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Perhaps we should ban the production of "forever" chemicals in general and not wait until they've accumulated enough in the environment to warrant a study as to

Perhaps we should ban the production of "forever" chemicals in general and not wait until they've accumulated enough in the environment to warrant a study as to whether they are harmful or not. If you can't show plausible mechanisms of degradation to naturally occurring, reasonably safe compounds in the environment in a couple of decades, look for a different way to solve your problem.

chmod600 4y ago
There are a lot of things that won't degrade in decades under normal natural conditions. Probably a lot of metal alloys, ceramics, glasses. There are also a lot of polymers and plastics we wouldn't call "forever chemicals" but still last quite a while. So is it really the "forever-ness" of these chemicals that's so bad? Maybe it's how they seem to spread everywhere and potentially mess with certain biological systems (e.g. endocrine disruption)?
- adrianN 4y ago
  Metals, ceramics and glasses also exist naturally and we have thousands of years of evidence that they are okay (heavy metals excluded of course). Polymers and plastics, well, evidence is mounting that microplastics are not particularly healthy and it would be better if we hadn't spent a century producing literal mountains of plastic. It is my understanding that currently you're allowed to manufacture a completely new chemical and put it into your product with essentially no testing of the long term effect of that compound. That doesn't seem very wise to me, but maybe I'm misinformed about this topic.
  - jabl 4y ago
    > It is my understanding that currently you're allowed to manufacture a completely new chemical and put it into your product with essentially no testing of the long term effect of that compound. Pretty much. There's also a fairly long history of a compound being found to be harmful and banned, only for industry to come up with a very similar compound to replace it, but since it's not the same compound the previous ban doesn't affect it. Then after some time the new compound is found to be harmful as well, rinse and repeat. The counter-argument is that requiring each chemical to be extensively studied before it can be taken into use would drastically slow down the rate of innovation. So to an extent there's a conflict between safety and innovation. But of course it's not black and white, and I think there's good reasons to turn the lever more towards the safety end.
    - bjelkeman-again 4y ago
      The EU will ban 200 PFAS compounds based on common properties in 2023. Maybe this is a start of a useful trend. https://chemsec.org/eu-puts-200-pfas-out-of-business-but-thousands-remain/ https://chemsec.org/eu-puts-200-pfas-out-of-business-but-tho...
    - streamlining 4y ago
      It's illuminating that there's the Federal Analogue Act used to go after recreational drugs users but nothing equivalent for chemicals that are environmental hazards.
  - concordDance 4y ago
    Requiring a long term study for each new chemical used would almost completely progress in a huge variety of industrial fields. This includes things like solar panel and battery tech we're relying on to get out of the co2 hole.
    - adrianN 4y ago
      Life is unfortunately more complex than policy suggestions that fit into HN comments can address.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
  - wcoenen 4y ago
    > spent a century producing literal mountains of plastic Plastic production is growing at 3.5% annually. This implies a doubling of annual plastic production about every 20 years (because 1.035^20 ≈ 2). And because of how exponential functions work, this also means there has been about a doubling of the total amount of plastic in the world over the last 20 years. So most of the problem has been created in the recent past. And it will get twice as bad in the next 20 years.
- forum_ghost 4y ago
  DDT lasts decades in the biosphere. It's a known carcinogen. It's not just endocrine disruptors. Those are just most salient to us because we are species with sexual reproduction. You could also have forever carcinogens, forever mutagens, forever neurotoxins, anything you like.
catchclose8919 4y ago
EDIT: OK, what I said is quite wrong or at least misleading, see forum_ghost's comment for discussion of importance of catalytic and enzyme inhibitor/activator activity of such compounds. --- ...generally a chemical that doesn't degrade is chemically inert so it has less chances than any other more degradable compounds to cause harm (btw, how much research did we put into the multiple pathways of degradation for the currently fashinable "biodegradable" stuff? how many of those possible intermediary degradation compounds are not in fact quite toxical). (Bio)degradable also means reactive, so things are more complicated than it seems. But yeah, any non-degradable fluid is probably a very bad idea because it's gonna spill and get everywhere, so even minor probability of toxic effect could have insanely large consequences...
- mtsr 4y ago
  What about bioaccumulation, though? Doesn’t inertness also make it more likely to stick around somewhere in the foodchain?
- forum_ghost 4y ago
  That's not how any of this works. Metabolism (reactivity by proxy) and enzymatic/inhibitory activity are orthogonal. One of the least reactive metals, Platinum, is an excellent catalyst in numerous reactions, but often found entirely unreacted in nature: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platinum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platinum a stable chemical can have catastrophic consequences for various species, if it is a potent agonist/antagonist in a critical signalling pathway, or an enzyme/inhibitor of some process. Often these effects are clinically relevant in nanomolar concentrations. The stable chemical DDT is so stable, it actually bioaccumulates, with biological half-life in decades. It's also a known carcinogen that elevates risks of cancer 4-5x simply from historical exposure decades ago. As for "biodegradable", that's often basically fraud. PLA (polylactic acid), one of the most common greenwashing plastics, does not biodegrade at all under common conditions, outside of very specific composting process, not usually (maybe even never?) found in nature. Luckily PLA isn't very toxic.
- adrianN 4y ago
  That is of course a good rule of thumb, but as the example in the article shows it is not generally true.
mushbino 4y ago
Who has the lobbying power to counteract that of chemical companies? It typically takes major disasters and not just one of them to force a ban.
Tozen 4y ago
That requires governments taking a strong position against businesses that are using such toxic industrial compounds for the health of their citizens. But, when money is involved, political will is usually weak. As is often the case, there will be a lot of bought off politicians, who will attempt to ignore or gaslight. The trick of contaminating the environment with such dangerous chemicals is that death is slow. That people die 10 or 20 years later of strange cancers or have children with odd birth defects, allows businesses wiggle room. It's not a clear immediate threat, so many minds are slow on grasping the extreme danger involved. Only very strong consumer advocacy and voter pressure (where politicians demonstrably get kicked out of office) will have a chance of making a true difference.

chmod600 4y ago

There are a lot of things that won't degrade in decades under normal natural conditions. Probably a lot of metal alloys, ceramics, glasses. There are also a lot of polymers and plastics we wouldn't call "forever chemicals" but still last quite a while. So is it really the "forever-ness" of these chemicals that's so bad? Maybe it's how they seem to spread everywhere and potentially mess with certain biological systems (e.g. endocrine disruption)?

adrianN 4y ago
Metals, ceramics and glasses also exist naturally and we have thousands of years of evidence that they are okay (heavy metals excluded of course). Polymers and plastics, well, evidence is mounting that microplastics are not particularly healthy and it would be better if we hadn't spent a century producing literal mountains of plastic. It is my understanding that currently you're allowed to manufacture a completely new chemical and put it into your product with essentially no testing of the long term effect of that compound. That doesn't seem very wise to me, but maybe I'm misinformed about this topic.
- jabl 4y ago
  > It is my understanding that currently you're allowed to manufacture a completely new chemical and put it into your product with essentially no testing of the long term effect of that compound. Pretty much. There's also a fairly long history of a compound being found to be harmful and banned, only for industry to come up with a very similar compound to replace it, but since it's not the same compound the previous ban doesn't affect it. Then after some time the new compound is found to be harmful as well, rinse and repeat. The counter-argument is that requiring each chemical to be extensively studied before it can be taken into use would drastically slow down the rate of innovation. So to an extent there's a conflict between safety and innovation. But of course it's not black and white, and I think there's good reasons to turn the lever more towards the safety end.
  - bjelkeman-again 4y ago
    The EU will ban 200 PFAS compounds based on common properties in 2023. Maybe this is a start of a useful trend. https://chemsec.org/eu-puts-200-pfas-out-of-business-but-thousands-remain/ https://chemsec.org/eu-puts-200-pfas-out-of-business-but-tho...
  - streamlining 4y ago
    It's illuminating that there's the Federal Analogue Act used to go after recreational drugs users but nothing equivalent for chemicals that are environmental hazards.
- concordDance 4y ago
  Requiring a long term study for each new chemical used would almost completely progress in a huge variety of industrial fields. This includes things like solar panel and battery tech we're relying on to get out of the co2 hole.
  - adrianN 4y ago
    Life is unfortunately more complex than policy suggestions that fit into HN comments can address.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- wcoenen 4y ago
  > spent a century producing literal mountains of plastic Plastic production is growing at 3.5% annually. This implies a doubling of annual plastic production about every 20 years (because 1.035^20 ≈ 2). And because of how exponential functions work, this also means there has been about a doubling of the total amount of plastic in the world over the last 20 years. So most of the problem has been created in the recent past. And it will get twice as bad in the next 20 years.
forum_ghost 4y ago
DDT lasts decades in the biosphere. It's a known carcinogen. It's not just endocrine disruptors. Those are just most salient to us because we are species with sexual reproduction. You could also have forever carcinogens, forever mutagens, forever neurotoxins, anything you like.

catchclose8919 4y ago

EDIT: OK, what I said is quite wrong or at least misleading, see forum_ghost's comment for discussion of importance of catalytic and enzyme inhibitor/activator activity of such compounds. --- ...generally a chemical that doesn't degrade is chemically inert so it has less chances than any other more degradable compounds to cause harm (btw, how much research did we put into the multiple pathways of degradation for the currently fashinable "biodegradable" stuff? how many of those possible intermediary degradation compounds are not in fact quite toxical). (Bio)degradable also means reactive, so things are more complicated than it seems. But yeah, any non-degradable fluid is probably a very bad idea because it's gonna spill and get everywhere, so even minor probability of toxic effect could have insanely large consequences...

mtsr 4y ago
What about bioaccumulation, though? Doesn’t inertness also make it more likely to stick around somewhere in the foodchain?
forum_ghost 4y ago
That's not how any of this works. Metabolism (reactivity by proxy) and enzymatic/inhibitory activity are orthogonal. One of the least reactive metals, Platinum, is an excellent catalyst in numerous reactions, but often found entirely unreacted in nature: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platinum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platinum a stable chemical can have catastrophic consequences for various species, if it is a potent agonist/antagonist in a critical signalling pathway, or an enzyme/inhibitor of some process. Often these effects are clinically relevant in nanomolar concentrations. The stable chemical DDT is so stable, it actually bioaccumulates, with biological half-life in decades. It's also a known carcinogen that elevates risks of cancer 4-5x simply from historical exposure decades ago. As for "biodegradable", that's often basically fraud. PLA (polylactic acid), one of the most common greenwashing plastics, does not biodegrade at all under common conditions, outside of very specific composting process, not usually (maybe even never?) found in nature. Luckily PLA isn't very toxic.
adrianN 4y ago
That is of course a good rule of thumb, but as the example in the article shows it is not generally true.

mushbino 4y ago

Who has the lobbying power to counteract that of chemical companies? It typically takes major disasters and not just one of them to force a ban.

Tozen 4y ago

That requires governments taking a strong position against businesses that are using such toxic industrial compounds for the health of their citizens. But, when money is involved, political will is usually weak. As is often the case, there will be a lot of bought off politicians, who will attempt to ignore or gaslight. The trick of contaminating the environment with such dangerous chemicals is that death is slow. That people die 10 or 20 years later of strange cancers or have children with odd birth defects, allows businesses wiggle room. It's not a clear immediate threat, so many minds are slow on grasping the extreme danger involved. Only very strong consumer advocacy and voter pressure (where politicians demonstrably get kicked out of office) will have a chance of making a true difference.