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Thirty years ago, Monsanto stopped manufacturing polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), chemical compounds which consist of chlorine, carbon and hydrogen. As the primary U.S. manufacturer of these chlorinated hydrocarbons, Monsanto ended 50 years of PCB production on American soil. The company's 1977 decision followed passage of the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) of 1976, a statute which empowered the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to track thousands of industrial chemicals. On July 2, 1979, federal law banned the production of PCBs altogether.
For many years, PCBs were used as electrical insulators in transformers and capacitors. They were marketed under trade names such as Aroclor, Askarel, Pyroclor, Sanotherm, Kennechlor, Hyvol, Chlorextol, and Pyranol. PCBs were popular because they were inexpensive and did not conduct electricity. They could also tolerate high temperatures and last a long time without degrading. Although PCBs were first used in electrical components, they were eventually used in heat transfer products, hydraulic fluids, adhesives, dye carriers, and plasticizers. Older electronic devices such as fluorescent lights, refrigerators, and television sets also contained PCBs.
PCBs were first manufactured commercially in 1927, by Alabama's Anniston Ordnance Company, the forerunner of Swann Chemical. Several years later, 23 of 24 workers at the plant began suffering from acne-like pustules – a classic sign of PCB exposure. After Swann was purchased by Monsanto in 1935, a senior official with the U.S. Public Health Surface reported that a plant worker's family had developed the same skin ailments from contact with the worker's clothes. In 1937, a conference at the Harvard School of Public Health concluded that "chlorinated diphenyl is certainly capable of doing harm in very low concentrations and is probably the most dangerous" of the chlorinated hydrocarbons studied.
For its part, American industry sought to minimize what Sanford Brown, president of Halowax Corp, called "mob hysteria" about the dangers of PCBs. A 1938 study by Westinghouse and General Electric (GE) asserted that skin contact with a PCB-oil mixture would not cause liver damage, but called for "greater personal hygiene" among workers who handled PCBs. A secret Monsanto study went further, however, admitting that "the toxicity of those compounds (PCBs) has been repeatedly demonstrated". Although Monsanto researchers continued to exchange confidential memos about their concerns, the chemical company did not provide workers with protective clothing and gear until the mid-1950s. By then, companies such as GE, Westinghouse, Sprague Electric and Appleton Paper had begun dumping PCBs and PCB-contaminated wastes in nearby waterways.
Click here for Part 2 of this series.
Resources:
http://www.clearwater.org/news/timeline.html
http://www.hercenter.org/facilitiesandgrounds/pcbs.cfm
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Re: The Truth About PCBs (Part 1)
