With all the PCB contamination at the construction site I wouldn't want to work there. I hope no pregnant mother were working there.
http://www.recordonline.com/article/20150608/NEWS/150609481/101008
WARWICK - The Watchtower Bible and Tract Society is suing International Nickel and several of its affiliates, which it accuses of contaminating land where the religious group is now building its massive 1.6 million-square-foot world headquarters.
The 252-acre property on Kings Drive was previously owned by International Nickel, which operated a research and development site and a foundry there between the mid-1960s and mid-1980s. Watchtower, better known as Jehovah’s Witnesses, purchased the property in 2009.
In the lawsuit, filed in federal court in New York's Southern District, Watchtower says International Nickel operated a wastewater treatment plant at the site to handle effluent, and also owned underground tanks to store fuel and other hazardous material.
Watchtower claims that International Nickel discharged petroleum, including oils containing polychlorinated byphenyls - or PCBs - into the wastewater treatment plant, and into the soil and groundwater, thereby contaminating the environment at the property. PCBs, which are probable human carcinogens, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, were banned in the United States in 1979.
Watchtower is in the process of building offices, apartments to house 1,000 adults, a cafeteria, a vehicle-maintenance building, an infirmary and a parking garage in Warwick. Construction is expected to be completed by the end of 2016.
Watchtower’s lawsuit says International Nickel failed to clean up the environmental problems it created during decades in Warwick. The suit also names International Nickel’s parent company, Vale Americas Inc., and its affiliates, including Vale Canada Limited, Precision Castparts Corp., and Special Metals Corporation.
Watchtower could not immediately be reached for comment. A spokesman for Vale said the company hadn’t been served yet and therefore had no comment.
It wasn’t clear when Watchtower discovered the contamination. The suit says Watchtower contacted the state Department of Environmental Conservation about the pollution in 2012 and '13, and has been cleaning the property under the direction of the DEC.
Watchtower is seeking unspecified reimbursement for the cost it has incurred in the cleanup and remediation. It is also seeking damages, restitution and attorney fees
http://www.clearwater.org/news/pcbhealth.html
Acute toxic effects.
People exposed directly to high levels of PCBs, either via the skin, by consumption, or in the air, have experienced irritation of the nose and lungs, skin irritations such as severe acne (chloracne) and rashes, and eye problems. [3]
PCBs cause developmental effects.
Women exposed to PCBs before or during pregnancy can give birth to children with significant neurological and motor control problems, including lowered IQ and poor short-term memory.
A group of children in Michigan whose mothers had been exposed to PCBs were found to have decreased birth weight and head size, lowered performance on standardized memory, psychomotor and behavioral tests, and lowered IQ. These effects lasted through at least 7 years. [4] A group of women occupationally exposed to PCBs in upstate New York had shorter pregnancies and gave birth to children with lower birth weight. [5]Another study, of the chidren of women who ate contaminated Lake Ontario fish, found significant performance impairments on a standardized behavioral assessment test. [6]
Exposure of one form of PCB to rats resulted in retarded growth, delayed puberty, decreased sperm counts, and genital malformations. [7] In other studies, exposure of PCBs to rats in utero led to behavioral and psychomotor effects that lasted into adulthood. [8]
PCBs disrupt hormone function.
PCBs with only a few chlorine atoms can mimic the body´s natural hormones, especially estrogen. Women who consumed PCB-contaminated fish from Lake Ontario were found to have shortened menstrual cycles. [9]PCBs are also thought to play a role in reduced sperm counts, altered sex organs, premature puberty, and changed sex ratios of children. More highly-chlorinated PCBs (with more chlorine atoms) act like dioxins in altering the metabolism of sex steroids in the body, changing the normal levels of estrogens and testosterone. [11] PCBs tend to change in the body and in the environment from more highly-chlorinated to lower-chlorinated forms, increasing their estrogenic effects.
Immune system and thyroid effects.
In a study of adolescents Mohawk males in New York State, PCBs were shown to upset the balance of thyroid hormones, which may affect growth as well as intellectual and behavioral development. [12]
Like dioxin, PCBs bind to receptors that control immune system function, disturbing the amounts of some immune system elements like lymphocytes and T cells. [13]
In a study of Dutch children, PCB levels were tied to an increased prevalence of ear infections and chickenpox and with lowered immune system function, and thus greater susceptibility to disease. [14]
Eating fish is the major route of exposure to PCBs.
The most common route of exposure to PCBs is from eating contaminated fish. The EPA estimates an increased cancer risk as high as 1 in 2500 for people eating certain species of fish from the Hudson River&em; thousand times higher than the EPA´s goal for protection. [15]
Air near a contaminated site may also be polluted by PCBs. By one estimate, residents of the Hudson Valley may inhale as many PCBs as they would get by eating one contaminated fish per year. [16] Although small amounts of PCBs can enter the body from swimming in highly contaminated water, this is unlikely to be significant except in the most extreme cases.
Municipalities that use the Hudson River as a drinking water source carefully monitor the water for PCBs, and there are no detectable levels in the water supplies. [17]
PCBs accumulate in the body and in the ecosystem.
Once PCBs enter a person´s (or animal´s) body, they tend to be absorbed into fat tissue and remain there.
Unlike water-soluble chemicals, they are not excreted, so the body accumulates PCBs over years. This means that PCBs also accumulate via the food chain: a small fish may absorb PCBs in water or by eating plankton, and these PCBs are stored in its body fat. When a larger fish eats the small fish, it also eats and absorbs all the PCBs that have built up in the small fish. In this way, larger fish and animals can build up a highly concentrated store of PCBs. Some types of PCBs may degrade into nontoxic form while they are stored in the body, but this process can take many years.
In the same way, PCBs accumulate in women and pass on to their infants through breast milk. This accumulation means that nursing infants may ingest PCB levels much higher than the levels in fish and other foods consumed by their mothers. [18]
PCBs have been found all over the world, including significant amounts in the Arctic and Antarctic, far from any sources. In fact, several studies have found very high levels of PCBs in the blood and breast milk of Inuit women. [19] It is thought that PCBs spread through the air, after evaporating from contaminated water and sediments, as well as through the water.