EPA Allows Asbestos Back Into Building Products

[HereOnThePrimalEdge]

Keep an eye on construction materials if you're building a home or remodeling in Puna (and everywhere else) in the future.

...on June 1, the EPA authorized a “SNUR” (Significant New Use Rule) which allows new products containing asbestos to be created on a case-by-case basis.

Why the change? The EPA:
will “no longer consider the effect or presence of substances in the air, ground, or water in its risk assessments.”

As far as regulating and disclosing if a product contains asbestos:
it will largely be the responsibility of local and state governments, as well as companies and informed consumers to counter these new federal moves.

Edited to add link: https://archpaper.com/2018/08/epa-asbest...facturing/

[terracore]

http://www.iflscience.com/policy/what-do...ally-mean/

"You may have heard the news that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is now allowing new asbestos products to enter the market. That’s right, asbestos – a family of minerals that has been linked to several nasty diseases, including asbestosis and various types of cancer.

However, as Snopes has clarified, the policy change won't affect any of the current bans on asbestos, including on flooring felt, rollboard, and commercial paper. What's more, any proposed new uses of asbestos would have to undergo various EPA assessments before being permitted.

It is also worth noting at this point that asbestos is not currently banned across the board. While its use has been restricted, it is still used in roof coatings, cement pipes, and even clothing among other things..."

[SNIP]

Recycled asbestos (the type that is removed from buildings for health reasons) is recycled into silicate glass for use in porcelain stoneware tiles, porous single-fired wall tiles, ceramic bricks, and other products.

All that being said, I haven't done any research into the EPA change in rulemaking, I only know that people have been promoting the proposed changes for their political agendas.

So as not to be accused of editing the news, the IFLscience article above does go on to weigh against the proposed rulemaking... but only by abandoning science and listing a bunch of opinions of the article writer:

"As with the HONEST Act, this will likely mean piles of important and relevant data concerning public health will be dismissed and, as the New York Times points out, the final risk assessment will be flawed with the EPA deciding there is a lower risk level than there is in reality.

This may be good news for chemical companies, but it's less good news for the public's health."

Not sure how this is good news for chemical companies, as asbestos litigation is the longest, most expensive mass legal liability in the history of the USA.

[HereOnThePrimalEdge]

Hawaii Senator Brian Schatz on the EPA proposal which would allow new products containing asbestos:
Trump’s EPA is bringing back asbestos... This the worst administration in modern history for our environment.

Some of the products that may now involve asbestos in the manufacturing process include adhesives, sealants, pipeline wrap, and several others.
Health advocacy groups are especially against the new proposal. Interview and quotes at the link:
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/cou...os-n898546

“Generalized intelligence and mental alertness are the most powerful enemies of dictatorship and at the same time the basic conditions of effective democracy.” - Aldous Huxley

[Hunt Stoddard]

quote:

---

Originally posted by terracore
Not sure how this is good news for chemical companies, as asbestos litigation is the longest, most expensive mass legal liability in the history of the USA.

---

Unfortunately you can't rely on the possibility of lawsuit to keep industry in line. "If there's a profit to be made today, then damn tomorrow" has been proven time and again. That said, any company that adds asbestos to a building product has to have its head examined, since if word gets out sales would tank.

[ElysianWort]

Another brilliant move by our government. No doubt Trump is behind it.
One step forward, two steps backwards.

[tada]

Should have used asbestos for the Grenfell tower in London.

[HereOnThePrimalEdge]

Should have used asbestos

It wasn’t the lack of fire retardant materials which caused that fire to spread, it was the use of highly flammable sheathing on the structure. Solid asbestos dry wall wouldn’t have helped the victims. And the survivors would get mesothelioma.

Lose-lose.

Up until 1972, General Motors blended whale oil in transmission fluid for its cars. -Spying on Whales

[tada]

Die now or die later. But I'm not a lawyer.




https://canadafreepress.com/article/how-...ll-tragedy

[HereOnThePrimalEdge]

Asbestos could be added to two commonly used products, adhesives and sealants in the near future and then sold in Hawaii. These substances are often applied with a tube, and a caulking gun. The person applying the material often will use his hand to smooth an edge or a lump or a corner, then wipe his hand on his clothing. Can you think of a better way to transfer asbestos fibers from a job site to everywhere that worker travels? Sticky asbestos fibers now end up where he sits in a restaurant for lunch, on the money he touches, on a loaf of bread he takes off the shelf, but puts back because he decided 12 Grain might be more healthy than 10 Grain, and then finally at the end of the day his asbestos coated clothing is thrown in the washing machine, along with his kid's play clothes, mixing not only asbestos fibers throughout the washing machine, but sticky adhesive asbestos fibers, which could potentially cling to anything else in that load of laundry.

The keiki are our future, if they can make it that far.


As far as isolated instances of burning buildings withstanding a fire - - if only they were coated with asbestos, I would like to see the statistics that show older buildings constructed with asbestos will not burn. Are you saying there were few if any building fires before asbestos was outlawed? Would you argue there were few if any deaths from building fires when construction techniques allowed homes and high rises to be made from materials that contained asbestos? Because that's what is implied when an argument is made that "oh, if only that building was made of asbestos, this tragedy could have been entirely avoided." That argument is a fallacy.

I'm glad construction in Puna hasn't used asbestos since the 1970's, I hope that doesn't change.

[gogould]

Remember how a short time ago a Koch brother was railing against the present administration? The Koch organization owns Georgia Pacific. When they bought that company the sale included what has become literally hundreds of thousands of asbestos lawsuits. It was a great deal except for that pesky problem. Cash talks. And a
big stick.
I first encountered the "good asbestos" safety meeting talk for the construction crew in 2008 on a maintenance job on a BP oilfied project. Quite a reversal in a a few short decades.