Document BR5JdwZ5QKOmgq2yM8vR0Xwg8

Risk-Benefit Ratio "ManCan'no longer enjoy/'t luxury \ of avoiding things toxic tef his environ ment. Scientists must face reality antKeyahiate the-fisk-henefit ratio of pesticides and other compounds more realistically than we have in the past." Thus did Dr. Dale R. Lind say of the Food and Drug Administra tion charge scientists at Michigan State University's Symposium on Pes ticides in Soil. Most toxicology research includes the use of very high rates of com pounds on very sensitive animals, he points out. "Under these conditions, scientists are almost always able to show some detrimental effects." The tendency is to interpret these experi ments to mean that the compounds are always going to be detrimental to the health of man, he says. "But this is not always the case. "There are no toxic chemicals, just toxic uses of them. Even table salt can kill you, if you use too much of it." In cleaning up the environ ment, Dr. Lindsay says, new, poten tially hazardous compounds should be banned whenever feasible before they become widely used. However, he adds, "We should expect to continue using some potentially harmful com pounds because their benefits far out weigh their detrimental effects." For example, ddt is still the best material for controlling malaria mos quitoes in underdeveloped countries, he says. Use of ddt should be con tinued, because the potential danger of ddt in these areas is small, while the malaria hazard is high. Dr. Lindsay urged large-scale "mega-mouse" experiments over long periods of time to really evaluate the risk-benefit problem as it relates to man. "This problem has more signif icance to man than his ability to ex plore space," he says, "and I doubt that it will cost nearly as much." Another scientist who asks for rea son in the face of the current emo tional antiagricultural chemical cam paign is Dr. C. R. Harris, head of the soils and pesticides section of the Canadian Agriculture Department's research institute. Substitution of new "nonpersistent" pesticides may compound the pollution problem rather than ease it, he notes. These materials are, in most in stances, broad-spectrum poisons that stay in the soil for a moderate length of time, he explains. Most are more soluble in water than the insecticides they replace, he says, thus increasing the risk of contaminating water. Also, Dr. Harris adds, "a few of these new materials for use as soil insecticides appear to be as persis- THE CHEMICAL WORLD THIS WEEK Research at MSU Tagging path of insecticides tent in the soil as ddt or dieldrin. Although restrictions on the use of the old insecticides, such as ddt, are well justified, they should not be hap hazardly replaced with materials which may have equally serious en vironmental side effects." CHEMICALS: The Prices Go Up Pointing to mounting costs as the cul prit, chemical makers last week were busily posting higher price tags on a host of organic chemicals. And they were doing so in the face of increasing pressure from Washington on both la bor and management to hold the line on wages and prices or face the possi bility of the Federal Government's im posing mandatory controls. Among the key chemicals caught up in the last round of price increases were styrene, phenol, aspirin, ethyl ene glycol, and solvents. The prices of plastics, nitrogen fertilizer solutions, and some inorganics have also been raised since changes can be made in second-quarter 1970 contract prices. Dow Chemical and Union Carbide posted the broadest array of new or ganic prices. In so doing, the compa nies apparently have adopted a prac tice started by Shell Chemical of in augurating price hikes on a broad sweep of chemicals at one time. And the companies say more price in creases are on the way. "We are re acting to the fact that we can't handle 6 or 7% inflation a year," a Dow spokesman says about the increases. J. B. St. Clair, president of Shell Chemical, says his firm raised the price of more than 50 organic chemi cals by 6.5% after making a compre hensive study of the steady upward trend in the cost of product manufac ture, distribution, and customer ser vice. In increasing prices on lowdensity polyethylene resins. Carbide says that, "While significant improve ments in manufacturing efficiency were achieved during the 1960's, the rate of technological advance has not been enough to offset the general rate of inflation dining the past few years." There is little doubt that the chemi cal industry hasn't fared as well as others in passing on higher costs by price increases to its customers. Ac cording to the Department of Labor, the chemical industry wholesale price index stood at 99.1% of its 1957-59 base in January. This compares with an index for all commodities of 116.0. Union Carbide first advanced prices of 14 chemicals and low-density poly ethylene resins. The Carbide in creases affected a number of solvents and industrial alcohols. Dow increased prices on 14 groups of organic chemicals involving 54 products. Most of the increases range from 0.5 to 2 cents a pound. Other organic chemicals that now list for higher prices include phenolic molding compounds, alkyds, and poly ester resins. Conoco Chemicals raised the prices of its linear alcohols, ethoxylates, and ether sulfates. Gulf Oil has increased the price of nitrogen fertilizer solutions and Allied Chemical posts an increase of $5.00 per ton nitrogen effective April 1 on anhydrous ammonia. R&D: Independent Boondoggle Sen. William Proxmire (D.-Wis.) takes a dim view of federal expendi tures for independent r&d. It's a "billion-dollar boondoggle," Sen. Proxmire charged last week, adding that he was "flabbergasted" when he found out that the Department of De fense was picking up the tab for $685 million and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration $131 mil lion a year for independent r&d. Independent r&d is r&d carried on by firms under contract to the Gov ernment, is paid for in large meas ure by the Government, but is un related to the work agreed to under the contract and is conducted at the discretion of the contractor. Not only is federal support of in dependent r&d improper and un authorized, said the leadoff witness at hearings before Sen. Thomas J. Mc Intyre's (d.-n.h. ) Ad Hoc Research and Development Subcommittee, but under the provisions of Section 203 of the 1970 Military Procurement DSW 552110 MARCH 9, 1970 C&EN 13 STLCOPCB4090527 Sen. Proxmire Flabbergasted at R&D tag Authorization Act--the Mansfield Amendment--it's illegal. Last fall Sen. Proxmire introduced and later dropped a Mansfield-like amendment to the 1970 MilitaryProcurement Authorization Act. The amendment would have prohib ited dod funding of contractor-initiated research unrelated to work being per formed under contract. It has since been reconstituted as a bill--s. 3003. Meanwhile, Rep. Emilio Q. Daddario (D.-Conn.), chairman of the House Subcommittee on Science, Research, and Development, testified before the House Armed Services Investigating Subcommittee on the Pentagon's in dependent r&d policies. Rep. Daddario observed that some charge that there is too much duplication in r&d projects because of a lack of coordina tion and evaluation. Some have proposed that the De fense Documentation Center establish a data bank on independent r&d ac tivities, he said, to coordinate various programs and prevent unnecessary duplication of effort. Rep. Daddario does not believe the Defense Docu mentation Center is the proper re pository for such data. The Science Information Exchange (sie), adminis tered by the Smithsonian Institution, he said, would be a more logical place because sie is supposed to have technical and fiscal information on all research grants and contracts directlysupported by the Government as well as on certain nonfederal activities. Rep. Daddario said that a General Accounting Office report to Congress on independent r&d contained one alternative to the present system that gives him "great cause for concern." The alternative would restrict defense support of research in almost pre cisely the same language as the Mans 14 C&EN MARCH 9, 1970 field amendment. He ' added that should this restrictive policy be im plemented for independent r&d, it . would apply not only to dod but to nasa and the Atomic Energy Com mission as well. Indeed, the logical extension would be to prevent any mission agency from performing re search that did not have a direct and apparent relationship to its mission. THE SUN: Measuring an Eclipse Just before 9 a.m. est last Saturday, the greatest show on earth opened to an audience of tens of millions--a total solar eclipse, more than just a na ture spectacular, the solar eclipse of fered scientists an opportunity for a wide variety of observations over a wide terrain. Moving eastward from the Pacific, the 80- to 90-mile wide total shadow passed over central Mexico and Florida, and then up the East Coast and out to sea. Scientists exploited the solar eclipse to carry out a multitude of observa tions and experiments, from the heights of central Mexico's mountains (spectroscopic studies of the sun's corona) to the depths of Georgia's (and Pogo's) vast Okefenokee Swamp (studies of the reactions of animals to the sudden darkness). However, perhaps the most inten sive studies were carried out from Wallops Island, Va., where nasa launched more than 30 sounding rockets in an "unprecedented'' attempt to study the earth's atmosphere and the sun, with many observations pos sible only during an eclipse. Four of the rockets were lofted into the upper atmosphere for the first highresolution ozone measurements made before, during, and after an eclipse. A group led by E. Hilsenrath of Goddard Space Flight Center deter mined ozone concentration as a func tion of altitude, using a chemilumines cent ozone detector. Ozone reacts chemically with Rhodamine-B dye absorbed on porous Vycor, and a photometer measures the luminescence produced. Rate constants for the for mation and decomposition of ozone in the atmosphere are determined from changes in ozone concentration with time in the presence and absence of the sun's catalyzing uv radiation. The workers can also tell whether water vapor and other constituents play' a role in ozone chemical processes. Another set of measurements, stud ying chemical changes and ionization processes in the thermosphere--75 to 200 miles above earth--was carried out by L. H. Brace and N. W. Spencer of Goddard Space Flight Center, G. R. Carignan of University of Michigan, and Dr. J. C. G. Walker of Yale Uni versity. Two rocket launchings bear ing multipurpose probes enabled them to make observations at four degrees of darkness. 1 A Bennett rf ion mass spectrometer measured the number and kind of ions and their changes with time during the eclipse. Pittsburgh Conference: More Emphasis on Leasing If lack of research and development funds has lowered spending and cut back on meeting attendance in some areas, it wasn't immediately apparent in Cleveland last week at the Pittsburgh Conference on Analytical Chemistry and Applied Spec troscopy. By midweek, registration stood at 5437, up comfortably from 4986 at the same point in 1969. And a number of instrument advances marked the equipment exposition--perhaps more than in the past couple of years. One sign of the times, however, was a greater emphasis on instrument leasing. DSW 552111 STLCOPCB4090528