Document zo68kyrmbEnKoxMo0Nwn72zjg

OECD sees energy self-sufficiency Hexachlorophene tied to Infant deaths The western world is not s helpless hostage of the oil producing states --at least not in the long term. This Cooperation opment on the energy outlook for its 24 member nations. According to the study, the west ern industrialized nations, as a group, could become self-sufficient in energy by 1985 through a program of increased indigenous production and conservation. They likely won't Ell the way to this goal as the shifts in capital investment resources involved would make it economically undesirable. However, these nations should be producing 80% of their own energy by 1985 assuming that world oil prices remain about unchanged in real (noninflated) terms. Before the recent oil price increases this proportion was expected to decline to about 55% from 65% in 1972. The study estimates that the potential for energy conservation In OECD countries is 15 to 20% of consumption levels previously fore cast for 1985. On the production side, indigenous oil and gas output could be twice as high in 1985 as it was in 1972, the base year for the study. Also, coal production could be up 65% from the 1972 level by 1985, and hydro and geothermal power could increase 67%. The big gest boost will come in nuclear power, up 20-fold by 1985. However, achievement of this greater production and conservation will need what the study calls "comprehensive international co operation between OECD coun tries." Some progress already has been made in cooperating within the group on overcoming temporary oil supply interruptions. What is leaded isi new ilong-tierm energy strategies. These should include: # A concerted energy conserva tion effort. e Accelerated development of OECD indigenous resources and of inter-OECD energy trade. e Methods to lower financial risks and monetary instabilities related to energy. Coordination of energy RAD. The study also points out the complementary interests of OECD nations and of the oil producing nations. The former seek to reduce their dependence on imported oil while the latter seek to diversify their economies from their present dependence on oil. Styrana Hasn't baan taggad as hazard to warkar haatth, but MCA fs chacklng Health hazards of monomers probed Last year it was vinyl chloride. This year it may he vinylidene chloride. Dow Chemical says it has in formation from Prof.P. L. Viols of Regina Elena Institute for Cancer Research, Rome (one of the original researchers to link vinyl chloride with liver tumor in animals) that vinylidene chloride may be carcino genic in high concentrations in rats via inhalation. Viola allegedly has found liver tumors in animals ex posed to the chemical. For its part, Dow has been conducting its own inhalation and feeding studies for about five months now, but adds that it started work before learning of Viola's finding*. Meanwhile, the Manufacturing Chemista Association (MCA), ap parently in response to the news from Italy, has revealed that it will administer a research program to be conducted by independent labs on the "occupational health as pects'' of vinylidene chloride and styrene. MCA had been told ver bally by Dow about Viola's findings prior to announcing the research projects. Styrene has been included, says MCA, even though it has not been tied to any healthhazards. MCA says that al "tliSylidene cmonde. Some Arms may participate in both, depending on their interests. But MCA won't identify the companies involved. Tots! cost for both projects should be $500,000 to $600,000. This will pay for inhalation and ingestion toxicity studies in a yet to he de cided animal species. Chemical effects on fetal development and metabolism of the compounds also will be looked at. Hexachlorophene, banned in 1972; by the Food A Drug Administration from most nonprescription (hug products, was linked at the time to brain lesions in newborn infants that were routinely washed with cleansers containing the compound. Medical researchers at the Univer sity of Washington (Seattle) school of medicine now believe that these chemically produced lesions may have killed some premature infants. The new findings will be pub lished this spring in Archives of Neurology (Chicago), and are a followup on a larger study reported in December by the American Academy of Pediatrics. The unpub lished data cover a group of 40 in fants bom prematurely between 1966 and 1973, and cued for at University Hospital in Seattle. According to Dr. Ellsworth C. Alvord Jr., director of neuropa thology at the medicaf school, autopsies of 26 of the infants showed mild to severe brain lesions. Of this latter group, brain damage was the only apparent cause of death in 16 of the infants. On the other hand, the cause of death in only four of the remaining 14 infants who didn't show brain damage was unexplain able. Brain lesions could occur more frequently in premature infants than in normal infanta, the Seattle researchers believe, since their skin is less well developed, and hence, presumably more permeable to hexachlorophene. Of the premature babies in the Seattle study, 23 had been bathed twice or more with pHisoHex anti bacterial scrub, which contains 3% hexachlorophene. The product is made by Winthrop Laboratories, a Sterling Drug division. Sterling Drug, for its part, claims that the cause and effects seen in the study don't clearly demonstrate what the researchers suggest, but adds that this doesn't mean the product (or >tber products containing hexa- :hloropnene) should be used reck lessly. FDA currently requires that hexachloropbene-containing prod ucts be sold only by prescription. Sterling Drug, in reply to the University of Washington, says that, based on the records that tne researchers used for their study, it's impossible to determine whether the product was used correctly. Current labeling for pHisoHex states that the product shouldn't be used on premature infants, except in "unique circumstances.'* G 4EN Jen. 20. 1975 RSV 0006517 nation's nuclear power program. Finally, Ford said that he wul ask for funds needed for energy R&D-- which may signal an increased federal energy R&D budget--and has set a goal of 1 million bbl of synthetic fuels and shale oil produc tion per day by 1985 together with an incentive program to achieve it. And Ford says that his program "envisions"--as opposed to prom ises--within the next 10 years 200 major nuclear power plants; 250 major new coal mines; 150 major coal-fired electric generating plants; 30 major new oil refineries; 20 major new synthetic fuel plants; many thousands of new oil wells; in sulation of 18 million homes; and millions of energy-saving autos, trucks, and buses. And Ford said, "We can do it." What it will take to "do it" was ex plained in part at a Manufacturing Chemists Association luncheon in Washington by Interior Secretary and energy chief Rogers C. B. Morton. In short, Morton said the nation would have to invest $800 billion by 1985 to achieve the Ad ministration's proposed energy invulnerability. Further, Morton said that the Administration is shaping its energy program so that the U.S. will not be vulnerable to a "desert tent decision" by the Arabs to drop the price of oil--and hence "gut" a 10* to 12-year pro gram by the U.S. to develop its energy resources. Venezuela to get petroproteln plant Venezuela may put up a plant for making high-protein yeast grown on normal paraffins, u plans ma terialize, the unit will be the first of its kind outside Europe and the first installed by an ou producing country. Technology would be based on a process developed by BP Pro teins, a part of the British Petrole um group. Plans call for a $70 million plant with an annual capacity of 100,000 metric tons of single cell protein. In addition, there would be a $23 million unit for extracting the nparaffin growth medium from oil. Completion and startup are fore seen by 1978 at Puerto la Cruz in eastern Venezuela. If, as now seems likely, the plans proceed, it will put BP Proteins well ahead of its competitors in the petroprotein race. The company already has several projects under way in Europe. At Lavera in south ern France, where the company conducted much of its pioneering technology development, there is a unit for making 20,000 metric tons per year of the material. And at Grangemouth, Scotland, site of BP's 8.8 million metric-ton-a-year oil refinery, there is a semicommer cial plant producing 5000 metric tons annually. A 100,000 metric- ton-per-year unit is now under con sideration there. Later this year, BP, in partnership with Italy's Anic, will bring on stream a 100,000 metric-ton-per-year petroprotein plant at Sarroch, Sardinia. Other companies who are well along in petroprotein development are Imperial Chemical Industries and Royal Dutch/Shell. ICI uses methanol as the growth medium. Shell is basing its process on methane. Both 1C1 ana Shell are concentrating their efforts on the growth of bacteria. Japan has another clean auto engine Still another commercial approach to low-pollution auto engine design has been introduced in Japan. Fuji Heavy Industries Ltd., maker of lightweight Subaru automobiles, claims a low-emission engine that meets Japan's 1975 emission stan dards without afterburner or cata lytic converter. These standards are very close to those originally set for 1975 U.S. autos. Fuji's SEEC-T (Subaru exhaust emission control) system uses the same general method to reduce pol lutant formation as do stratified charge engines--slow burning of lean gasoiine/air mixtures, com pared to conventional engine opera tion. But the mechanical approach is different. The aluminum-alloy Subaru en gine, which has a horizontally op posed cylinder arrangement, uses a fairly lean fuel mixture that is pre heated in the intake manifold to en sure thorough vaporization. Once the combustion stroke begins, an air suction valve brings more air into the cylinder to promote full com bustion. Improved combustion means a smaller amount of carbon monoxide formed, as well as a lower level of residua) hydrocarbons. High gas temperatures in an en gine cylinder promote the formation of nitrogen oxides, the other main automotive emission pollutant. Maximum combustion temperature during the power stroke is reduced in the SEEC-T engine, Fuji says, through changes in cam specifica tions, compression ratio, and igni tion timing from those of its stan dard engine design. The same modifications, along with a newly designed cylinder head, also help reduce hydrocarbons and carbon monoxide. Data from the company's 10mode, hot-start testing after a 60,000-km durability trial erf the SEEC-T engine mounted in the Subaru Leone 1400 (a four-cylinder, 1700-lb car) show nitrogen oxides emission levels ranging from 0.67 to 0.97 gram per km. Japan's new auto emission standards, which will be applied from April to new models and from December to present models, set a 1.6 gram-per-km max imum on nitrogen oxides. Other emissions in the Subaru tests (with new Japanese standards in paren theses) ranged from 0.15 to 0.17 gram per km for hydrocarbons (0.39) loir-em/ssfofi engines ahould holp com pel Jopon't auto pollution problama and from 1.70 to 1.81 grams per km for carbon monoxide (2.7). Three other Japanese auto mak ers have developed commercial en- S'nes that meet the 1975 standards. onda's CVCC (compound vortex controlled combustion) engine, on sale since the end of 1973, uses the stratified-charge approach. Toyo Kogyo's REAPS (rotary engine antipollution system) treats exhaust from its Wankel rotary engine in a thermal reactor. The firm's Mazda Luce has used this system since mid-1973. Mitsubishi Motors last year completed development of its MCA (Mitsubishi clean air) system, which uses both a thermal reactor and partial recirculation of exhaust gas to meet the emission standards. Toyota Motor Co., Japan's largest auto maker, meanwhile is convert ing some of its models to a modified CvCC engine based on licensed Honda technology, and for the time being will depend on catalytic con verters to meet Japan's new stan dards for the rest of its passenger- car production. Jan. 20.1075 CAEN 7 RSV 0006516