Medline and Sterigenics haven't reported cancer-causing ethylene oxide emissions to the EPA's pollu
Source: Chicago Tribune
Nearly every major industrial source of ethylene oxide makes it relatively easy for Americans to know how much of the cancer-causing gas drifts into surrounding communities.
The only outliers are two Illinois-based companies that for years have failed to report emissions to the Toxics Release Inventory, a Tribune review of federal records found.
A Medline Industries plant in north suburban Waukegan last appeared in the inventory during the mid-2000s, even though the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency later determined the facility has been responsible for some of the nation’s highest cancer risks from air pollution.
Sterigenics closed the Willowbrook plant in 2019. It still uses ethylene oxide to fumigate medical equipment in eight other cities, including suburbs of Atlanta and Los Angeles. But the past four years of emissions are absent from the EPA’s inventory — omissions the agency refused to address during the Trump administration.
Read more: https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/environment/ct-ethylene-oxide-cancer-epa-medline-sterigenics-tt-20210517-ovk3a2fckbeftfkubortxhal54-story.html