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November, 2012:

New Book Sparks Climate Suit Against The Netherlands

http://cleantechnica.com/2012/11/17/new-book-sparks-climate-suit-against-the-netherlands/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+IM-cleantechnica+%28CleanTechnica%29

New Book Sparks Climate Suit Against The Netherlands

November 17, 2012 By Joshua S Hill Leave a Comment

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New Book Sparks Climate Lawsuit
A new Dutch book written by ‘the climate-lawyer’ Roger H.J. Cox has sparked a lawsuit being filed against the Dutch government, claiming that the Netherlands is under a legal obligation to reduce its CO2 emissions by as much as 40% by 2020 and up to 95% by 2050.

The book provided not only the impetus but a blueprint for such lawsuits, and a call for similar suits to be levied against many other Western nations.

The book is backed by world-renowned American climate scientist James Hansen, who was the first to receive an English translation of the work at the book’s launch in The Hague. Author and Dutch attorney Roger H.J. Cox thinks reaching a wider audience with the English translation is important: “Multiple climate cases throughout Europe and in other Western countries will speed up the process toward an energy revolution that is demanded by citizens. This is why we worked hard to make the translation available as soon as possible, so potential petitioners in other countries can use it as a working document for their climate suits.”

“In the climate and energy debate we need more pressure and involvement from the public, willing to defend our rights and those of our children and grandchildren using all the means of our laws to achieve justice,” added Hansen.

Author Cox argues that without the legal intervention outlined in the text, Western nations are at risk of “committing domestic human rights violations on a scale nobody had thought to ever see again after World War II.”

With the fast-paced readability of a crime novel, Revolution Justified leaves no room for reassuring doubt or denial about the huge societal challenges of oil decline, climate change and the failure of democracy. Meticulously substantiated with a wide array of international scientific, journalistic and even military sources, the text draws readers into a tightening stranglehold that eases only in the final section. Here, the reader learns how the judiciary may yet rescue the climate and break through the status quo in the energy world to prevent the literal downfall of Western society.

RevolutionJustified.org

The book can be purchased from the website RevolutionJustified.
Clean Technica (http://s.tt/1tRdH)
Read more at http://cleantechnica.com/2012/11/17/new-book-sparks-climate-suit-against-the-netherlands/#XhMyzmMurE100r2E.99

Mallorca: Sun & Waste!

http://www.no-burn.org/img/pic/GOB-No-volem-ser-el-femer-dEuropa-620x350.jpg

The tourists going to the island of Mallorca in Spain are invited to bring their trash along with them to burn it in the new incinerator which is successfully fighting recycling, composting and reuse.

This is the –ironic- message that the local group GOB wanted to transmit in their latest action in front of the regional parliament upon the approval of the decree to import waste to feed the burner. Sadly, the European Commission is also supporting importing waste from many km away to the island despite being a contradiction of the proximity principle and the waste hierarchy.

In the beautiful island of Mallorca one can find the best and the worst of waste management in southern Europe. On one hand some zero waste municipalities (15% of Mallorca`s population) have implemented ambitious door-to-door source separation schemes which would allow them to recycle more than 75% of the waste. On the other hand the regional government through the company TIRME created to privatise waste management had built an incinerator with the capacity to burn 300,000tn of waste which represented 75% of all the municipal solid waste generated in the island.

After an obscure and dodgy process in 2007 this already oversized burner was enlarged with an extra capacity to burn 432,000tn more. In total, Mallorca generates 542,094 tn and has an incineration capacity of 736,000tn in 2011. The biggest incinerator in southern Europe burns 84% of all municipal waste generated in the island; hence most recyclables and compostables are today incinerated. Madness.

Today in Mallorca the more you recycle the more you pay, the more you burn the cheaper it is.

There are at least three reasons why this is a bad practice of waste and resource management:

–          It contradicts the waste hierarchy: Instead of recycling targets Mallorca has incineration targets of 62% of MSW. Before recycling or reuse the first option for waste in Mallorca is incineration. Every ton of waste that is recycled instead of burned increases the fee for the citizen because the contract with the incinerator obliges to feed it during the next 30 years, if a municipality prefers to recycle or reduce waste they will have to pay for the tones that the incinerator will not receive.

–          It goes against the European Resource Efficiency Roadmap: because of the contract with the incinerator the incentives are all for burning and not for recycling. According to the Resource Efficiency Strategy by 2020 incineration should be only for what is not recyclable and compostable. In Mallorca according to the contract most recyclables and compostables are and will be burned during next 30 years.

–          It goes against the people: the citizens are already paying the highest prices in waste management in Spain to burn waste in an inefficient incinerator that doesn’t even recover the heat. At the same time modern recycling and composting plants partly financed with EU money have to be paid when not being used because waste is being sent to the incinerator.

The case of Mallorca illustrates with all cruelty how incineration –or any kind of disposal- competes with recycling and the upper levels of the hierarchy. Hence, it is unlikely that the targets set by the EU will be accomplished unless the economic and legislative drivers are changed to prioritise recycling.

There are good examples of islands in the Mediterranean which have recycling rates above northern European standards (regions in Sardinia are above 60%). Mallorca itself has municipalities such as Esporles or Puigpunyent doing an excellent job (above 70% recycling) despite the adverse legislation and local conditions. With the right legislation and political will Zero Waste is possible in Mallorca, with current conditions sustainability is a mission impossible.

The Zero Waste movement asks the European Commission to intervene to cap the incineration overcapacity in cases like the one of Mallorca when recycling is directly hijacked. The current EU legislation gives all incentives to do the wrong thing and Mallorca is a clear example of it.

The sheer willful stupidity of official inaction on pollution

Submitted by admin on Nov 16th 2012, 12:00am

Business

MONITOR TOM HOLLAND

Tom Holland

It would be far cheaper for the government to tackle air pollution now, rather than in a few decades when the health costs will be incalculable

This week’s Audit Commission report on the effectiveness of the Hong Kong government’s pollution policy makes depressing reading.

That is not so much because of the government’s repeated failure to meet even its own modest environmental targets, although that’s dismal enough.

No, the real reason the report is so discouraging is the sheer willful official stupidity that lies behind the government’s failure.

Back in the late 1980s, the government introduced targets for the maximum permissible concentrations of harmful atmospheric pollutants and set up the Environmental Protection Department to enforce them.

A quarter of a century later those targets look feeble compared with the latest international standards.

For example, the World Health Organisation’s air quality guidelines recommend an annual average PM10 – that’s cancer-causing diesel soot to you and me – concentration of no more than 20 microgrammes per cubic metre.

The Hong Kong government’s target is not even half as onerous; a generous 55 microgrammes per cubic metre.

But the government has never come close to meeting even its own undemanding objectives. For instance, last year the average roadside concentration of lung-shrivelling nitrogen dioxide was 50 per cent above the government’s target, and three times the WHO’s ceiling.

Officials cannot blame their failure on pollution from the mainland. Yes, smog drifts down from Guangdong. But pollution concentrations are inversely proportional to the cube of the distance from the source.

So although a factory 80 kilometres away in Dongguan might emit 100,000 times as many pollutants as that bus roaring past you in the street, the bus is doing twice as much damage to your health. In short, the harmful stuff is pumped out right here in Hong Kong.

Yet the government has consistently failed to tackle the problem. Despite 10 years of official promises to clear the air, there are still more than 50,000 trucks and buses with highly polluting pre-2001 diesel engines plying our roads.

Similarly, the government has failed to introduce new standards requiring shipping to use less polluting low-sulphur fuels.

Meanwhile, most of the electricity we consume is still generated locally by burning coal instead of natural gas, which is much cleaner.

Nor can officials blame their failure to do anything on a lack of resources.

At the last count the Hong Kong government was sitting on accumulated excess reserves of HK$1.3 trillion. That’s more than three years’ worth of government spending.

And this is where we encounter mind-boggling levels of stupidity. Asked what all this money is for, officials occasionally mutter something about needing the reserves to meet future health care liabilities as the city’s population ages.

Yet the single most effective thing the government could do to ensure it can meet its future health care liabilities would be to cut local pollution levels.

According to estimates compiled by the University of Hong Kong’s School of Public Health, last year the city’s high pollution levels were responsible for 8.7 million visits to the doctor, 24,500 hospital admissions and 3,600 deaths.

HKU estimates the total cost to Hong Kong’s economy was more than HK$42 billion.

What the cumulative health effects of living in such a polluted environment will turn out to be over the coming decades is incalculable. But it is safe to assume that the annual cost will be many multiples of last year’s figure, placing a massive strain on the city’s economy.

As a result, on the principle that prevention is better than cure – and far better than palliative care – the government should do now what it ought to have done 10 years ago and spend as much as it takes to cut local pollution levels to meet, and even exceed, the WHO’s most stringent guidelines.

In the short term, it should order all pre-2001 dirty diesel-engined vehicles off our roads. It should require all shipping to comply with the latest International Maritime Organisation emission standards, while insisting local vessels like ferries use only ultra-low-sulphur fuels. And it should compel Hong Kong’s power companies to stop burning coal entirely, switching to natural gas as soon as possible.

In the longer term the government should draw up plans to phase out diesel-engined trucks and buses altogether.

Starting with the city’s buses, it should replace them with electric-powered vehicles, moving the source of pollution away from street level where it does the most harm.

All this will be expensive. But Hong Kong can easily afford it. And in the long run the costs of doing nothing will be far higher.

Surely our officials aren’t that stupid.

tom.holland@scmp.com [1]

Topics:

Air Pollution in Hong Kong

roadside pollution

Health Care

Environmental Protection Department

World Health Organisation

Air Quality Index

scmp_02aug12_ns_mk4_nora7254a_30319997.jpg

Vietnam News: Living together with smoke from incinerators

VietNamNet Bridge – Black smoke spirals up through the exhaust pipe on the roof of the funeral home. The fishy smell comes from the open outlets to the surrounding areas. Local residents in Binh Duong province complain they have to live together with the smoke from incinerators.

http://english.vietnamnet.vn/fms/environment/52506/living-together-with-the-smoke-from-incinerators.html

The incinerator next to residential quarter

The Binh Duong incinerator in Tan Dong Hiep ward of Di An town of Binh Duong province handled three incineration cases on the morning of November 5. When the mourners left, the incinerator began operating, discharging black smoke through the three exhaust pipes to the sky.

“We always get suffocated with the smoke. The situation is more terrible at night than in the day,” a local resident said to reporters. “We have to have the blanket cover over the surface to prevent the smell. If not, we cannot sleep,”he said.

Meanwhile, the reporters, though wearing two protective masks, still clearly smelled the fishy odor and the bone-ash.

A broken pipe was found behind the incinerator, from which the water from the incinerator comes out directly to the environment. Reporters’ heads got dizzy just after several minutes of standing there and breathing the fish smell.

Local residents said that the waste water has been flowing from the incinerator for the last many years, which has been soaking into the earth and the water wells, thus making the water dirty unusable.

Since the local residents reported the case to the incinerator’s management board, an edge has been built to prevent the waste water from flowing to the road. As a result, the waste water has been threading its way among the tombs and then soaking into the earth.

People not only have to live with the terrible waste water, but also have to sniff the smoke from the cremation.

Waste water and smoke attack people

Nguyen Tan Hoang, whose house faces the incinerator, said that he has been living in the fishy odor and the burnt smell for the last few years already. He has to close the doors tightly after 10 pm every day to prevent the smell, wearing a protective mask when sleeping.

Especially, Hoang complained relatives and friends do not want to visit him at home because they do not want to stay in the terrible atmosphere.

Tran Van Dinh, who lives next to Hoang, said that the board of management of the incinerator always promises that they would apply necessary measures to settle the problems, but nothing has been changed.

There are some 40 households living in the Tan An residential quarter of Tan Dong Hiep ward. The local residents here joked that they can be full up with the smoke every day, no need to eat.

Nguyen Van Trieu, an old man, said that every family has 2-3 children, and most of the children suffer bronchitis regularly. He said that local residents have complained about the environment pollution since the day the incinerator began operation.

However, the incinerator’s board of management still keeps a deaf ear to the complaints, while the situation is getting worse.

Tran Quoc Tuan, Chair of the Tan Dong Hiep ward People’s Committee, said that when inspectors come, the pipes would stop generating smoke. Therefore, the provincial environment department concludes that is cannot find any problems here. Meanwhile, local people still have to live in the serious pollution.

However, Tuan said, people have vowed that they would keep struggling to protect their lives. The problem would be discussed at the upcoming meeting between the local National Assembly’s deputies and voters.

Thanh Mai

Lawyer slams government impact report on offshore incinerator

Submitted by admin on Nov 16th 2012, 12:00am

News›Hong Kong

ENVIRONMENT

Austin Chiu austin.chiu@scmp.com

It was a breach of natural justice for head of environment department to approve review that gave green light to incinerator, court told

It was unreasonable for the Environmental Protection Department director to approve an impact-assessment report made by his own department on the proposed building of a massive offshore waste incinerator, a court heard yesterday.

Barrister Hector Pun Hei made the criticism on behalf of a Cheung Chau resident, who brought a judicial review against the HK$23 billion project on Shek Kwu Chau, an island south of Lantau.

In the Court of First Instance, Pun, one of the lawyers representing 66-year-old Leung Hon-wai, said it involved a conflict of interest when the director granted the permit that allowed the proposal to go ahead.

“It is a breach of natural justice to make a person a judge in his own cause,” Pun said.

Leung is challenging decisions by the Town Planning Board and the director of the Environmental Protection Department, which cleared the way for the incinerator’s construction. He is one of four people who lodged a judicial challenge. His was selected to proceed and the other applicants will be bound by the decision.

Johnny Mok SC, for the government, rejected a criticism by Leung’s lawyers that the environmental-impact assessment report did not meet the requirements specified in a technical memorandum and a study brief from the administration.

On Wednesday, Leung’s lawyer contended that the report was substandard, because the department deferred looking at how it would remedy the permanent loss of a 31-hectare marine habitat of high ecological value. That problem was to be considered in a supplementary study.

Yesterday, Mok said that while the department was not allowed to make another environmental-impact report, a supplementary study that sought to help with the “technical implementation” of the measures must be permitted.

Mok said the environmental-impact assessment already included, as required, a study on the feasibility and effectiveness of establishing a 700-hectare marine park to make up for the loss of the existing habitat, which was home to finless porpoises.

The supplementary study would deal with the marine park’s ecological profile, extent and location.

“It would be strange if there was no further study,” Mok said. “The fact that a small corner of a vast stretch of water where finless porpoises swim is cut out doesn’t mean a massive loss. You have to consider the bigger picture.”

He also said it was wrong for the other side to suggest that the department did not conduct any studies on the establishment of the marine park, citing reports from various departments from 2002 and last year.

“This is a careful regime designed to protect the valuable species,” Mok said, referring to the creation of the marine park.

The hearing continues today before Mr Justice Au Hing-cheung.

Topics:

Incinerator

Shek Kwu Chau

Lantau

Environmental Protection Department


Source URL (retrieved on Nov 16th 2012, 5:42am): http://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/1083308/lawyer-slams-government-impact-report-offshore-incinerator

Hong Kong Government Audit Slams Air Quality

The Wall Street Journal

http://s.wsj.net/public/resources/images/OB-VI931_hkair_G_20121114054246.jpg

A man looks around in front of high rise buildings shrouded in a haze of heavy pollution on August 3, 2012 in Hong Kong.

For years, Hong Kong residents fed up with choking fumes have slammed the city’s lackluster efforts to fight air pollution—and as it turns out, the government’s own audit office agrees with them.

The government’s audit commission found that Hong Kong has consistently failed to reach its goals on air quality since 1987, when they were first adopted. Last year, the report found, roadside concentrations of key pollutants exceeded the government’s air-quality objectives by up to 53%. Meanwhile, levels of nitrogen dioxide—a major indicator of roadside pollution—exceeded World Health Organization limits by 205%.

The report also found that last year—which clocked record-high roadside pollution levels—the average concentration level of nitrogen dioxide in Hong Kong was 279% higher than in Sydney, 47% higher than in London and 36% higher than in New York. Levels of “PM10,” larger particles of air pollutants, were 220%, 100% and 153% higher than those cities, respectively.

Local green groups responded to the report’s release with cheers. “I’ve never seen anything similar before from the government,” said Patrick Fung, campaign manager for the Clean Air Network, a local environmental NGO, of the report’s release. “This [presents] a green light for more measures to be carried out by the current administration.”

Since he was inaugurated in July, Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying has been moving more aggressively than his predecessor to confront the issue of air pollution, with his environmental secretary floating the prospect of a ban on old diesel vehicles last month. In September, the administration also tapped Christine Loh, a well-known green activist, to serve as undersecretary for environment.

“We will vigorously improve air quality and carefully consider public health when formulating clean-air policies,” Mr. Leung told lawmakers last month, including through possible efforts to “[make] polluters pay.”

The audit report noted that the World Health Organization has stated that air pollution can cause respiratory and heart diseases, as well as lung cancer. It also added that there is “growing public concern” over how Hong Kong’s air-pollution levels have deteriorated among locals.

The audit’s findings come as a new report from CPA Australia finds that Hong Kong is continuing to lose out to cleaner, greener rival Singapore among companies seeking to set up a corporate regional hub in Asia. According to the group’s survey, 59% of respondents said they believed international companies would prefer to set up their regional headquarters in Singapore, compared with just 22% who cited Hong Kong. Pollution ranked as the No. 3 reason why companies would decide against settling in Hong Kong, after high rental and living costs.

– Te-Ping Chen. Follow her on Twitter @tepingchen.

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Cloud of failure thickens in war against foul air

HK Standard

Air quality objectives for 2014 can hardly protect public health, the Director of Audit says in criticizing officials who have failed to meet standards that began to be set 25 years ago.

Mary Ann Benitez

Thursday, November 15, 2012

Air quality objectives for 2014 can hardly protect public health, the Director of Audit says in criticizing officials who have failed to meet standards that began to be set 25 years ago.

People had to suffer through 175 days last year when the air pollution index topped 100, which means levels are at high or very high and the stuff of serious health warnings. That compares with 74 similar bad days in 2007.

And even as the Director of Audit’s report was released yesterday, the API touched 140 – an alarmingly high level – in Central.

The auditor noted that 2014’s quality objectives that take into account four major pollutants “do not provide adequate protection of public health” when compared with World Health Organization guidelines.

And as roadside pollution levels caused mainly by emissions from diesel vehicles indicated, schemes to offer incentives to replace vehicles have been far from effective.

Only 54 percent of diesel-driven public light buses ran on LPG by the end of a HK$142 million scheme in December 2005.

Also, a HK$772 million scheme in 2007 saw 12 percent of pre-Euro-standard buses switching to Euro IV. But only 11 percent of vehicles that needed to convert to that standard had done so by March this year under a HK$261 million scheme that started in 2010.

By the time another HK$261 million scheme ends next June there will still be a large number of old standard buses running.

There was also a failure to cut emissions from buses to any marked degree by reducing the number on the road. A spokeswoman for KMB admitted there was a cut of only 2.9 percent from a fleet of 3,900 buses.

Simon Ng Ka-wing, head of transport and sustainability research for Civic Exchange, said: “Air pollution in Hong Kong is so worrying that we must go for policies and measures that would not just bring a marginal difference but substantial and measurable improvement in air quality and public health.”

IMPLEMENTATION OF AIR-QUALITY IMPROVEMENT MEASURES

Executive Summary
1. Air pollution is one of the major problems in Hong Kong. The
Environment Bureau (ENB) and the Environmental Protection Department (EPD)
are responsible for formulating and implementing environmental policies, including
those on air quality. In 2012-13, the EPD’s estimated expenditure on managing air
quality is $627 million.
2. The existing air quality objectives (AQOs) in Hong Kong were set
in 1987, some 25 years ago. The AQOs stipulate the concentration levels for seven
major air pollutants, of which sulphur dioxide (SO2), nitrogen dioxide, and
particulate matters with a diameter of 10 micrometres or less (PM10) are the most
relevant and significant ones in Hong Kong. The major sources of air pollution in
Hong Kong are motor vehicles, marine vessels and power plants as well as
emissions from the Pearl River Delta (PRD) region.
3. Under the Air Pollution Control Ordinance, the EPD, as the Air Pollution
Control Authority, is tasked to aim to achieve the AQOs as soon as is reasonably
practicable and thereafter to maintain the quality so achieved. In the past decade,
through the EPD’s efforts, concentrations of SO2, PM10 and carbon monoxide have
been reduced in Hong Kong. In January 2012, the Government announced that,
based on the Air Quality Guidelines issued in 2006 by the World Health
Organisation, the AQOs in Hong Kong would be revised to more stringent levels
with effect from 2014 (2014 AQOs). To meet the 2014 AQOs, the Government
would, subject to resource availability, implement 22 air-quality improvement
measures.
Download PDF : e59ch02sum

MONITORING AND REPORTING OF AIR QUALITY

Executive Summary
1. Air pollution is one of the major problems in Hong Kong. The
Environment Bureau (ENB) and the Environmental Protection Department (EPD)
are responsible for formulating and implementing environmental policies, including
those on air quality. In 2012-13, the EPD’s estimated expenditure on managing air
quality is $627 million.
2. The existing air quality objectives (AQOs) in Hong Kong were set
in 1987, some 25 years ago. The AQOs stipulate the concentration levels for seven
major air pollutants, of which sulphur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide (NO2), and
particulate matters with a diameter of 10 micrometres or less (PM10) are the most
relevant and significant ones in Hong Kong. Since 1999, the EPD has also
compiled an hourly air pollution index (API) for each of the 11 general air-quality
monitoring stations and three roadside stations.
3. In January 2012, the Government announced that, based on the Air
Quality Guidelines (AQGs) issued in 2006 by the World Health Organisation
(WHO), the AQOs in Hong Kong would be revised to more stringent levels with
effect from 2014 (2014 AQOs).
Download PDF : e59ch01sum

PCBs, other pollutants may play role in pregnancy delay

NIH study finds delays after exposure to pesticides, industrial chemicals

Couples with high levels of PCBs and similar environmental pollutants take longer to achieve pregnancy in comparison to other couples with lower levels of the pollutants, according to a preliminary study by researchers at the National Institutes of Health and other institutions.

PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls) are chemicals that have been used as coolants and lubricants in electrical equipment. They are part of a category of chemicals known as persistent organochlorine pollutants and include industrial chemicals and chemical byproducts as well as pesticides. In many cases, the compounds are present in soil, water, and in the food chain. The compounds are resistant to decay, and may persist in the environment for decades. Some, known as persistent lipophilic organochlorine pollutants, accumulate in fatty tissues. Another type, called perfluorochemicals, are used in clothing, furniture, adhesives, food packaging, heat-resistant non-stick cooking surfaces, and the insulation of electrical wire.

Exposure to these pollutants is known to have a number of effects on human health, but their effects on human fertility — and the likelihood of couples achieving pregnancy– have not been extensively studied.

“Our findings suggest that persistent organochlorine pollutants may play a role in pregnancy delay,” said the study’s first author, Germaine Buck Louis, Ph.D., director of the Division of Epidemiology, Statistics, and Prevention Research at the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) at NIH.

Dr. Buck Louis added that individuals may limit their exposure by removing and avoiding the fat of meat and fish, and by limiting the consumption of animal products.

The study was published online in Environmental Health Perspectives and is available online at http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/2012/11/1204996/. In addition to researchers at the NICHD, the study also included investigators from the Texas A&M Health Science Center, College Station, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Emory University, Atlanta, and The EMMES Corp., Rockville, Md.

To conduct the study, the researchers enrolled 501 couples from four counties in Michigan, and 12 counties in Texas, from 2005 to 2009. The couples were part of the Longitudinal Investigation of Fertility and the Environment (LIFE) study, established to examine the relationship between fertility and exposure to environmental chemicals and lifestyle. An earlier analysis from the LIFE study found that high blood levels of lead and cadmium also were linked to pregnancy delay.

The women taking part in the study ranged from 18 to 44 years of age, and the men were over 18. Couples provided blood samples for the analysis of organochlorines (PCBs) and perfluorochemicals (PFCs). Women kept journals to record their monthly menstrual cycles and the results of home pregnancy tests. The couples were followed until pregnancy or for up to one year of trying.

The researchers calculated the probability that a couple would achieve pregnancy by using a statistical measure called the fecundability odds ratio (FOR). The measure estimates couples’ probability of pregnancy each cycle, based on their blood concentration of the compounds. A ratio less than one suggests a longer time to pregnancy, while a ratio greater than one suggests a shorter time to pregnancy.

The researchers examined PCB congeners, which are single, unique well-defined chemical compounds in the PCB category.

The lowest FORs were seen for couples in which the females were exposed to PCB congener 167 (FOR 0.79); and in which the males were exposed to PCB congener 138 (FOR=0.71). For each standardized increase in chemical concentration the researchers measured, the odds of pregnancy declined by 18 to 21 percent for females exposed to PCB congeners 118, 167, 209, and the perfluorchemical, perfluorooctane sulfonamide. Perfluorooctane sulfonamide is one of a broad class of compounds known as perfluoroalkyls, which have been used in fire fighting foams.

With increasing exposure, the odds for pregnancy declined by 17 to 29 percent for couples in which males were exposed to PCB congeners 138, 156, 157, 167, 170, 172, and 209 and to DDE, produced when the pesticide DDT degrades in the environment. DDT is banned for use in the United States, but is still used in some countries.

The investigators noted that they cannot rule out that some of the delays they observed may have been due to exposure to multiple chemicals. They added that these associations would need to be confirmed by other researchers.

About the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD): The NICHD sponsors research on development, before and after birth; maternal, child, and family health; reproductive biology and population issues; and medical rehabilitation. For more information, visit the Institute’s website at http://www.nichd.nih.gov/.

About the National Institutes of Health (NIH): NIH, the nation’s medical research agency, includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIH is the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and its programs, visit http://www.nih.gov.

NIH…Turning Discovery Into Health ®

http://www.nih.gov/news/health/nov2012/nichd-14.htm