Cancer In The Workplace: Soil Contamination’s Lingering Danger.

Cancer In The Workplace: Soil Contamination’s Lingering Danger.
This is the fourth in our series on how workplace health and safety issues can elevate cancer risks, and how to control potential problems. This article focuses on soil pollution.
– by Isaac Rudik

One thing about many cancer-causing toxins used by industry: The risk continues long after they have injured or killed workers. A prime example is the solvent used in paint. A key ingredient is something called “2-nitropropane.” Not only can brief, unprotected exposure to it kill people, once it enters the soil it stays there for hundreds of years.

For example, two construction workers became ill recently after applying an epoxy resin coating containing 2-nitropropane in the confined space of an underground concrete vault. One man died 10 days later and although the second man recovered, he has had persistently elevated levels of a harmful serum in his pancreas. These cases show the importance of both effective industrial education and protective work practices.

Even non-industrial toxins can be deadly.

For example, The New England Journal of Medicine reported 25 years ago that radon, a common radioactive gas emitted by soil, stones and most building materials, may be responsible for as many as 10,000 lung cancer deaths among non-smokers in the United States each year. Follow-up studies reveal nothing to contradict the original findings.

Thus, industry must take special care not to add to the problem – and to ensure that workers are adequately protected as well as minimising the risk of contaminating soil.

Many Potential Sources

A large number of industrial processes use toxic material directly, or employ materials that contain toxins.

These can range from arsenic and PAH’s such as benzoapyrene to garden variety diesel oil products.

Diesel oil can be especially deadly if mishandled. Frequently, soil testing at industrial sites find that the contamination levels from petrocarbons – often diesel products – greatly exceed guidelines mandating clean-up. The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) has determined that occupational exposure to fuel oils are probably carcinogenic in humans based on animal studies suggesting that repeated contact seems to cause liver and skin cancer.

If diesel products leak into the soil, the cancer-causing by-products take hundreds of years to disappear, spreading their deadly impact into residential areas and farms where they become part of the food chain.

Other heavy metals commonly used by business cause a range of medical problems, both when unprotected workers are exposed as well as if they contaminate the soil around an industrial site. These include heavy metals such as zinc, barium and cadmium – very common in industry – as well as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons such as benzoflourantheme.

Studies indicate that soil contaminated by these minerals and compounds can lead to so-called “cancer clusters” both in the workplace and surrounding communities. A cancer cluster is defined by doctors as “(an) aggregation of relatively uncommon events or diseases in space and/or time in amounts that are believed or perceived to be greater than could be expected by chance.” Many instances brought to the attention of health and environmental regulators are “occupational” in that patients in a cluster are identified in terms of their workplace.

Costly Problems, Inexpensive Prevention

Controlling soil contamination from the workplace and in the surrounding community can be a complex problem. When a hazard is discovered, the clean-up cost is enormous to say nothing of potential expenses resulting from worker illnesses, community problems, fines and lawsuits.

Still, there are ways to minimize and even eliminate the risks:
• Worker education is the always first step to ensure that employees understand what they are dealing with and how to prevent potential problems.
• Ensure that toxic material is stored properly in appropriate sealer containers or rooms.
• Install self-contained treatment filters to capture inadvertent spills and run-offs.

Some of this is simply common-sense, some is already required by law and some – such as installing plant site water treatment facilities – is under serious consideration by regulators. A workplace audit where risks are involved will reveal ways to minimize potential problems.




Isaac Rudik is a compliance consultant with Compliance Solutions Canada Inc., Canada’s largest provider of health, safety and environmental compliance solutions to industrial, institutional and government facilities.

E-mail Isaac at irudik@csc-inc.ca or phone him at 905-761-5354.