[CPEO-BIF] ", EPA begins testing air in homes near South Bay Superfund sites, " Los Angeles County, California

[Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@cpeo.org>]

EPA begins testing air in homes near South Bay Superfund sites


By Tony Barboza 
Los Angeles Times (CA)
March 9, 2014

The EPA is testing the air in homes near two of the nation's worst chemical dumping sites in the South Bay
Nearly 15 years after crews dug up and replaced contaminated soil from Cynthia Medina's frontyard, federal officials have placed dart-sized air quality samplers in her South Bay home. The tests will reveal whether dangerous vapors are seeping inside from polluted groundwater below her house.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency last month began testing the air inside dozens of homes near two of the nation's worst chemical dumping sites for trichloroethylene, benzene and chlorobenzene. They were prompted by worries that, through a process known as vapor intrusion, the pollutants could be evaporating through the soil and into homes and putting residents at risk.

Medina and other residents and community activists have pleaded with the EPA in recent years to test their homes for soil vapors. Their demands followed decades of discoveries of contaminated soil and groundwater in the unincorporated community near Torrance, the legacy of decades of chemical dumping at the former Montrose Chemical Corp. DDT plant, at the Del Amo synthetic rubber plant and at other industrial operations that closed years ago.

Federal officials now agree that indoor air quality tests are urgently needed. They cite recent scientific studies that show breathing trichloroethylene, or TCE, an industrial solvent often used in the area, poses more serious health risks, including cancer and birth defects, than previously thought.


…

For the entire article, see
http://www.latimes.com/science/la-me-del-amo-20150309-story.html#page=1

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Lenny Siegel
Executive Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight
a project of the Pacific Studies Center
278-A Hope Street
Mountain View, CA 94041
Voice: 650-961-8918 or 650-969-1545
Fax: 650-961-8918
LSiegel@cpeo.org
http://www.cpeo.org




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