AT SCHOOL & WORK
Industrial Cleaners
The Labour Environmental Alliance Society has taken environmental protection right into the workplace by linking it to health and safety with its innovative Cleaners, Toxins and the Ecosystem project. The concept is simple: environmental researchers work with health and safety committees in a number of institutional work sites to review the ingredients in cleaning products being used. The first target is to identify products that may be toxic to workers as well the environment. Once ingredients are identified, LEAS researchers work with committees to determine the health and environmental effects of those chemicals and to suggest alternative products.
Low Dose Does it Matter
"Aren't the relatively low levels of carcinogens that we may be exposed to in day-to-day use of consumer products likely to be below the safe threshold?"That has often been the assumption but doesn't take into account the potential interaction with other toxic chemicals that we're exposed to, the cumulative impact of hundreds of different chemicals that we come into contact with on a daily basis or the effects of chronic long-term exposures. More importantly, new emerging research about endocrine disruptors indicates that they have effects at minute levels, far below those expected, because of the sensitivity of hormone receptors in the body." According to Dr. Peter deFur, a toxicologist and affiliate associate professor at Virginia Commonwealth University, "scientific research demonstrates the fact that chemicals are biologically active at incredibly low levels - far below anything that might be considered a threshold."
Key to the project is workers' right to know what hazardous substances they may be exposed to. This right is contained in federal Workplace Hazardous Materials Information System legislation, which requires that workers have access to Material Safety Data Sheets on any product containing hazardous materials used in the workplace.Since it was launched in 2001, the project has made changes in numerous worksites - including dozens of Canadian schools - replacing products containing carcinogens and reproductive toxins with safer substitutes.
LEAS has also published a 24-page Cleaners and Toxins Guide that has been used by workers in many additional sites across BC and elsewhere in the country. The project has turned many workers on to environmental activism and has spurred increased demand for green cleaning products in Canada.
LEAS 24-page Cleaners and Toxins Guide shows workplace health and safety committees how to identify toxic ingredients in the cleaning products they're using and develop strategies to replace them with healthier, environmentally-preferable alternatives. Contact LEAS at 604-669-1921 if you would like someone to make a presentation or develop a workshop with your workplace committee.
