Document VKJGNr7DZambanXyVJpmMrRoK

RETD JAN 1 8 1978 INTER-OFFICE CORRESPONDENCE Date: January 3, 1978 From: R- E. Stack Location: General Office--20 North Subject: Vinyl Chloride Safety Association Meeting Sumnarizad below are the highlights of the VCSA meeting held recently at Valley Forge, PA. A. Vinyl Chloride Physiological Effects - R. W. McBumey, M.D. Diamond Shamrock VOX. is detoxified in the liver by enzymes containing sulfur compounds. The target organs are the linings of small blood vessels (arterials) and not specific sites such as the liver and the lungs. This is why attacks on the fingers (Renauld's Syndrcme) and finally the bones (Acroosteolysis) occurs because of degeneration of the blood vessels. VCM can also cause cirrhosis and enlargement of the spleen because of back up pressure from constriction of blocked blood vessels. Medically speaking, VCM is considered a very carmnnggn i.e.. only 1 in 2400 who were exposed to high concentrations for prolonged ^periods rtevploparf rancor. McBumey believes the Dew studies have pretty definitely established the cancer threshold for rats at 35 ppm. VCM is not considered a primary carcinogen such as bis-chloranethyl ether. B. Medical Surveillance Problems - H. Lloyd, Georgia Pacific Medical surveillance falls into three categories: pre-employment, periodic, and after exposure during emergencies. The first two are fairly well detailed under OSHA regulations, but the third is quite ambiguous as to what to do and when they are necessary. Air Products allcw exposures for 45 minutes as long as exposure is less than 5 ppn. Dow and Pantasote have no time limit on emergency exposures, but the TWA must be below 1 ppn. After emergency exposures above 100 ppm, most companies simply have a doctor examine the person, but Dew gives blood tests. C. OSHA Enforcement Action - H. Waltanate, B. F. Goodrich California under its State Health Department is inspecting plants knewn to be using carcinogens, suspected carcinogens and even unrelated ccm- JQG. cuitf hcns<. pounds. For instance, Goodrich was checked for VCM, benzene, airnonia, >>? 'if asbestos concentrations. They received a potential Htafinn on , r j improper use of respirators. They were also inspected at Louisville e ccxi'orde^L during a strike because of a union complaint i.e., the employees did >r? tb us* ot- not believe the validity of Goodrich's monitoring program. The inspec- 'ssp, ret toys. l>. tion lasted 12 days and did not result in a citation. ' Bel 12 W | FORM SOS.A REV, SL 068685 -2- Waltemate has requested that OSHA judgments and citations be sent to his attention by the VCSA members. He will correlate an input for distribution to the group. (Attention lake Charles and Caribe) OSHA Compliances Practices Review - D. Rhodes, Tenneco Tenneco reviewed their experience with an OSHA inspection on toluene diisocyanate (1DI). OSHA measured a .035 ppm on a TOA at Tenneco's This resulted in a serious cita- They have found that at lew VCM levels, area monitoring usually runs heavier than personnel monitoring for TWA's. Air Products confirms this observation. They also mentioned that they use the "log normal mean" (OSHA reccmmended) as opposed to the "arithmetic mean". The "log normal" usually gives results about 2/3 the value of the arithmetic mean in calculating the TWCs. Area monitoring among plants shews that 75% to 90% of the readings are belcw 1 ppm, although 16 producers reported excursions above 25 ppm more than ten times per month. E. Emission Control Methods Review - J. Barr, Air Products J. Barr reviewed various methods of controlling VCM emissions including PPG's work an lew taiperature catalytic destruction. (Have we published this?) Union Carbide is using an absorption technique in an unidentified solvent. (EDC?) In a review of methods currently employed: 25 plants use incineration, 17 of which have back-up systems if needed. 6 plants are using carbon adsorption. 5 plants are using solvent absorption including Carbide and Goodrich. Transportation Update - R. Wilson, Stauffer s Several directives are out covering 112A, 340W, and 114A tank cars. Initial directives cover vertical restraint systems an couplers which -should.be-jretrofi tted. by July, 1979.__ Oth^r requirements are for retrofitting cars with head protection by December 31, 1981 and thermal protection on the same date. Coating and jacketing requirements may mean reduced loading capacity in carder to meet shipping weight restric tions. SL 068686 3- ' G. Jtejor Accidents, Near Misses - J. Alvarez, Primex Primex in Mexico experienced a irejor accident where 7 storage tanks ^ exploded resulting in one fatality, three injuries and three million dollars damage. Cause was a VCM breakthrough during maintenance on a 3-inch liquid valve. Carbide gave a brief description of their accident on September 5, 1977 where an autoclave (not suspension resin) released VCM which ignited ^ resulting in 2 people, 75 feet away burned severely. Cne, the chief operator has since died, the other remains critical. The explosion was heard 20 miles away and one large piece of the reactor, a 6,000 gallon commercial type, blew a distance of 1600 feet. This confirms previous estimates that evacuation distances should be at least 2,000 feet. Ethyl in Sarnia, Canada, reported finding stress corrosion on 3OSS vessels, but have found none on 316SS construction. Air Products stated that last January's cold weather caused a shutdown of their FVC plant because of frozen pipelines. On reopening a VCM valve a 500 lb. release occurred which traveled 50 to 100 feet and ignited at a welding machine. The resulting fire damaged instrumentation, but caused little structural damage. However, 8 people v^re admitted to the hospital for bums and snoke inhalation. H. Planning For Disasters - J. Vanwinkle, Diamond Shamrock Hnergency plans should have shift people as primary respondents. If an emergency happens on a weekend, salaried personnel can be hard to find. Training should be dynamic and continuous, because of turnovers of emer gency crews such as a fire brigade. Vanwinkle also stated that if you don't belong to- an snergency team, don't go to the scene and add to the ^ confusion. Seme unions have claimed that a company does not have the right to assign men to an emergency team. This is currently under arbi tration in Texas. I. Catalyst Handling - A. Dixon, Goodyear In general there are 8 to 10 initiators caimonly in use, generally stored at low temperatures. Suppliers are usually Lucidol, PPG, and Noury. Dixon cemented that Lucidol has 50%, PPG 30%, and Noury 15%, with the remaining 5% divided among the other organic peroxide producers. He stressed the need to review the producers' technical bulletins on handling and storage. Most companies use electrically refrigerated walk-in type freezers -with-tanperature monitoring ^and-pcwer-loss-alarms.____ Goodyear uses two compressors for a walk-in freezer, backed up by a diesel generator. Factory Mutual's storage code was reviewed outlining require ments on the storage vs. distance. Most plants have a chest type freezer in the reactor area, containing from one shift to one day's supply of initiator. Goodyear uses a snail walk-in freezer in the reactor area SL 068687 -4- containing one day's intitiator requirenents. lab personnel measure required amounts at their primary storage area and transfer it to the reactor area freezer. Unused initiator is never returned to primary storage and they always use the oldest initiator first. Care is taken to store packages allowing an air space between them and an outside wall for air circulation. Dixon reviewed various methods for charging initiator into the reactor: 1. Sane use charge bottles.(Goodyear considers this dangerous) 2. In the bulk FVC process, many charge manually into the reactor. 3. Goodyear pours their catalyst into a styrofoam ice chest. They also pump into the first stage reactor, but have had problons with plugging lines, but no decomposition. They also inadvertently left part of a jug (1/2 gallon) of 75% Lupersol 223 EHP in the reactor area resulting in a "white smoke" type decomposition, but no fire. In another instance 2-1/2 gallons of EHP was left in their styrofoam chest which decomposed on a filter head believed to have been initiated by sparks fran an electric cable. Pete Bogart of Tenneco reviewed an incident involving an unidentified Lucidol or Noury initiator stored below 28 F. They have a walk-in freezer with a water deluge system activated by J & W Heads. The heads got dirty ard activated prematurely, flooding the freezer with 750 F river water. The shift foreman reactivated the compressor and confirmed after a period of time that the freezer temperature returned to normal. However, the initiator (EHP?) decomposed the following morning resulting in a $4,000 catalyst loss. The initiator is used in their co-polymer plant. Tenneco charges their reactors by sucking the initiator up with a vacuum hose. Some producers use liquid nitrogen or carbon dioxide as back-up cooling in case of refrigeration failure. In a survey, 14 producers are using walk-in freezers and 8 have chesttype units. Eight also have back-up sprinkler systans. J. Sidelight - Both Lucidol and Noury continue to have hospitality suites promoting their initiators, PPG still gets "friendly" criticisn for not having the same arrangement. R. E. Stack RES/blh CC: G. J. Lazarchik B. C. Brennan C. M. anith R. E. Sourwine J. F. VanHoozer W. A. Keim K. Ezelle/J. Torres R. P. Lynch________ SL 068688