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 Media Center > Target and PVC
PVC – the Poison Plastic:
Cancer-Causing Chemicals Used and Released in Manufacture
PVC is the second largest commodity plastic in production in the world today, with over 59 billion pounds produced worldwide a year. PVC is commonly used in building materials such as pipes, siding, flooring, and wall coverings. It’s also used in many consumer products such as children’s toys, infant products, electronics, shower curtains, and packaging. Highly hazardous chemicals including dioxins and furans, vinyl chloride, ethylene dichloride, lead, mercury, and phthalates are used or released in the manufacture and disposal of PVC. Vinyl chloride, the key building block of PVC, is a known human carcinogen, can increase the risk of a rare form of liver cancer, impact the nervous system, and has been linked to an increased incidence of birth defects.
Polluting PVC Plants in Communities of Color
PVC plants are often located in low-income communities and communities of color, making the production of PVC a major environmental justice concern for neighboring residents. PVC’s toxic lifecycle is probably felt no stronger than in Mossville, Louisiana, a small community of about 1,500 African Americans. This town is surrounded by a toxic cluster of four vinyl production facilities including two major vinyl chloride manufacturers, producing more vinyl than any other community in the country making it the unofficial PVC capitol of America. Studies by the EPA have found levels of vinyl chloride, a known carcinogen used to make PVC, more than 120 times higher than air standards in the Mossville area. Mossville area PVC plants have contaminated not only the air, but also the groundwater in the community, which has forced many families to abandon their homes and move out of the neighborhood. Most recently, chemist Wilma Subra found that high levels of cancer-causing dioxins in the bodies of Mossville residents corresponded with the dioxins being released by PVC chemical plants nearby.
PVC Harmful to Workers
Studies have documented links between working in PVC facilities and the increased likelihood of developing diseases including angiosarcoma of the liver, a rare form of liver cancer, brain cancer, lung cancer, lymphomas, leukemia, and liver cirrhosis. Workers face deadly hazards from accidents and explosions on the job at PVC manufacturing plants. In mid-August 2007, no less than eight workers were killed from major accidents at PVC plants in India and Russia. On April 23, 2004, a Formosa Plastics PVC plant in Illinois exploded, killing five workers.
Toxic PVC Toys
Infants and children chewing on PVC toys and baby products may be exposed to phthalates, dangerous chemicals linked to premature birth delivery, early puberty in girls, impaired sperm quality and sperm damage in men, genital defects and reduced testosterone production in boys. On the government level, California just joined the European Union and fourteen countries in banning phthalates in children’s toys. Six other states are considering similar measures. About 5.4 million tons of phthalates and 156 thousand tons of lead are used each year in the worldwide production of PVC. The world stock of PVC in use contains a staggering 3.2 million tons of lead. Lead has been found in PVC children’s toys, lunch boxes, baby bibs, packaging, electronics, and even Christmas trees. Short or long–term exposure to lead can harm young children, babies, and even adults. It can damage the brain and nervous system, cause behavior and learning problems, slowed grown, hearing problems, head aches, difficulties during pregnancy, other reproductive problems, and more.
Toxic PVC Shower Curtains
That new vinyl shower smell may be toxic in the home. Researchers at the US EPA reported that a vinyl shower curtain released 14 different compounds into the air, including methanol, methlyene chloride, toluene, and phenol, which are classified as hazardous air pollutants by the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments. In 2002, the same researchers reported that one new vinyl shower curtain in the bathroom, “can cause elevated indoor air toxics concentrations…for more than a month.” Four air toxics—toluene, methyl isobutyl ketone (MIBK), ethylbenzene, and phenol—were detected. Toluene is listed as a developmental toxin, and ethylbenzene is listed as a carcinogen, under California Proposition 65 law. Another study by the Danish EPA found that vinyl shower curtains contain organotins and high levels of the phthalate DEHP, a dangerous reproductive toxicant.
Terrorist Risks
A 2002 Rand report for the U.S. Air Force identified chlorine gas storage and transport facilities as among the top chemical targets for a terrorist attack and cited examples of a number of such threats and attacks already carried out around the world. As a prime feedstock for PVC, chlorine makes the PVC manufacturing plants and the trains that supply them highly vulnerable to terrorist attacks. Experts predict that as many as 100,000 Americans could be killed or injured in just 30 minutes as a result of a terrorist attack on railways carrying lethal chlorine. In July, 2004, the Homeland Security Council estimated that an attack on a single chlorine facility could kill 17,500 people, severely injure an additional 10,000 and result in 100,000 hospitalizations and 70,000 evacuations.
The Deadly Connection: PVC, Chlorine and Dioxin
PVC is particularly unique from most other plastics because it is chlorine-based, 57% chlorine when pure, making it a major dioxin source during production and especially in disposal. Dioxins are a highly toxic group of chemicals that build up in the food chain, can cause cancer and can harm the immune and reproductive system. Dioxins are so toxic they’re one of twelve chemicals that have been targeted for a global phase out by an international treaty, the global Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants. Dioxins have also been targeted for phase out in the Great Lakes by a binational advisory body of the United States and Canadian governments charged with protection of the Great Lakes ecosystem. PVC is the leading contributor of chlorine to four combustion sources –municipal solid waste incinerators, backyard burn barrels, medical waste incinerators and secondary copper smelters – that account for an estimated 80% of dioxin air emissions.
No Safe Way to Dispose of PVC
More than 100 municipal waste incinerators in the U.S. burn 500 to 600 million pounds of PVC each year, forming dioxins and releasing lead and other toxic additives to the air and ash disposed of on land. An average of 8,400 landfill fires are reported every year in the U.S., contributing further to PVC waste combustion and dioxin pollution. PVC packaging has a national recycling rate far lower than other plastics. Just .7% of PVC bottles were recycled in 2004, compared to 21.6% for PET plastic bottles and 25.9% for HDPE bottles. One PVC bottle can contaminate and ruin a recycling load of 100,000 recyclable PET bottles.
Safer Alternatives are Available
Safe, cost-effective alternatives to PVC are readily available for virtually every use. From safer plastics, to bio-based materials, there is a growing market replacing hazardous PVC products. Some safer plastics include PLA, PET, HDPE, LDPE, EVA, and PP. One way to be sure if the packaging of a product is made from PVC is to look for the number “3” inside or the letter “V” underneath the universal recycling symbol. In addition, soft flexible plastic products that are made with PVC often have a distinct odor, such as vinyl shower curtains. Some other plastics, particularly Polycarbonate, Polystyrene, and Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene, should be avoided due to health and environmental concerns. For additional information, visit http://www.besafenet.com/pvc/safe.htm
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