Microbead Ban

Ohio weighing ban on plastic microbeads

A bill recently introduced in the Ohio House of Representatives would ban the sale and manufacture of products containing tiny plastic particles known as microbeads, a likely companion to legislation introduced earlier this year in the Ohio Senate.

The plastic bits — too small to be filtered by most sewage treatment plants — are emerging as one of the more troubling forms of pollution in the Great Lakes, especially lakes Ontario and Erie.

They are found in more than 100 varieties of soaps, facial scrubs, and toothpastes, and similar hygiene and personal-care items.

Introduced Nov. 20, the House version — House Bill 400 — would ban the manufacture of products containing microbeads starting in 2017 and give retailers until 2018 to sell remaining inventories.

It is co-written by state Reps. John Patterson (D., Jefferson) and Kent Smith (D., Euclid).

The Senate version was introduced earlier this year by state Sens. Mike Skindell (D., Lakewood) and Randy Gardner (R., Bowling Green). It calls for a ban on sales of anti-bacterial soaps, hand soaps, bar soaps, liquid soaps, body washes, lotions, moisturizers, facial and body cleansers, facial masks, exfoliating facial scrubs, sunscreens, acne products, shampoos, conditioners, toothpastes, shaving creams and gels, and foot-care products that contain microbeads.

The latter was assigned to the Senate’s Energy and Natural Resources committee on Sept. 17.

The House bill is awaiting its first hearing before a committee.

Microbeads where the subject of front-page Blade story Nov. 2. Mr. Patterson said he first heard about the issue about two years ago.

He said his interest grew after hearing a presentation in Quebec City in 2014 by Sherri “Sam” Mason, a State University of New York-Fredonia chemistry professor who is one of the Great Lakes region’s most active microbead researchers.

Mr. Patterson said the legislation he and Mr. Smith introduced is modeled after that in other states, as well as similar legislation for a national ban that recently passed through the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee by a unanimous vote.

“At this point in time, there are limited solutions [other than a ban],” Mr. Patterson told The Blade.

In a joint news release, Mr. Patterson said he’s learned that Americans flush an estimated 8 trillion microbeads down the drain each day.

The news release cited a recent study published by the National Academy of Sciences that claims more than 90 percent of sea birds have pieces of plastic in their guts, some of it microbeads and some of it larger plastic.

The fear is that plastic of all kinds can absorb various toxins and pass them up the food chain to humans.

Fish often mistake the tiny particles as fish eggs or zooplankton.

“Lake Erie is a part of the largest freshwater ecosystem in the world, and it needs to be protected,” Mr. Smith said in the news release. “Other states along the Great Lakes have introduced or passed similar bans. It is time for Ohio to do the same.”

Biologists also fear more pollution from microbeads could lead to a long-term impact on the Great Lakes’ $7 billion fishing industry.

Barely large enough to be seen by the human eye, microbeads are by definition no bigger than 5 millimeters in diameter.

But they’re usually 2 millimeters or less, many of them a fraction of 1 mm — small enough that dozens could occupy a human fingertip or cover a penny.

A tube of facial cleanser may have about 330,000 of them.

In a statement to The Blade for the Nov. 2 story, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency recognized pollution problems associated with plastics in general, but said there “are no EPA regulations addressing microplastics or microbeads under the agency’s statutory authorities.”

The Ohio EPA does not regulate them, agency spokesman Heidi Griesmer says.

In a report issued earlier this year by the New York State Attorney General’s Office, the New York professor Ms. Mason and Jennifer Nalbone, an environmental scientist in that office, found 25 of 34 upstate New York sewage-treatment plants had microbeads in the finished effluent discharged to Lake Ontario and Lake Erie tributaries. All of them had some form of plastic.

“Treatment plants are not designed to remove microbeads from the wastewater stream, and treatments potentially effective at removing microbeads are unproven. Even if effective treatment technologies are found to be available, the potential cost and time necessary to retrofit wastewater treatment plants with such technology is likely to be substantial,” the report said.

Ms. Mason told The Blade recently her lab — using open lake water highly filtered by fine mesh screens between 2012 and 2014 — found Lake Ontario to be the No. 1 spot in the Great Lakes region for microbeads and Lake Erie to be No. 2.

That was not a surprise, given the population densities along those shorelines, she said.

The tiny particles are believed to migrate from the Upper Lakes down to Lake Erie and Lake Ontario with water that flows out to the St. Lawrence Seaway, and from there into the Atlantic Ocean.

Scientists want to know how much microbeads have become part of fish diets and what it may be doing to them.

One theory is that in addition to the petrochemicals of plastic itself, the material may be absorbing free-flowing pesticides and chemicals in water.

Microbeads don’t dissolve or break down, at least not for years. In response to growing concerns, several manufacturers have voluntarily taken microbeads out of their products.

Illinois became the first state to ban sales of such products in 2014. Several other states have followed suit or are in the process of considering bans, including Ohio and Michigan.

Groups such as the Alliance for the Great Lakes urge manufacturers to use crushed almonds, oatmeal, or pumice as natural exfoliants in products that need abrasives.

Source: Toledo Blade

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