towels and outdoor decorations around the world.
The adhesive that made the strip possible was invented by a 3M scientist in the late 1980s. The exact science is a closely guarded secret, but it can resist gravity while somehow pulling away clean when tugged as instructed. In hindsight the market for such an invention is obvious, and yet it was almost lost to corporate bureaucracy.
3M is one of the most sparkling brand names in US business history, known for advancing material science to the point that the first astronauts who walked on the moon were equipped with boots made from its synthetic rubber. If America wanted it, 3M could invent and produce it, building its fortunes on products as innocuous as Post-it notes and as dangerous as chemicals lining nonstick pans.
First and foremost, those pan-lining chemicals — specifically certain types of perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, which were also used in products such as Scotchgard fabric protector and firefighting foam — have been found to increase the risk of cancer, decrease fertility and suppress the immune system, including weakening response to vaccines. Those findings have fueled a vast array of lawsuits that analysts estimate could end up costing 3M in the neighborhood of $20 billion, including ones it has already settled.
‘Forever Chemicals’ Found in Nearly All Southeast Louisiana Drinking Water Samples
Louisiana Illuminator reported:
A new report is sounding the alarm over the presence of harmful chemicals and heavy metals in Southeast Louisiana’s drinking water.
The Southeast Louisiana Residential Water Quality Study, conducted by the Water Collaborative of Greater New Orleans, tested for contaminants in home tap water from seven parishes. Nearly every home among the 107 total tested in St. James, St. John the Baptist, St. Charles, Jefferson, Orleans, St. Bernard and Plaquemines parishes had at least trace amounts per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS for short.
The consumption of PFAS – also known as “forever chemicals” because they don’t naturally degrade – has been linked to high cholesterol, liver damage, increased risk of thyroid disease and reduced vaccine response in children.
PFAS have widespread uses in consumer and industrial products, including nonstick cookware, cleaning products, carpets, waterproof clothing and firefighting foam. As contaminants, they have been found in air, water, soil and fish.
The study was conducted to inform residents about the long-term health risk of low-level exposures to lead, arsenic and PFAS “even when most detections fall below enforceable limits,” according to the study.
Scientists Warn: Bottled Water May Pose Serious Long-Term Health Risks
The tropical beauty of Thailand’s Phi Phi islands is not the kind of place where most PhD journeys begin. For Sarah Sajedi, however, it was not the beaches themselves but what lay beneath them that sparked her decision to leave a career in business and pursue academic research.
“I was standing there looking out at this gorgeous view of the Andaman Sea, and then I looked down and beneath my feet were all these pieces of plastic, most of them water bottles,” she says. “I’ve always had a passion for waste reduction, but I realized that this was a problem with consumption.”
Sajedi, BSc ’91, decided to return to Concordia to pursue a Ph.D. with a focus on plastic waste. As the co-founder of ERA Environmental Management Solutions, a leading provider of environmental, health, and safety software, she brought decades of experience to compliment her studies.
Her latest paper, published in the Journal of Hazardous Materials, looks at the science around the health risks posed by single-use plastic water bottles. They are serious, she says, and seriously understudied.
Sarah Sajedi with Chunjiang An: “Drinking water from plastic bottles is fine in an emergency but it is not something that should be used in daily life.”
Appeal Could Make It Easier for Companies to Spread Drilling Fluids on Pennsylvania Roadways
In rural Western Pennsylvania, communities routinely spray briny fluids on unpaved backroads to control dust in the warmer months and ice in the winter. Often, those liquids are drilling byproducts from nearby conventional oil and gas wells.
That mostly comes courtesy of a loophole in state law that opponents say poses a risk to human and environmental health, and that they fear may soon become larger.
A potentially landmark legal case on the practice is currently before the state Environmental Hearing Board, a quasi-judicial body that hears appeals to state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) regulations. The matter follows a previous case before the board that prompted the DEP in 2018 to impose a moratorium on formal approvals for such “roadspreading” using wastes from oil and gas wells.
But that left open the door for companies to try a second route, by instead claiming the liquids are a “coproduct.” Under that process, they test their fluids, which can contain toxic metals and radioactive materials, to ostensibly ensure they are comparable to existing commercial products. When the DEP called the coproduct testing of a northwest Pennsylvania company “invalid” this year, the firm appealed to the board.
