Chinese Drywall and Your Health
Chinese drywall controversy is a health and safety issue involving defective drywall manufactured in China and imported by the United States starting in 2001.Drywall is a common building material typically made of a layer of gypsum-based plaster pressed between two thick sheets of paper, then dried in a kiln. Foreign drywall was imported by the United States during the construction boom between 2004 and 2007. Importation was further spurred by a shortage of American-made drywall due to the rebuilding demand of nine hurricanes that hit Florida from 2004 to 2005, and widespread damage caused along the Gulf Coast by Hurricane Katrina in 2005. An analysis covering drywall imports since January 2006 showed that more than 550 million pounds of Chinese drywall was brought into the United States since then, enough to build 60,000 average-sized homes.
Due to this problem's recent nature, there are currently no government or industry standards for inspecting contaminated drywall in homes. Professionals who have handled contaminated drywall in the past may know how to inspect for sulfur compounds but there are no agencies that offer certification in this form of inspection. Some of the quick items to look for area: Was your home built or did you have new drywall installed between 2001-2008? Do you notice a certain smell or odor when first entering your home, especially when not running the A/C? Does this smell dissipate soon after you've been in the home? (It doesn't always have a smell, especially in partially tainted homes). Have you had A/C problems? Have you replaced your evaporator coils? Have you noticed your faucets corroding or do they have black spots that are hard to remove? Have you noticed blackened copper on refrigeration lines, wiring, plumbing or gas lines?
The bulk of these incidents have been reported in Florida and other southern states, likely due to the high levels of heat and humidity in that region. Most of the affected homes were built during the housing boom between 2004 and 2007, especially in the wake of Hurricane Katrina when domestic building materials were in short supply. An estimated 250,000 tons of drywall were imported from China during that time period because it was cheap and plentiful. This material was used in the construction of approximately 100,000 homes in the United States, and many believe this has lead to serious health and property damage.
Scientists at the Centers for Disease Control recently announced they found no link between the deaths of eleven people and homes with Chinese drywall. Click here for a link to that report and others filed with the Consumer Produce Safety Commission. However, the Consumer Product Safety Commission is urging the CDC to do comprehensive study into the long term health effects from prolonged exposure to sulfur. But there's one lesson our scientist said we should take away from this experiment. "It keeps going on. It keeps accumulating so unless you take it out you're still going to have that reaction happening in your house," said Hejzlar.
The exemptions reveal that Chinese drywall was only used in Southwest Florida between 2004 and 2007; the four year span of recovery from Hurricane Charley and Wilma and the building boom. If you break it down by percentage, in Lee County only .44% of the single family homes and condos are infected and only 2.5% from the boom building years. In Charlotte County the percentage of homes infected is .27% and in Collier County it is .06%. The toxic material causing all the problems is only found in the 1/4 inch drywall used in residential construction. The 1/2 inch drywall used in commercial buildings is safe.
Lab comparisons of Chinese- and American-made drywall show significantly higher levels of pyrite in the Chinese material. This suggests that pyrite oxidation may be the source of the sulfur compounds released by Chinese drywall. The problems have been attributed to the use of fly ash in the drywall, which degrades in the presence of heat and moisture; although United States' drywall uses fly ash as well, the process used creates a cleaner final product. According to a 2010 laboratory study, one hundred percent of affected drywall samples obtained from homes located in the southeastern United States tested positive for the presence of Thiobacillus ferrooxidans, an iron and sulfur reducing bacterium. Samples of non-contaminated drywall were found to contain only miscible levels of T. ferroxidans.
Due to this problem's recent nature, there are currently no government or industry standards for inspecting contaminated drywall in homes. Professionals who have handled contaminated drywall in the past may know how to inspect for sulfur compounds but there are no agencies that offer certification in this form of inspection. Some of the quick items to look for area: Was your home built or did you have new drywall installed between 2001-2008? Do you notice a certain smell or odor when first entering your home, especially when not running the A/C? Does this smell dissipate soon after you've been in the home? (It doesn't always have a smell, especially in partially tainted homes). Have you had A/C problems? Have you replaced your evaporator coils? Have you noticed your faucets corroding or do they have black spots that are hard to remove? Have you noticed blackened copper on refrigeration lines, wiring, plumbing or gas lines?
The bulk of these incidents have been reported in Florida and other southern states, likely due to the high levels of heat and humidity in that region. Most of the affected homes were built during the housing boom between 2004 and 2007, especially in the wake of Hurricane Katrina when domestic building materials were in short supply. An estimated 250,000 tons of drywall were imported from China during that time period because it was cheap and plentiful. This material was used in the construction of approximately 100,000 homes in the United States, and many believe this has lead to serious health and property damage.
Scientists at the Centers for Disease Control recently announced they found no link between the deaths of eleven people and homes with Chinese drywall. Click here for a link to that report and others filed with the Consumer Produce Safety Commission. However, the Consumer Product Safety Commission is urging the CDC to do comprehensive study into the long term health effects from prolonged exposure to sulfur. But there's one lesson our scientist said we should take away from this experiment. "It keeps going on. It keeps accumulating so unless you take it out you're still going to have that reaction happening in your house," said Hejzlar.
The exemptions reveal that Chinese drywall was only used in Southwest Florida between 2004 and 2007; the four year span of recovery from Hurricane Charley and Wilma and the building boom. If you break it down by percentage, in Lee County only .44% of the single family homes and condos are infected and only 2.5% from the boom building years. In Charlotte County the percentage of homes infected is .27% and in Collier County it is .06%. The toxic material causing all the problems is only found in the 1/4 inch drywall used in residential construction. The 1/2 inch drywall used in commercial buildings is safe.
Lab comparisons of Chinese- and American-made drywall show significantly higher levels of pyrite in the Chinese material. This suggests that pyrite oxidation may be the source of the sulfur compounds released by Chinese drywall. The problems have been attributed to the use of fly ash in the drywall, which degrades in the presence of heat and moisture; although United States' drywall uses fly ash as well, the process used creates a cleaner final product. According to a 2010 laboratory study, one hundred percent of affected drywall samples obtained from homes located in the southeastern United States tested positive for the presence of Thiobacillus ferrooxidans, an iron and sulfur reducing bacterium. Samples of non-contaminated drywall were found to contain only miscible levels of T. ferroxidans.
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