Three environmental groups say the wood poses a risk to children because of arsenic
St. Petersburg Times, Julie Hauserman
Published October 3, 2001
BETHESDA, Md. - With the economy slumping, the home improvement industry has been telling consumers that this fall is the perfect time to build a new deck.
But in Washington, D.C. Wednesday, three environmental groups asked the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission to ban pressure-treated lumber - one of the most popular building products in America. The wood, they said, poses an unreasonable risk to children because it leaks poisonous arsenic. "Only a ban is going to protect children from this product," said Bill Walsh, of the Healthy Building Network.
Some 30 people met at the headquarters of the Consumer Product Safety
Commission, a federal agency best known for recalling defective toys and unsafe child car seats. The commission is considering a petition, filed by environmentalists, to ban arsenic-treated wood. The commission is unlikely to make a decision until spring.
The environmentalists said Wednesday that the science is strong enough now to show that children under age 6 routinely pick up enough arsenic on their hands while playing on decks and wood playgrounds to increase their risk of getting cancer.
"Children really are exposed to large amounts of arsenic on these play
structures," said Jane Houlihan, research director for the Environmental Working Group. She has studied children's risk from the wood. "Small children face a greater risk. Kids put their hands in their mouths an average of 91/2 times an hour. When kids are eating candy or ice cream or anything, that makes their hands sticky, and they are going to pick up more arsenic."
The arsenic comes from chromated copper arsenate, or CCA, a pesticide that's infused into the wood to make it resist bugs and weather.
Houlihan and the other environmentalists said there are now safer products available - including pressure-treated lumber that's made without arsenic - and it makes sense to get the arsenic wood out of the marketplace.
"This agency needs to intervene," said Jay Feldman, executive director of a group called Beyond Pesticides.
Officials from the wood treatment industry attended the meeting, but did not testify. They gave their scientific presentation earlier this summer.
After Wednesday's meeting, they insisted their product isn't harmful.
"We have said it's safe, because we believe it's safe," said Scott Ramminger, who heads the industry's trade group, the American Wood
Preservers Institute. "Clearly, you can see that what you're talking about is a set of assumptions about how much is in the wood, how much goes from hand to mouth, and the proper people to sort that out are the EPA and the Consumer Product Safety Commission."
Meanwhile, the industry is putting better warning labels on pressure-treated lumber, to let consumers know the wood contains arsenic, and to let anyone who uses it know they should wear gloves, a dust mask, and wash their hands and clothes after working with it. The industry came up with the labels after news reports showed that consumers weren't aware that the wood contains a pesticide. The EPA signed off on the new labels, but the program is voluntary.
At Wednesday's meeting, the man who heads the Consumer Product Safety
Commission's hazard identification and reduction section, Ron Medford, said the government still wants to collect more information. "We think we need better data - and more data - than we already have," Medford said. To that end, the Consumer Product Safety Commission and the EPA will be fanning out across America, starting in November, and taking soil tests at some 75 playgrounds from coast to coast to see if arsenic is leaking into play yards.
Tests in Florida and elsewhere - including some commissioned by the St.
Petersburg Times - have found arsenic in soil near wooden playground
equipment. The EPA has stepped up its own investigation into arsenic-treated wood. During a three-day meeting in Washington starting Oct. 23, the EPA will hear presentations from the latest scientific studies on how much risk children face from arsenic-treated lumber. The agency hasn't begun to address another concern: how much risk carpenters and do-it-yourself builders face from the arsenic.
