Published: December 26, 2007 11:57 pm      

ENVIRONMENT: Activists to push N.Y. for better standards on toxic vapors

Niagara County residents are among a group of about 20 activists who will be asking New York state for faster investigations and better standards with toxic vapors.

The New York Vapor Intrusion Alliance was born after the activists met in November to discuss the problem of toxic vapors and the health hazards they cause. The activists came from counties all over the state, including Niagara. The group wants New York to do more to try to detect fumes and produce a better way to take care of the problem. The November meeting focused on the how activists’ actions in the past could help each other now.

“It was combining resources,” said Sue Hughes of Lockport. “Basically we all listened to what was going on in each other’s communities and found ways that past experiences could make the process run smoother.”

Hughes, along with Julie Rizzo of Middleport, were the Alliance’s representatives for Niagara County.

Hughes said there are several things the Alliance wanted the state Legislature to move quickly on. The first deals with the state Legislature’s Committee for Children’s Environmental Health and Safety. The committee is on the drawing boards, but does not have any members yet.

“It has yet to be seated,” Hughes said. She said once the committee gets off the ground, the Alliance will focus on getting the Legislature to take action on safety regulations that have already been passed by the state.

Another item the Alliance will lobby for is to mandate private well testing.

The new legislative session will begin Jan. 9, and the Alliance plans to meet in Albany on Jan. 28 to meet and talk with the Legislature. The Alliance will have a telephone conference between its members on Jan. 8, and will be discussing how they will let the Legislature know who they are and what they would like the state to do.

Most people know about what health dangers there are with contaminated soil and water. But the hazardous effects from toxic vapors, no matter how much the exposure, have been discovered only recently. Vapors can seep into homes, schools and other buildings through slabs and foundations in the ground.

“It’s a fairly new (concern), but volatile compounds travel in water where it was thought they’d dilute,” Hughes said. “They don’t, and rise up through the ground and hit a building. The vapor forms a pocket and gets into the building.”

The state recognizes the problem vapor intrusion poses, according to Carl Johnson of the state Department of Environmental Conservation. He testified in 2005 before the Assembly Standing Committee on Environmental Conservation regarding the vaporization of contamination from soil and groundwater into indoor air.

“The process for evaluating vapor intrusion exposure is evolving, as we learn more about this highly complex phenomenon. We will refine and improve our approach to addressing vapor intrusion as we work through the investigation and mitigation of specific sites,” he said.

Mitigation is action to prevent exposure associated with soil vapor intrusion. Some of these actions may include “sealing cracks in a building’s foundation, adjusting the building’s heating, ventilation or air-conditioning system to maintain a positive pressure to prevent infiltration of subsurface vapors, or installing a sub-slab depressurization system beneath the building,” according to Johnson.

Hughes said the group wants the state to develop better standards with toxic vapors, finding and cleaning them up, instead of the current guidelines. New York can do better, she said.

“We need something more concrete,” she said.

Contact reporter Joe Olenick

at 439-9222, ext. 6241.