It’s here!
The Big Dream Gathering
Tonight from 6:30 - 10 p.m.
Polk County Convention Center
501 Grand Avenue, Des Moines
Stop by and say “hi” - I’ll be live-blogging the event. It’s free. Kids are welcome.
Writer: Sandy Renshaw is a self-employed communications consultant. You will also find her blogging at Purple Wren.
Technorati Tags: Iowa, Des Moines, Central Iowa News, Big Dream Gathering
What kind of net? Basketball net? Fishing net? Nope. Internet! Today in Des Moines we are not hearing much about net neutrality, but net neutrality is a hot issue.
SearchNetworking.com defines the term.
Net neutrality is the principle that data packets on the Internet should be moved impartially, without regard to content, destination or source. Net neutrality is sometimes referred to as the ‘First Amendment of the Internet.‘ (accessed 04/20/2008)
Net neutrality means that information coming to your computer will come to you at the same speed as it comes to the computers of Mid American Energy, British Petroleum, or Blue Cross Blue Shield of Iowa (and without changing the order in which that information moves); it means that information coming from Fox News, Halliburton, or Hearst-Argyle would move at the same speed as information coming from Catholic Charities, Century of the Common Iowan, or The Rural Populist. It would not be held up because of who you are, whether giver or receiver. It means that you have the same rights as the rich and powerful to hear and be heard in this grand adventure called the Internet.
Many see net neutrality as a Constitutional right guaranteed by the First Amendment.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
Today in contrast to much of U.S. history, the Internet is the way in which people are assembling peacefully, speaking freely, expressing religious views, petitioning and reporting news and opinion. The Internet is as fundamental as the traditional press in disseminating information; it is as fundamental as free speech in the expression by the individual; it is now the place where people assemble peacefully; it is today’s street corner; it is one place in which religious views can be debated without violence; it is now the door-to-door manner of collecting signatures from people of common views for the redress of grievance. These rights are worth protecting.
When liberty is taken away by force it can be restored by force. When it is relinquished voluntarily by default it can never be recovered. (accessed 04/20/2008) Dorothy Thompson
If we sell or diminish even part of these rights to someone with more money or more power, we have indeed given up our rights to freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and the right to peaceable assembly. That has almost happened twice - once very recently, once in 2006.
As it turns out Comcast Communications, the powerful cable company and internet service provider was caught red handed restricting service to some lawful users. Upon discovery our federal government through the FCC stepped in quickly. A second, widely reported hearing was held last week in the heart of Silicon Valley on the campus of Stanford University. Who didn’t bother to show up? Comcast, AT&T, Verizon, and Time-Warner. They are not big supporters of net neutrality.
So who is supporting net neutrality? Among many others, here at least are three groups that are fun to put together.
Net neutrality is not big news in Des Moines, but let’s see who is reporting this news elsewhere.
We also have a Congressman who is not a big supporter of net neutrality. In 2006 a critical bill (H.R. 5252) called COPE came up in the U. S. House. It was narrowly defeated. One of the Democratic Congressmen who sided with the powerful telecommunications industry against net neutrality was Representative Leonard Boswell. While I voted for Representative Boswell, and he has represented me well on many issues, he certainly did not represent me that day. I want to have a Congressman who understands the importance of the Internet to our basic American freedoms.
If the telecommunications industry should ever win this battle to set different standards for different internet clients, your ability to hear and be heard will be affected. Your voice will be restricted to the small pipe. The more powerful, moneyed interests will have the big one.
Restriction of free thought and free speech is the most dangerous of all subversions. It is the one un-American act that could most easily defeat us. William O. Douglas (accessed 04/20/2008)
Be well-informed on net neutrality.
Guest Writer: James G. Lindberg (Jim) is the Purple Wren’s sweetie and is a visiting chemistry professor at Grinnell College and retired from Drake University.
Photo on flickr by shapeshift
Photo on flickr by lovers v haters
Technorati Tags: Iowa, Des Moines, Central Iowa News, Net Neutrality, Leonard Boswell, First Amendment, Telecommunications, Common Cause
The new game for the under 30s is connection and networks, and KCCI gets it.
Powerful institutions are sometimes the last to understand and employ new concepts. Not so with KCCI. They get it. They understand new social media.
Speaking for myself, I’m a little old, I’m a little slow, and quite often I don’t pick up on things right away. Some of you older folks may understand when I say, “I have an analog mind trapped in a digital world.” When I was little, I listened to the radio, my dad read me the funny papers, we didn’t have a TV until I was 11, and my mother was always after me to read more books. I’ve made my living being traditional (might be a little boring too) - went to school, used print libraries for information, got degrees, got a job and stayed in it for 35 years, and felt a little anxious when I thought I didn’t know some fact or process I should. Ho-hum. Bo-oring!
The Purple Wren on the other hand is sometimes a little quicker on the uptake. She is quite insightful, intuitive and definitely less conventional. If you wait for traditional methods of proof, you’ll always be about a decade behind her. Case in point: she came home from a business seminar a couple of years ago talking about blogging, new social media, business transformation, and networks. Oh brother, I thought I’d never hear the end of it.
If you’re over 40 and look at politics, the world, business, and communication today and think, “What is this? What is happening here?,” I would suggest that new social media, networks, and blogging are part of it. Sandy Renshaw is the expert here, not me; she has written a chapter in The Age of Conversation, but I will have a different perspective.
Let me name a few applications of new social media, some of which are huge, transforming institutions, and one is more modest:
When you are around younger people (like college students), you find that they are members of multiple extended groups that share information. The other night after a community meal several of my students went to their Facebook sites and showed everyone family pictures. Their family albums sprang to life in an instant. (Note to self: watch out for grandparents carrying laptops.) They stay connected to family, high school friends, college friends, and classroom peers.
But getting back to KCCI and playbook, doesn’t every kid want to feel valued, to be part of community, to gain a sense of recognition, to know that their school is a fine place to be? KCCI has that figured out and has linked Des Moines and Central Iowa to a larger internet community called high school playbook and attached it on their website; high school playbook is a device of Hearst-Argyle Television Inc., the owner of KCCI. If you go to the Hearst-Argyle website you will recognize the theme song for a lot of television stations that they own or manage.
If my count is right KCCI has linked over 140 Central Iowa high schools to a network where individual students can upload information (data, text, photos, graphics, messages and other materials), start conversations, and view content posted by others and by KCCI. Listen to Andy Garman explain. The Hearst-Argyle stations including KCCI even provide video camera and software, and this is explained from Greenville, SC.
Congratulations to KCCI for success in building a new community.
Guest Writer: James G. Lindberg (Jim) is the Purple Wren’s sweetie and is a visiting chemistry professor at Grinnell College and retired from Drake University.
Photo on flickr by robinhamman
Technorati Tags: Iowa, Des Moines, Central Iowa News
“Shall [Polk County, Iowa] be authorized to renovate and improve the existing courthouse and construct an 8-1/2 story courthouse facility…with related site improvements, at a total cost not exceeding [$127 million] and issue its general obligation bonds in an amount not exceeding [$132 million] for that purpose?” That is the question being put to voters in a special election on April 29, 2008.
To promote support for the referendum, officially known as Public Measure Letter A, judges have been giving tours of the current courthouse. I participated in the first tour, led by Judge Robert A. Hutchison, on March 25th. There was a strong case made for the need to do something in order to improve the current operations of Iowa’s Fifth Judicial District. However, there were virtually no pleadings on why this particular referendum should be approved.
On the county’s website there is a 21 page referendum document. This provides sketches of plans for the renovated courthouse and the new facility. On page 20 is a chart comparing various options that were considered before this option, known as 5A, was selected for the referendum. From a non-detailed look at the chart, 5A appears to be in line with other options with the important component of retaining use of the historic current building. Allegedly there has been strong public support for retaining the courthouse as a courthouse.
To help understand how the current courthouse and the new facility will be used, I recommend at least a quick look at the Iowa Judiciary’s website. On that site is information about the types of judges and magistrates that use space in county courthouses. There is also a map that shows which counties are in which district.
There are numerous reasons for building a new facility, but there are also questions voters need to ask. For instance, the new facility is projected to be maxed out in terms of space at about the time the general obligation bonds used to construct it are paid off, approximately 20 years from start of construction. Is that a reasonable planning timeframe? As businesses and residents move westward into Dallas County, will there be a related shift in where court cases are filed?
In previous reports on the courthouse, I had mentioned that access for disabled jurors, litigants, and attorneys was a matter of concern. Yet, when I asked Judge Hutchison how many jurors he had excused due to accessibility issues, he said there had been none. Although, he did acknowledge that it was sometimes a challenge to accommodate those particular jurors. During the tour a woman in a wheelchair was seen moving easily in the fourth floor hallway. In the new facility, a large juror orientation room is included in the first floor plans.
In economic terms, the lack of space in the current courthouse means that various types of courts and judiciary services are in rented space throughout Des Moines. In addition to the cost of space, this adds to the strain on budgets and personnel for deputies and other necessities of court. Costs for 5A also include temporary relocations while the current courthouse is renovated. The referendum does not provide details on this item.
In terms of physical safety, there are concerns over matters of physics and matters of law. For instance, the current courthouse does not have enclosed stairwells appropriate for fire evacuation. Neither does the courthouse permit defendants, witnesses, and jurors to be separated easily as they all must use the same hallways.
For Judge Hutchison, the human need is also important. He noted that juvenile courts handle both Child in Need of Assistance (CINA) cases and cases of juvenile justice. In the latter, it is not uncommon for teenagers to be taken into the courthouse in handcuffs. Judge Hutchison believes it is inappropriate to have youth sitting in a public hallway while handcuffed. He wants a building design that will offer them some privacy.
A new facility could also serve the public interest. Lack of space in courtrooms means the family members of defendants and of victims may have difficulty finding seating in criminal cases. Even the media must sit outside courtrooms when covering cases. This means nuances of reaction and interaction that are important may be missed.
A few polling places have been changed for this special election. If you know how you will vote, absentee voting is already taking place. In the comparison chart for the various options, it is estimated that a homeowner with a $100,000 house would pay $23.24 under 5A. A business property owner would pay $286.44 on an assessed value of $500,000.
M.R. Field covers local issues for AroundDesMoines.com. 
On April 29, 2008, residents of Polk County, Iowa, will be asked to vote to spend money on renovations to the county courthouse and for construction of an adjacent court facility. The current courthouse between 5th and 6th Streets and between Cherry and Mulberry, just south of Walnut Street, in downtown Des Moines is on the National Register of Historical Places.
A February 12th news release from the Polk County Board of Supervisors notes that the referendum will be to authorize up to $132 million with no more than $127 million being spent on construction costs. The news release also notes that the current courthouse, built in 1906, now has 28 courtrooms but was designed to include only 4 such rooms. The current building also needs to be retrofitted for disabled individuals, including jurors, lawyers, and defendants.
The new building will be 8-1/2 stories tall. A 21-page pdf file is available online with details about the proposed construction.
Tours of the current courthouse are being held to educate the public about the need for the referendum and new building. The schedule is below. Enter the courthouse through the south door. Tuesday, March 25 - 1:30 p.m.
Thursday, March 27 - 4:30 p.m.
Saturday, March 29 - 10:00 a.m.
Monday, April 7 - 9:00 a.m.
Monday, April 14 - 9:00 a.m.
Monday, April 21 - 9:00 a.m.
M.R. Field covers local events for AroundDesMoines.com. 
Common sense ain’t common. Will Rogers
And the Iowa House had difficulty with a common sense issue - smoking in bars, restaurants, and casinos. Now we wait for compromise. A joint committee will start negotiations on Monday.
How about this for a compromise: a smoker in every other seat?
It has been 44 years since the first Surgeon General’s report on smoking and health.
The late Louis F. Fieser, a fine organic chemist, headed the first Surgeon General’s committee. He was an expert on cancer-causing chemicals. The committee issued a 387 page report in 1964.The crux of the report? “…cigarette smoking is a health hazard of sufficient importance to warrant remedial action.” How ironic it is that Louis Fieser was a chain smoker who developed lung cancer the following year and had surgery only to live another 13 years with emphysema and bronchitis. He died of pneumonia in 1978. One of Fieser’s colleagues, R. B. Woodward won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1965. Few would dispute that Woodward was the greatest synthetic organic chemist who ever lived. Woodward would have shared a second Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1981, but he was also a chain smoker and (not unrelated to his smoking) died in 1980 of a heart attack at 62 years of age.
Ah, but let’s not dwell on dead chemists. Let’s keep things in perspective. Let’s use our common sense. What’s important in Iowa is to make sure we have enough jobs. Wouldn’t you hate to lose your job in a smoky bar or casino? Talk about bad luck! Come to think of it lots of Iowans are dependent on smoking for their jobs: nurses, cardiologists, pulmonologists, medical receptionists, insurance claims agents. Wow! I never thought of it that way. It’s good that we have people with common sense watching out for our interests. (And here we Iowans thought we wanted a statewide smoking ban.) Maybe we should think about putting people to work at jobs that would extend their productive lives rather than shorten them.
Until common sense makes its return to Iowa, suck it up, nonsmoker. Don’t be such a wuss.
Keep the faith. I have every confidence that the Iowa Legislature will reach a good solution.
Guest Writer: James G. Lindberg (Jim) is the Purple Wren’s sweetie and is a visiting chemistry professor at Grinnell College and retired from Drake University.
Photo on flickr by idea313
Photo on flickr by miikkahoo
Technorati Tags: Iowa, Des Moines, Central Iowa News, Iowa Legislature, Smoking Ban
Asbestos abatement is the containment of asbestos fibers in a building. This is usually by removal, encapsulation, encasement, or repair, but abatement also includes proper techniques for building maintenance (such as the sweeping and cleaning of asbestos-containing floor tiles, ceiling tiles, etc.).
As we have seen in Part 4 this process is regulated, expensive, and time-consuming. So why do it?
Older buildings will have deteriorating, friable asbestos in sprayed-on fireproofing and in wall and ceiling insulation and in ceiling texturing. Asbestos will also be present in caulks and putties. Boilers and pipes will have been coated or covered with friable asbestos that may or may not be wrapped. Friable asbestos is also found on reinforcing beams and ceiling tiles installed before 1981. (Floor tiles have better encapsulated asbestos containing materials [ACM], but if they begin to crack or break, fibers will become airborne then too.) When asbestos-containing material is undisturbed, that’s great, but the problem with aging asbestos-containing materials is that they are disturbed - disturbed by water, by vibration, by careless or unknowing workers who may have drilled, cut, polished, sanded, smoothed, ripped, or otherwise abrasively contacted the ACM. I can even imagine someone vacuuming textured ceilings or walls because they were dusty. Then it’s time to abate.
Would you like to see what the materials disturbed and otherwise look like? site 1 (several pictures; see especially “exposed”); site 2 (18 pictures); site 3 (a deteriorating wrap).
I’ve seen two abatements in different institutions. I saw different activities each time, and I will share some pictures of each. But first I’d like you to see how seriously Iowa State University takes asbestos removal. Being a state institution they are more transparent so we can read their protocols on-line. In the ISU manual, jump or scroll to University Responsibilities. That section is pretty impressive. The President acknowledges: I am responsible; the EH&S says: we will keep an inventory; we will write the procedures and we will follow the rules (permits, records, training, protection of workers, disposal of wastes). And you can bet money they do. I’ve met some of the people in Environmental Health & Safety at ISU; they are very open and very knowledgeable (also true in the places I have worked).
Who does the asbestos abatement?
In part 4 we saw there are federal guidelines for personnel training for asbestos removal. In Iowa there are companies who do the removal and there are companies who do the training.
So here is the fun and interesting part that you are not likely to see other places. What does asbestos abatement look like?
I am one of those people who wants to know stuff. So I visit with workers and ask questions - just like a little kid. “Whatcha doin’? … why?” Nearly all the workers have been quite happy to share their knowledge. Remember Part 4 when my former student told me, “As of this minute you are in violation of federal law…” (when he saw that asbestos wrap had been hacked away?) It’s been over 20 years, but I think the abatement firm that fixed that problem was from Ankeny. They came in, brought in their tools and equipment, they sealed the room with thick polyethylene, and they set to work. These are some pictures:
See that bucket of liquid (arrow) in the first picture? The worker told me that before they ever cut the asbestos wrap, they wrap then wet the asbestos thoroughly so the fibers don’t float off. Only then do they slice and remove a piece of the asbestos wrap. In the third picture you can see the wet asbestos in the bottom of the bag. In two of the pictures you can see that even with these precautions, all of the workers are wearing tight fitting masks with canister filters. (I took the pictures through the window of a sealed door.)
As of May 2006 the U. S. Department of Labor said these workers are paid an average of $17.04/hr. According to the ISU document, working in this industry increases the risk of lung cancer 5 fold, smoking by 10 fold but the combination, that is, for a smoking asbestos worker, by 90 fold (a synergistic increase).
The second project was more recent. In the top left picture you can see that the working room is again sealed with thick polyethylene. Then there is a box (arrow, a negative pressure pump) and a large polyethylene tube running from the box. What you can’t see is that a tube also runs from the room into the box. The box is a pump that is sucking the air out of the room and pushing it through a HEPA filter. The other two pictures show the path of the already-purified air being discharged into a courtyard.
Well, that’s it. That’s my story, and I’m stickin’ to it. People from New Jersey to California got excited about Asbestos and the Equitable Building within 24 hours of the time that the story broke on February 2, 2008. Over 2500 years of geology, chemistry, history, health, law, business, and commerce - now 5 weeks in Des Moines. When you go back and read Perry Beeman’s story in The Des Moines Register and then next week when you see the result of the DNR meeting scheduled for Tuesday March 11, pictures will spring to mind, and you’ll have some ideas of your own!
If you think it’s the end, it’s not. Just watch.
Guest Writer: James G. Lindberg (Jim) is the Purple Wren’s sweetie and is a visiting chemistry professor at Grinnell College and retired from Drake University.
Technorati Tags: Iowa, Des Moines, Central Iowa News, Asbestos, Equitable Building, Abatement
As of this minute you are in violation of Federal law….
I took those words quite personally since the speaker and I were the only people in the room; the words still ring in my ears more than 20 years later. My friend who was also my former student was visiting campus as a member of a board advising the university president on general issues. A chemistry major with a law degree, he had worked for more than a decade for the Environmental Protection Agency. His visit with me was social. We’d had lunch and I was giving him a tour of some old haunts and newer lab spaces in a building completed in 1950. I thought we were in a pretty uninteresting room when he looked up, stopped, looked closer, and with anger in his voice said something along the lines, “That’s exposed asbestos. They have hacked it away to make room for that heat exchanger. As of this minute you are in violation of Federal law….” and I hardly remember the rest. There might have been something to the effect that there was a daily fine until it was fixed. Well, luckily I was not in charge and he reported it to the president within the hour. Very shortly thereafter an asbestos abatement crew was on the job. In the next post (Part 5) I will describe several asbestos removal projects (abatements) that I watched first hand. But first, who’s in charge?
I am not an attorney. I’m a chemist. Don’t take my comments as legal advice. Asbestos is a regulated chemical.
As I look at the issues surrounding any activity that includes asbestos, it is clear that the task will be complex, difficult and daunting. Dealing with asbestos adds a layer of legal complexity, administrative complexity, and physical complexity. Everything is harder, slower, and more expensive. Reinforcing that point is an article Is your business using regulated chemicals? Watch your profits evaporate.
Asbestos is regulated at the federal level by:
In their own words, “The mission of the Environmental Protection Agency is to protect human health and the environment. EPA works to develop and enforce regulations that implement environmental laws enacted by Congress.” One regional EPA office has provided a succinct summary of asbestos history and regulations.
While the EPA has a host of functions, two that are relevant to our discussion of asbestos are 1) setting standards and practices and 2) delegating authority to states for granting permits, monitoring, and enforcing compliance. Under point 2) then EPA delegates authority to Iowa to determine compliance and enforce regulations. By law the state regulations must be equal or more stringent than federal standards.
Asbestos is regulated at the state level by:
Among the many rules are notification of intent, permitted levels of asbestos exposure, monitoring asbestos levels, training, worker protection, record keeping and disposal of wastes. At every step help is available from the regulatory agencies.
Some of the key statutes under which asbestos is regulated include
If you would like a sense of the relevant federal code on environmental protection and EPA (where the codes are often prefixed with 40 CFR with the 40 for environmental law and the CFR for Code of Federal Regulations) check this e-site from the Government Printing Office. Within this site the code for building renovation is in section 61.145.
The regulations governing labor are found mainly in 29 CFR. A short fact sheet is useful orientation. We find that OSHA and the U. S. Department of Labor have three standards for workers handling asbestos: 29 CFR 1926.1101 covers construction work, and it is 45 pages; 29 CFR 1915.1001 at 42 pages covers shipyard workers; and the 24 page 29 CFR 1910.1001 covers general industry (custodial work, brake repair, etc.). This last one is also found as a 25 page pamphlet.
The Iowa Administrative Code on environmental protection (in which we find more than 100 references to asbestos) and Iowa NESHAP are also accessible on-line. The DNR has a short introduction with links. We can also note that the Iowa Administrative Code sends us back to 40 CFR 61.145 that is the EPA document. San Luis Obispo, CA has a convenient form that outlines the federal policy. You can read one section of Iowa law dealing with permits. In that link see 22.102(3) b.
There is a carrot for the owner of a building containing asbestos: help from the regulating agencies. In general it appears that both EPA and OSHA seem to recognize the difficulty of wading through pages of regulations and offer assistance through fax, phone, and TTY. There is also a stick; the federal and state governments are serious enough about protecting the public and enforcing compliance that anyone can report suspected violations. Federal law requires asbestos workers to be trained; EPA lists the certified trainers in Iowa.
Finally, Gordon Gibb, a very talented freelance writer, has also written about asbestos and the Equitable Building in LawyersandSettlements.com. His article is very interesting and considerably shorter than the sum of what will be my five.
In the next and last post on Asbestos and the Equitable Building (Part 5), I will describe several asbestos removal projects (abatements) that I watched first hand.
Guest Writer: James G. Lindberg (Jim) is the Purple Wren’s sweetie and is a visiting chemistry professor at Grinnell College and retired from Drake University.
Photo on flickr by neoyogyrt
Technorati Tags: Iowa, Des Moines, Central Iowa News, Asbestos, Equitable Building
A short history of asbestos
It is pretty obvious, isn’t it? Once upon a time someone looked at the materials we now call asbestos and said, “What great stuff! Think of all the things we can use it for!” And use it they did.
Three of the great properties of asbestos are 1) flame resistance, 2) steel-like durability, and 3) wonderful insulating properties, and we should also note 4) asbestos can be woven into soft fabric. Every material has its own combination of good and bad properties, and asbestos has some that are quite unique. An article in print called Asbestos Revisited was written by two college professors, James Alleman in civil engineering at Purdue University and Brooke Mossman of the College of Medicine at the University of Vermont. You will find the article on pages 70-75 in Scientific American in July of 1997 in any established library (Des Moines Public Library downtown or Drake to name two).
Let’s examine some minor anecdotal stories of asbestos use. In ancient Persia (now principally Iran and areas both west and east) some tablecloths were woven from asbestos fibers. When it was time to clean them, they were put over fire. Everything on the tablecloth burned off and left it white. Royals and slaves from Persia to Greece had clothing of asbestos. (Imagine the hand-me-downs in those families - grumble, grumble - soft fabrics possessing steel-like durability. “But that was great-great-grandpa Ganath’s. It’s sooo out of style.”)
As a chemist schooled in the 1960s and working since, I have seen a lot of asbestos in lab settings. As we will see in the upcoming Part 3, this was not always a good thing. Most of the common lab equipment using asbestos - but not all - is gone now, replaced by materials considered less hazardous. All schools had 4″ square wire screens with an asbestos center, 8″ square fiberboard asbestos hot pads (that we would break in two accompanied by a little puff of dust), rolls of soft, gray asbestos ribbon that looked a lot like thick burlap, spools of asbestos yarn, and asbestos gloves to handle hot glass. (You can still buy asbestos gloves and find them in labs, but Kevlar has many of the same insulating properties and durability without the dangers.) For the first twenty-five years of my career bottles and cans of chemicals used to arrive packed in a chunky, dusty material called vermiculite, some but not all of which, contained asbestos. Before we laugh too hard about the Persians and Greeks in ancient times, check out this asbestos homeware available in my lifetime.
But people didn’t make their fortunes selling tablecloths and lab gloves. They made their fortunes insulating and fireproofing with asbestos itself and by making products formulated, that is, combined or mixed with asbestos.
Some of the products made with minimally modified asbestos included insulation for steam furnaces, steam engines, and heating pipes, thermal insulation and fireproofing for chimneys and flues, fire blankets, electrical wire insulation, asbestos tape for sealing duct work, and one of the biggest - for insulation in ships for boilers, nuclear reactors, and hot water and steam pipes. In some critical military applications, asbestos is still used. But when you consider this list always keep in mind that asbestos has been largely replaced with safer but sometimes inferior products. Other products that used to be formulated with asbestos include sprayed-on insulation and fireproofing, brake linings and pads, clutch plates, acoustical plaster, ceiling tiles and panels, floor tiles, linoleum, shingles, black jack tar, wallboard, sheetrock, putties, caulking, glues for tile (mastic), siding, popcorn ceiling texture, and lots of other materials. An earlier version of “soft concrete” included asbestos. It was lighter and considered fireproof so was just the ticket for construction, especially roofs. Asbestos of a somewhat different composition is still used in a few types of construction today as noted in Table 6 of the USGS publication. These newer formulations are bonded and nicely contained (unless they are sawed, ground, or finely pulverized by other mechanical processes). Generally I don’t like to posts lists, but this one from Princeton University is nicely qualified. Note where asbestos is likely to be found in buildings constructed before 1981.
If you want to see what some of these asbestos-containing materials look like (because many have survived to this day in older buildings and in homes), try this Web site with great photos of actual aging asbestos materials. These photos are posted by a state-licensed inspector in New York. You can see a few more pictures from a training site at the University of North Texas.
Well, that’s Part 2, a quick tour of the history of asbestos. What great possibilities! The Magic Mineral of the 1939 World’s Fair. I’ll be back later with a little about the discovery of some adverse health effects.
Guest Writer: James G. Lindberg (Jim) is the Purple Wren’s sweetie and is a visiting chemistry professor at Grinnell College and retired from Drake University.
Photo on flickr by J. James Bono
Technorati Tags: Iowa, Des Moines, Central Iowa News, Asbestos, Equitable of Iowa
Unless you headed back underground with the ground hog on February 2, you noticed asbestos in the news around Iowa this week: in The Des Moines Register; on WHO-TV; or as it was picked up from WHO by msnbc in two articles (1, 2), KCCI-TV, WOI-TV, WQAD in the Quad Cities, KPTM42 in Omaha. You might even have seen it on-line in the Quad City Times, The Creston News, the Muscatine Journal, the Worthington MN Daily Globe, the Waterloo Cedar Falls Courier, or heaven forbid the citation by the Oakland County MI Asbestos Lawyers Association or the New Jersey Asbestos Lawyers.
The genie is out of the bottle. Asbestos and the Equitable Building was big news, and it spread fast. Getting up to speed on why newscasters, lawmakers, law enforcers, scientists, universities, contractors, homeowners, real estate agents, and the general public would be interested in asbestos is not a short story, but it is pretty interesting. Thus, I would like to spend a few blogs sharing and linking a little of the information that is available - a short primer if you would. I intend to do this in five parts: what is asbestos? what is its history? is it considered harmful? what are some of the government regulations? and what is asbestos abatement? Through all five parts you will discover just who is concerned in Iowa, in the U.S. and around the world. Here we go.
Photo on flickr by Aaron Dan
Part 1. What is asbestos? How can a rock be airborne?
Faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound? Nope. But asbestos survives unharmed by fire, can be woven into cloth, and can be described as stronger than steel. While that is not as good as Superman, it’s a pretty good start.
Asbestos is a mineral and a strange one at that. Rocks are usually made up of several minerals, but a few rocks are just one mineral. If you’d like to see photos of a few rocks and minerals, try this site from the University of North Dakota. Don’t worry, we’ll get to asbestos. A scientist would tell you that minerals have a definite chemical composition, and they would talk about which chemical elements were present, like lead and sulfur (found in galena over by Dubuque), silicon and oxygen (found in quartzite in northwest Iowa), or carbon, iron, and sulfur found in coal in central and southern Iowa. If you want to see other Iowa minerals, go to DNR’s site prepared by Jean Cutler Prior. The elements in the many individual minerals known generically as asbestos are mostly silicon, oxygen, magnesium, but often calcium, aluminum, iron, and manganese as well. These elements are common materials generally considered harmless on their own (unless you get hit in the head with a rock, of course).
Like other minerals it is a natural product that is mined. Major mines are found in Canada, South Africa, Australia with smaller mines along the East Coast of the U.S. and near Coalinga, California. Many other areas in the U.S. also have small mines.
On the outside chance that you are already so taken by minerals that you want to go a little further with minerals and see more photos, you can investigate sites at Bremen University in Germany (in English or German), or the University of Michigan (in English or Spanish).
But back to asbestos. The United States Geological Survey or USGS is a government agency. The USGS classifies six different fibrous minerals that are grouped under the term asbestos: chrysotile, crocidolite, amosite, anthophyllite asbestos, tremolite asbestos, and actinolite asbestos. The most common is chrysotile.
The three asbestos minerals most likely to be found in commercial products are chrysotile, amosite, and crocidolite. You can find lists of commercial asbestos-containing products on-line, but some of these lists are very misleading. For example, I found one list with the names of items that in years past were formulated with asbestos, but now these same products have no asbestos in them. Who needs that?! So stay away from those comprehensive lists. You’ll make yourself badly informed. We will look at a few specific products of significance in Part 2.
One of the nicest photos of asbestos the mineral is one from the State of Arizona. Take a look. There are a couple of features you should take note of. Unlike the other rocks and minerals, this example of asbestos looks like bundles of fibers. Exactly right. You can even see how they are lined up with each other. Some of this asbestos can be peeled away in fibrous bundles. It can be crushed between the fingers and reduced to a powder. The term for this reduction to powder is friable. We would also apply the term friable to soil. So, some asbestos is friable, and some is not, and friable asbestos is the most dangerous. Now friable is not a term we would normally associate with a rock or mineral, but it is a good descriptor of several forms of asbestos. Historically the more widely used more friable asbestos minerals were those classified as amphibolic. This class would include amosite and crocidolite (but not chrysotile).
Imagine then, if you would, crushing, grinding, hammering, rubbing, sanding or otherwise breaking materials containing friable asbestos. These processes can release asbestos fibers from the surface. As this happens some of the fibers become airborne. Some fibers or bundles of fibers can be seen and look a little like dust, and some cannot be seen with the naked eye. The dusty fibers get airborne, resettle to the ground, only to be picked up again by wind, drafts, motion, shoes, brooms, sweepers, or vacuums. They may get broken into smaller pieces, and they keep moving. Some of the asbestos pieces are big enough that if we breathed them, they would catch on the membranes in the nose and throat and be sneezed or coughed out. Others however are called respirable, meaning that they make it into the lungs. And here comes the rub. Just how big are these respirable fibers? The answer to that is: pret-ty darn small. Wikipedia (not always a perfect source of information, but generally pretty reliable) has a section of an article on asbestos that talks about the size of respirable asbestos fibers. (Go to the part of the article labeled “Asbestos as a contaminant.”) They point out that you could take anywhere from 1,000 to 10,000 respirable asbestos fibers and line them side by side in the width of a human hair. (Don’t try this at home, and if you do, don’t sneeze. You’ll have to start over again.) Naturally you can’t see these respirable fibers with the naked eye, but the Wikipedia article has an interesting picture taken with a scanning electron microscope (SEM). That photo gives you a pretty good picture of what they look like. Notice the spiky quality to the fibers. This will be important later.
Well, now you have some idea of what asbestos is, where it comes from, and some of its properties. I’ll be back with a little history, but I have to go back to work.
Guest Writer: James G. Lindberg (Jim) is the Purple Wren’s sweetie and is a visiting chemistry professor at Grinnell College and retired from Drake University.
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