Dioxin

Dow Chemical will conduct a test this month to determine whether it would be possible to fuel its Midland operations with energy recovered from burning plastic.
Dow is one of the world’s biggest plastic manufacturers with plastics-related business making up about 40 percent of the company’s $46.6 billion in sales last year, Frank Esposito of Plastic [...]

A federal study of a potent toxin that has contaminated Michigan’s largest watershed may not be done by the end of the year as promised.
The director of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s National Center for Environmental Assessment, Peter Preuss, has reportedly warned that EPA is “really unlikely” to meet the December 2010 deadline set by [...]

A draft of the long-awaited EPA update of its findings on the dangers of dioxin contamination finds that the chemical is more of a health risk than previously believed even at far lower levels of exposure.

A recent study found that eating meat or vegetables grown in the dioxin-contaminated floodplains around Saginaw causes high dioxin levels in the blood, but few people in the area know that and neither Dow nor the government seems to be taking any steps to inform the public.

A Dow Chemical-funded study conducted by researchers at the University of Michigan has found that consumption of food grown in the dioxin-contaminated Tittabawassee floodplain resulted in a toxic burden in the bodies of some local residents.

A coalition of labor groups said today the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed guideline for dioxin cleanup at commercial and industrial sites is not strong enough to protect workers and others from cancer risks.
Late last year EPA recommended that cleanup goals for commercial/industrial soil be changed from 5,000-20,000 ppt to 950 ppt.

Despite a history of ethically challenged research funded by corporations — and Dow Chemical specifically — the University of Michigan is refusing to release internal documents that could reveal problems with a study that downplays the dangers of dioxin.

In response to requests from the chemical industry the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has extended the public comment period on new cleanup goals for dioxin. Critics worry that this extension may signal a softening of EPA’s commitment to addressing the dioxin problem.

Experts and local residents of the dioxin-laden Saginaw River watershed are displeased with a new agreement between the EPA and Dow that allows the chemical company to determine which areas are most in need of cleanup — even after that company has spent decades claiming that there is no need for cleanup at all.

The group that represents American chemical manufacturers wants the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to back off criticisms of a Dow Chemical-funded dioxin exposure study conducted by researchers at U-M’s school of public health.