To Use or Not To Use

The Debate over PVC 

KIM J GIFFORD / Constructive Images v.11, n.2, Spring 2005

When choosing materials for a building project, a variety of factors come into play — cost, durability, availability and the safety of the material itself. Determining whether a material is safe can be difficult, especially if the material in question is as hotly contested as polyvinyl chloride (PVC).

The Debate

PVC is a synthetic material formed from 57 percent chlorine and 43 percent ethylene (oil). The ethylene and chlorine combine through chemical reaction to form ethylene dichloride, which in turn is transformed into a gas called vinyl chloride monomer and subsequently into polyvinyl chloride. PVC was first developed for the military in World War II and began appearing in commercial use in the 1960s.

Widely used in the construction industry, the safety of PVC has long been the subject of debate, coming to the forefront recently with publication of PVC: Bad News Comes in Threes (the “three” referring to the code number of the plastic resin), a joint report by the Center for Health, Environment and Justice and the Environmental Health Strategy Center that characterizes PVC as “the poison plastic.”

But another draft report from the U.S. Green Build Council’s PVC Task Group concluded that “the available evidence does not support a conclusion that PVC is consistently worse than alternative materials on a life cycle environmental and health basis.”

These reports are two voices in a dispute between environmental advocates and the vinyl industry. The positions have become polarized with PVC alternately being portrayed as an environmental evil or a panacea to the construction industry.

PVC and the Construction Industry

Construction and plastic pipes account for over two-thirds of PVC consumption in North America and half in Western Europe. According to PVC: Bad News Comes in Threes, construction is also the fastest growing PVC sector with a projected annual average growth rate of 3.5 percent between 2002 and 2007. According to Joan Lowy from Scripps Howard News Service about 300 billion pounds of polyvinyl chloride has been installed in construction and other long-lasting uses over the last 40 years.

Determining whether a material is safe can be difficult, especially if the material is question is as hotly contested as polyvinyl chloride (PVC).

PVC is used in window frames and doors, gutters, cable ducting and conduits, flooring, wall coverings, roofing, reservoir linings, sheets and panels, roller shutters, shower curtains, shades and blinds, moldings and much more. The Bad News Comes in Threes report states that gutters, fencing, decking and other special applications account for 8.1 percent of PVC’s growth in the construction industry, windows and doors account for 6.1 percent and vinyl siding accounts for 4.5 percent.

PVC pipe accounts for the largest portion of all polyvinyl chloride used in the United States. PVC is favored in piping for its durability. “Because it’s less prone to breaks and other failures, the cost to repair and maintain a PVC water or sanitary system is far less than with other materials,” says the Uni-Bell PVC Pipe Association.

According to the Chlorine Chemistry Council, more than 75 percent of PVC pipes will have a lifetime of more than 40 years, with the potential for a lifetime of 100 years with little loss of strength. An August 2004 report Challenges and Context: Paradoxes in Vinyl and Sustainable Design by the Design Futures Council states “after a 6.7-magnitude California earthquake, PVC main lines remained in service while asbestos, cement and steel pipes experienced hundreds of breaks.”

The Critique

Michael Belliveau — executive director of the Environmental Health Strategy Center (a public health organization that promotes safer alternatives to hazardous chemicals) and co-author of PVC: Bad News Comes in Threes — outlines several reasons why he considers PVC to be the most environmentally harmful plastic:

PVC is toxic throughout its lifecycle; the chemicals used to make it are cancer causing and extremely harmful

These toxic additives don’t stay in the product, but instead come out during use especially during disposal

PVC is the only chlorine containing plastic causing it to form dioxins, [see note at right] which are toxic carcinogens. Belliveau also feels, more than any other plastic, PVC is full of toxic additives such as heavy metals like lead and cadmium as well as other chemicals that are used to soften and make the PVC flexible.

In addition to dioxin, opponents also suggest that ethylene dichloride and vinyl chloride created in the production of PVC can cause health problems ranging from cancer, endocrine disruption and endometriosis to neurological damage, birth defects and impaired child development, and reproductive and immune system damage.

Belliveau worries about PVC in a construction setting because of the burning of vinyl scraps on a rural jobsite. He also points out that the majority of PVC is used for construction and these types of materials tend to be “longer lived.” As a result, opponents of PVC fear “we are building up a stock of PVC products in use which will eventually create a looming waste crisis. Because these products have 20-, 30-, 40-year life spans and were introduced in the last couple of decades, they will come out of service and there will be a huge amount of vinyl waste full of toxic additives and chlorines that we are ill-prepared to handle,” he says.

Opponents to PVC criticize the recent USGBC draft saying it ignored such vital details as the use of lead as a stabilizer in PVC production and the association of mercury with chlorine plants.

“The chemical industry that makes this vinyl is never going to do anything but try to market it,” Belliveau says, suggesting numerous material alternatives for some of the most common construction purposes. These alternatives include natural products as well as “cleaner” plastics [see note at right] such as polyethylene and polypropylene, a list of which are available from the Healthy Building Network on its Web site (www.healthybuilding.net).

The Defense

Allen Blakely, a spokesman for The Vinyl Institute, feels that the opponents of PVC are “trying to trump up issues that really don’t seem to amount to much.” He points to the USGBC’s draft report, calling it “the mother of all resources.” This draft not only concluded that PVC offers comparable environmental and health impacts to other competing materials, but suggested a credit in the LEED rating system for eliminating PVC could lead those in the construction industry to use materials that perform worse over their lifecycles.

Blakely also states PVC pipe can meet standards set by the National Sanitation Foundation and the National Fire Protection Association. Furthermore, “PVC pipe and wiring are accepted in almost every state code in the country,” he says.

He cites a number of benefits to PVC including its durability, versatility, energy efficiency and cost effectiveness. Because it is durable, “you don’t have to replace it, allowing for the conservation of resources,” he says.

According to the Design Futures Council report, EPA data suggests “production of vinyl has more than tripled in the past 30 years, yet dioxin levels in the environment have steadily declined.” It also states “chlorine gas is not released into the atmosphere by incineration (or recycling or landfilling) of vinyl. A majority of the chlorine present in incinerator waste comes from sources other than vinyl, such as table salt and food waste.” The Chlorine Chemical Council concludes that restrictions on PVC would have “negative economic consequences for the construction industry.”

Blakely maintains that PVC plastic accounts for only 1 percent of municipal solid waste. He argues that some of the concerns of PVC opponents are outdated and result from safety issues dating back to the 1970s. During that time, workers exposed to prolonged, high amounts of vinyl chloride monomer were shown to be at risk for angiosarcoma of the liver. Improvements in the industry have resulted in a 99 percent reduction of vinyl chloride monomer emissions.

“Our illness and injury rate are among the lowest in the manufacturing industry, lower than manufacturing and the chemical industry as a whole,” he says. “Depending on who you talk to you, you will hear a litany of charges, but we have answers to most of them.”

source: 2jul2007

Mindfully.org note: This is much less a debate than anyone in the industry would like readers to think. All plastics are toxic threats. PVC just happens to be about the worst because of its undeniable production of dioxins, which even the industry admits. They say it is an unintended byproduct. It has been known for decades that the production of dioxins throughout the lifecycle of PVC is unavoidable. However, they continue to produce PVC, all the while knowing this. That is hardly unintentional. Mindfully.org says that dioxin production is clearly an intentional byproduct of PVC. Be sure to read the referenced articles above.