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Inadvertently Generated PCBs in Consumer Products: Concentrations, Fate and Transport, and Preliminary Exposure Assessment
Citation:
Liu, X., M. Mullin, P. Egeghy, K. Woodward, K. Compton, B. Nickel, M. Aguilar, AND G. Folk. Inadvertently Generated PCBs in Consumer Products: Concentrations, Fate and Transport, and Preliminary Exposure Assessment. ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY. American Chemical Society, Washington, DC, , NA, (2022).
Impact/Purpose:
Although commercial polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) production was banned in 1979 under the Toxics Substance Control Act, inadvertent generation of PCBs through a variety of chemical production processes continues to contaminate products and waste streams. While food consumption has been well-known as the most significant exposure route of PCBs for the general population, there is increasing evidence that inhalation of indoor air and ingestion of indoor dust via hand-to-mouth or hand-to-object-to-mouth pathways also contribute to human exposure, especially for children. This research is to conduct source characterization, emission, and fate and transport experiments and modeling for inadvertently generated PCBs in consumer products. The data generated for multi exposure pathways of inadvertent PCBs from consumer products into the environment is informative for risk assessment.
Description:
Although commercial polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) production was banned in 1979 under the Toxics Substance Control Act, inadvertent generation of PCBs through a variety of chemical production processes continues to contaminate products and waste streams. In this research, a total of 39 consumer products purchased from local and online retailer stores were analyzed for 209 PCB congeners. Inadvertent PCBs (iPCBs) were detected from seven products, and PCB-11 was the most frequently detected congener with a maximum concentration exceeding 800 ng/g. Emission of PCB-11 to air was studied from one foam sheet product using dynamic micro chambers at 40 °C for about 120 days. PCB-11 migration from the product to house dust was also investigated. The IAQX program was then employed to estimate the emissions of PCB-11 from 10 foam sheets to indoor air in a 30 m3 room at 0.5 h-1 air change rate for 30 days. The predicted maximum PCB-11 concentration in the room air (156.8 ng/m3) and the measured concentration in dust (20 ng/g) were applied for the preliminary exposure assessment. The generated data from multi-pathway investigation in this work should be informative for further risk assessment and management for iPCBs.
