EPA: Asbestos in garden only a hazard if you handle vermiculite regularly

WASHINGTON -- Commercial gardeners, nursery workers and others who handle vermiculite on a regular basis could face a significant risk of asbestos-related disease, but the risk for home gardeners is negligible, according to a yet-to-be-released Environmental Protection Agency study.

The EPA plans to release a final version of the national study of asbestos contamination of garden and packaging products within 10 days.

Meanwhile, the agency is conducting additional tests. But some members of the vermiculite industry are already saying the EPA's research is flawed.

Investigators in Seattle and Washington, D.C., repeatedly tested more than three dozen lawn products purchased in 11 states during the past five months.

The initial round of tests found measurable levels of asbestos in five brands of vermiculite. The remaining lawn products tested -- blends of soil, fertilizers and vermiculite -- were either free of asbestos or contained only trace amounts.

The intricate assessments of the risk of using asbestos-contaminated vermiculite show that home gardeners who use the product once a year for 30 years face a negligible risk of contracting cancer from the asbestos. However, commercial gardeners, nursery workers and people using bulk vermiculite on a regular basis, also for 30 years, could face a greatly increased cancer risk, depending on the material used.

Preliminary assessment for the workers' group calculated a risk that could mean as much as one additional cancer for every 100 workers using the tainted vermiculite.

Although government agencies differ over what degree of increased risk will trigger official action, most agree that anything greater than one extra cancer per 1,000 people is serious.

The EPA's concern over vermiculite surfaced in January when the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, as part of its continuing examination of the issue of asbestos regulation, had several vermiculite-containing products analyzed. Asbestos was detected and the results were given to the EPA's regional office.

The regional office did its own tests, which also found asbestos in the products.

EPA's national headquarters then ordered additional surveys and hired Versar Inc., a consulting firm the EPA used 15 years ago to investigate vermiculite in consumer products, to conduct the new tests.

The final EPA report -- a combination of Region 10's and Versar's work -- was expected in early July. But after a July 6 meeting at agency headquarters with members of the vermiculite industry, the EPA agreed to do more tests and risk assessment.

The meeting included senior EPA officials; scientists from Versar; officers of The Vermiculite Association (TVA); representatives from The Scotts Co. and the Schundler Co., two of the nation's largest producers of lawn and garden products; and representatives of W.R. Grace & Co. and Virginia Vermiculite, who run the country's two largest vermiculite mines.

EPA officials gave the gathering a list of the products tested and where they were purchased.

The group was not shy about expressing concern over EPA's methods.

"Based on comments made at the meeting, TVA has grave concerns that the planned Versar report of the testing may inappropriately emphasize Versar's few findings of asbestos and thus be misconstrued by the public," association President Michael Allen wrote on July 18 to John Melone, director of the EPA's National Program Chemical Division.

Allen listed questions about 16 areas of the testing.

The association was especially concerned over the EPA's admission that the analytical results were "mixed," says Charles Simmons, a Washington lawyer who briefly was a spokesman for the United Kingdom-based TVA.

"We interpreted this to mean that the agency is experiencing substantial difficulty in identification and quantification" of the asbestos in the vermiculite, Simmons said, but acknowledged that the EPA did not provide its complete test results.

Details of the testing

Discussions with those familiar with the testing and a review of EPA documents obtained by the Post-Intelligencer indicate the agency's scientists are having no problem identifying or quantifying asbestos detected in the samples.

Several methods of testing with increasing sensitivity -- all long-accepted procedures -- were and are being used. But there was inconsistency in some results.

For example, examination of vermiculite from one sample would detect no asbestos, but a subsequent analysis of another sample from the same bag would find asbestos. Scientists say these differences are partly a result of the non-homogenous nature of the products. The asbestos is a contaminant of some vermiculite ore, and the hazardous fibers are not uniformly distributed in the material.

The level of asbestos in vermiculite will differ not only from mine to mine, but also within the mines themselves.

"Human exposure to respirable asbestos is a very serious concern," Simmons added, and cautioned: "Asbestos is not expected to be associated with all vermiculite."

The existence alone of asbestos in a product does not present a serious health risk unless those fibers are inhaled or ingested. So EPA investigators in Seattle and at Versar simulated how consumers might use vermiculite.

In a 10-foot-square, plastic-lined room in a Washington, D.C., suburb, scientists, wearing sensitive air filters, emulated how a home gardener would likely use vermiculite. Asbestos fibers, in some cases at relatively high levels, were found in microscopic examination of the air filters.

Although the EPA is the lead agency in this study, its findings -- because they deal with products sold in the marketplace and the health of workers using vermiculite -- would have to be acted upon by the Consumer Product Safety Commission and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

Neither agency would publicly discuss its views on the testing done thus far, but several people in OSHA and other sections of the Department of Labor expressed concern at what they characterized as a surprisingly high exposure threat to workers.

The EPA's role in testing the products is authorized under the Toxic Substances Control Act, which was passed by Congress in the mid-'70s, said Stephen Johnson, EPA's deputy assistant administrator for the Office of Prevention, Pesticides and Toxic Substances.

"TSCA gives us broad authority to regulate chemicals such as asbestos, lead and PCBs and so forth," Johnson said.

"We could mandate labeling. We could limit or restrict the use of the material. We could ban the material from use. There are provisions which allow us to initiate a civil suit for an imminent hazard to deal with the situation."

But the EPA's actions and those of CPSC and OSHA will depend on the level of asbestos documented in the final report, something he declined to discuss.

"Generically," Johnson said, "in the area of additional cancer risks, our general benchmark for taking action is when we start to see numbers that exceed one additional death per 100,000 to one in 1 million. That's when we become somewhat concerned. If we start to see numbers of one added death in 1,000 to one in 10,000 for the general population, then those numbers are of real concern to us."

The debate over fibers

Some in EPA and OSHA believe the industry's expected attack on the reports will dust off the frequently used industry rebuttal: The fibers were not asbestos, but only look like asbestos.

The groundwork for this argument has been laid in a letter to Melone dated July 14 from Virginia Vermiculite, which is owned by Robert Sansom, a former EPA associate administrator and White House staff member under Ronald Reagan.

The 25-page package was to "provide (Melone) with information on 'true asbestos' vs. 'non-asbestiform' . . . which can also exist in a fiber-like form."

The letter also questioned a micro-photograph of a fiber handed out in the July 6 meeting: "This particle, according to the experts that testified before OSHA, is not an asbestos-type particle."

Asbestos is a generic term used to describe a number of naturally occurring fibrous minerals, including chrysotile, amosite, crocidolite, anthophyllite, actinolite and tremolite. All have been proved to cause fatal diseases.

The asbestos and stone industries have long and, for the most part successfully, argued that six fibers regulated by the government are the only true asbestos. Physicians who have treated asbestos, vermiculite and talc miners and workers say if a fiber looks like asbestos and kills like asbestos, the government ought to regulate it.

More than 37 million pounds of vermiculite are produced in the United States each year from ore mined by Grace in South Carolina and Virginia Vermiculite in Louisa, Va., according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

The ore is exfoliated -- heat-treated -- which causes it to expand, popcornlike. There are 20 exfoliating plants in 13 states, the USGS said, selling processed vermiculite to hundreds of companies in scores of industries.

In November, the P-I reported that vermiculite ore from a now-closed mine owned by Grace in Libby, Mont., had caused asbestos-related disease and deaths among miners and their families for decades.

That ore was sent to hundreds of exfoliating plants, where it caused more fatal asbestos-related disease.

The major uses of the product are in agricultural and horticultural work, as well as insulation and construction.

Thousands of workers -- ranging from those who use vermiculite as a base for swimming pools, to plasterers, cement mixers and insulation installers -- are exposed to far greater amounts of vermiculite than horticultural workers.

OSHA declined to comment publicly on the EPA report and what the findings might mean to other vermiculite workers.

When the EPA releases this study it will be the fourth time in 20 years the agency reported on dangers of asbestos-contaminated vermiculite to consumers and workers.

Even though the first three investigations -- 1980, 1985 and 1991 -- documented significant risk of increased cancer from exposure to the tainted feather-weight mineral, neither the EPA nor any other government agency took action.

These studies were among dozens of government reports done on Libby vermiculite that the P-I reported last year were shelved and ignored by the EPA.

An EPA spokeswoman wouldn't comment on why no action has been taken, saying the agency's inspector general is investigating.

P-I reporter Carol Smith contributed to this story.

P-I senior national correspondent Andrew Schneider can be reached at 206-448-8218 or andrewschneider@seattle-pi.com

INSIDE SEATTLEPI.COM