“Was not their mistake once more bred of the life of slavery that they had been living?—a life which was always looking upon everything, except mankind, animate and inanimate—‘nature,’ as people used to call it—as one thing, and mankind as another, it was natural to people thinking in this way, that they should try to make ‘nature’ their slave, since they thought ‘nature’ was something outside them” — William Morris


Thursday, November 29, 2012

Cultures of Energy Liveblog 5

BTEX is crude oil's lightest aromatic compound
just one benzene ring

BTEX and PAH known to be carcinogenic, mutagenic, teratogenic.

2004-2007 data to court: capture this, enumerate
Ecuador standard was 1000ppm; levels up to 900 000ppm

the findings found very few BTEX and PAH: they did not exist in virtually all the soil and water samples
The corporations were able to say there was no risk on this basis

Degradation: BTEX is extremely volatile, dissipating from oil quickly, evaporating; can dissolve in water or evaporate
Chevron is correct when it says that the tests demonstrate the virtual absence of BTEX...

"There is no single criterion" for toxicity; the assessment is not based on science of human health risk; "standards may be overly conservative and costly"

The TPH group reviewed data and developed an approach to calculating risk based screening levels
quantifiable level of health protection
>> very comprehensive work

1990s + oil scientists promoted the TPH work >> transformed how hydrocarbon sites are understood
Need for scientific analysis

Gross TPH regulation >> mid 2000s not one US state regulates re: a TPH measure, they use the fractions
new cleanup standards based on dividing hydrocarbons into 13 fractions

The light aromatic hydrocarbons dissipate and biodegrade; heavy PAH's remain in the environment but they are inert: this has been the TPH and industry line

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