December 11, 2002—A lawsuit was recently filed in federal court by Beyond Pesticides, an environmental group, and the Communications Workers of America (CWA), affiliated with the AFL-CIO, the Canadian Labour Congress and the worldwide Union Network International, the Oakland, CA-based Center for Environmental Health, and a victim family from Florida to stop the use of arsenic and dioxin-laden wood preservatives, which are used to treat lumber, utility poles and railroad ties.
The litigation charges that the chemicals, known carcinogenic agents, hurt utility workers exposed to treated poles, children playing near treated structures, and the environment, and cites the availability of alternatives.
The complaint seeks to stop the continued use of the wood preservatives chromated copper arsenate (CCA), pentachlorophenol (penta) and creosote. The plaintiffs say that EPA has overwhelming data on the wood preservatives’ health and environmental risks and is aware of widely available and economically viable alternatives that compel the agency to stop use, rather than continue reviews that have gone on for over 20 years.
The lawsuit also cites EPA’s test results that indicate that continued disposal of treated wood in municipal landfills does not provide necessary protection and violates EPA’s hazardous waste regulations. Beyond Pesticides has filed a separate petition urging EPA to reclassify pesticide-treated wood waste as hazardous, citing requirements in law.
The principal users of chemically treated wood products include utility companies (treated wood poles), construction companies (treated lumber) and the railroad owners (treated railroad ties). Wood treated with CCA is widely available through retail markets. The arsenic treated wood used to build playground equipment and decks will be available in the marketplace for years, as wood preservers agreed to stop producing wood for these uses only as of December 31, 2003. In the latest data available from the American Wood Preservatives Institute’s 1995 statistical report, 1.6 billion pounds of wood preservatives are used to treat wood annually, 138 million pounds of CCA, 656 million pounds of penta and 825 million pounds of creosote. The vast majority of wood preserving arsenic, penta and creosote are used in a broad array of products from utility poles to railroad ties.
The three wood preservatives targeted by the lawsuit are linked to a wide range of health problems including cancer, birth defects, kidney and liver damage, disruption of the endocrine system and death.
EPA has calculated that children exposed to soil contaminated with penta leaching out of utility poles face a risk of cancer that is 220 times higher than the agency’s acceptable level. According to EPA’s own data, a typical worker who paints penta onto poles in the field faces more than a 100% lifetime risk of cancer. Other categories of workers, such as utility pole installers, also face risks many times above EPA’s “acceptable” level. The practice of allowing the disposal of treated wood in unlined dumps or its recycling into mulch is exacerbating contamination and risk factors, according to the lawsuit.
