Sludge Watch ==> California - School contaminated with vinyl chloride -soil and groundwater plume

[Maureen Reilly]

Sludgewatch Admin:

There are more and more concerns about school contamination.  Schools are 
using sewage sludge on playing fields.  In many parts of the US and Canada 
areas designated for suburban development are heavily sludged just a year or 
two before the houses are constructed.

These subdivisions and their schools are being built on top of tons of 
sludge.  There are lawsuits related to sludge contamination in subdivisions 
in a number of states in the USA.

The Norco school case below speaks to the need to do a full environmental 
assessment near waste facilities.  What is being done for students and 
teachers who are now exposed to these toxins?

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California

Norco High contamination mystery lingers; no problems found at other schools



  To Download story podcast go to:
http://www.pe.com/localnews/coronaarea/stories/PE_News_Local_C_gas21.ac3e03.html



10:00 PM PDT on Friday, April 20, 2007

By PAIGE AUSTIN
The Press-Enterprise

Parents, students and teachers can breathe easier, knowing that common 
construction materials are not releasing a cancer-causing gas into 
classrooms, officials with the Corona-Norco Unified School District said 
Friday.

Preliminary test results from indoor air samples taken at Corona High School 
and El Cerrito Middle School do not show levels of the carcinogen vinyl 
chloride, said Ted Rozzi, the district's assistant superintendent for 
facilities. The tests commissioned by the district last month were the first 
major efforts nationwide to test vinyl tiles, carpets and wall coverings for 
links to cancer-causing indoor pollution in public buildings. If the 
district had found traces of vinyl chloride in the air, the findings would 
have had major public-health effects.

This week's findings suggest that there is not a widespread health threat 
from building materials, but it also leaves school and state officials 
wondering why vinyl chloride gas has been found in the air at Norco High 
School.

"This is good news. I'd rather be dealing with a unique situation at one 
school than to discover that we have a widespread problem," said school 
board member Bill Hedrick. "We're back to wrestling with why (the 
contamination) is at Norco High School."

The findings were pretty predictable, said Hedrick, who has long maintained 
that the indoor air pollution is likely linked to underground contamination 
from the nearby Wyle Labs hazardous-waste site.

The California Department of Toxic Substances Control found the 
contamination at Norco High while investigating pollution from Wyle Labs, 
which is across the street from the school.

Wyle Labs, which closed two years ago, tested military products, electronics 
and parts for rocket engines and space shuttles at the site for about 47 
years.

The state had traced a plume of soil and groundwater pollution from Wyle to 
the surrounding residential neighborhood and below portions of the high 
school. Trichloroethylene, also known as TCE, is the main contaminant in the 
plume. TCE, a banned industrial solvent, breaks down into vinyl chloride, 
and that fact led state officials to suspect that the underground plume 
could be linked to the indoor air gas.

However, state officials were unable to link the school's indoor pollution 
to the plume, prompting them to speculate that the building materials were 
to blame.

The district ran tests at the two other schools because they have buildings 
that were erected about the same time as the affected building at Norco High 
School using the same materials.

Working with state officials, the district plans to continue testing at 
Norco High School to find the source of the problem, said Rozzi. They will 
test indoor air in the school's science building early next month to see 
whether the building's ventilation system is properly dispersing the gas, he 
said.

In June, the state will conduct another round of underground testing to try 
to link the plume to the indoor air pollution.

Susie Wong, a spokeswoman for the Department of Toxic Substances Control, 
said department officials have not yet seen the test results from Corona 
High and El Cerrito Middle schools and cannot comment on them.

Although officials are no closer to identifying the cause of the problem at 
Norco High School, Hedrick says he has no regrets about spending the time 
and energy testing the building materials in other schools.

"We bring all of these students together, and I think we need to have a high 
standard to ensure their safety," he said. "(Vinyl chloride) is not a 
chemical you want around if you can avoid it. I think we will continue to 
try to mitigate it and discover the cause."

The levels of vinyl chloride inside Norco High School are not high enough to 
pose a health risk to students, but they could slightly increase the cancer 
risk to employees who work in the contaminated areas for decades, said state 
officials overseeing the Wyle cleanup effort.

In all likelihood, the indoor air contamination is coming from the plume, 
said Mike Schade, the polyvinyl chloride campaign coordinator for the Center 
for Health, Environment and Justice. The center is a nonprofit organization 
that works with communities dealing with hazardous building materials as 
well as waste sites where underground pollution seeps indoors by a process 
called vapor intrusion.

Schade called on state and school district officials to continue 
investigating the source of contamination at Norco High School in order to 
eliminate it.

http://www.pe.com/localnews/coronaarea/stories/PE_News_Local_C_gas21.ac3e03.html