POLYCYCLIC AROMATIC HYDROCARBONS & PESTICIDES OTHER THAN DDT

Yesterday I wrote here about Contaminants of Potential Concern (COPC) and how they had been scoped, thinned, minimized and reduced to a tiny fraction of the total number of contaminants in and around the downstream Canagagigue Creek. Today I've been looking at Table F.2 and E.1. There are issues with them. Table F.2 is titled "Reevaluation of COPC-Canagagigue Creek". First of all the sampling appears to be done in such a fashion as to make comparison over time in the same locations impossible. Secondly even if they were in the same locations twenty years apart there are problems. If the source of fresh contamination has either stopped or even been significantly reduced then one would expect to see concentrations in sediments reduce over time as they are flushed further downstream year after year during spring high flows and also floods after heavt rainfalls at other times of the year. So what and why are we comparing here? ........................................................................................................... Table E.1 includes several Uniroyal Chemical former pesticides they manufactured. As there allegedly is no screening criteriaa Site-Specific Background Threshold Value (BTV) has been manufactured. Maybe this is a real thing and maybe it's just more junk science from Lanxess. Who's to know with Uniroyal Chemical's successors over the decades? Anyways many of the pesticides have sediment concentrations greater than the BTV. Regardless every single one is eliminated as a COPC by Lanxess. Isn't it just grand being in charge of your own cleanup? These pesticides include Endosulfanl & ll, Endosulfan sulphate, Methoxychlor, Nonachlor cis and trans. .................................................................................................................................. There are also some peculiar failures to sample certain chemicals at appropriate locations. Many PAHs (Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons) seem to have been completely missed in Reaches 1,2 and 3 which are all the downstream reaches from the Uniroyal/Lanxess stretche of the creek (i.e. Reach 4). Both selective timing and locations can grossly bias results especially if that's exactly what those in charge want to do.