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Nanotech Environmental Activist ShenanigansBy Pearl Chin - Managing General Partner, Seraphima Ventures |
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In a Thursday, October 28th, 2004 Washington Post article titled "Nanotech Group's Invitations Declined" (by Rick Weiss), the article spoke about how three key environmental activist group representatives were invited but had declined to join the International Council on Nanotechnology (at its inaugural meeting in Houston on October 28, 2004). This council was organized as an international group of industry, government, academics, environmental and social organizations, formed to identify and address potential risks of nanotechnology before the risks become real problems, and to quickly fund the research. The representatives cite that they declined for now because they doubted the initiatives would serve the public interest.
Industry does not have a wonderful track record when it comes to social and environmental responsibility, but things have improved much since the ills of the Industrial Revolution, and there is still room for improvement. So they should be allowed the room and latitude to improve.
With $500,000 in industry donations, the council hopes to answer questions about risk, and advise governments on how best to regulate new substances. The attempt at preemptive cooperation drew praise from some who have opted to join. However, none of the three invited representatives of environmental groups has agreed to join the newly created International Council on Nanotechnology.
Jennifer Sass of the Natural Resources Defense Council said the group's "heart is in the right place" but worried that it "may be heavily influenced by industry because that's where the funding is coming from." Scott Walsh of Environmental Defense in Washington - who will attend to listen but not as a member - expressed similar concerns.
One representative stated that they wanted their name removed from the membership list because the group - "funded almost entirely by industry - seemed more interested in easing public jitters than in actually doing something about the potential risks of nanotechnology." Easing public jitters and actually doing something about the potential risks of nanotechnology are not mutually exclusive; you cannot actually not do something and expect to ease public jitters.
I do not think the International Council on Nanotechnology would refuse funding from non-industrial sources if the activist groups wanted to raise some funding themselves. Did they ever offer to help this initiative? Were these activist groups not aware of this Council being formed from such high profile participants as DuPont, Mitsubishi, L'Oreal, non-profit organizations like Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, and the U.S. federal government? Did they actively participate in forming of the Council's makeup and objectives instead of just waiting to be invited to join?
Of course big business will fund an initiative like this. They must because they must demonstrate that they are addressing societal concerns in order to maximize their profits. If their products are not proven safe, they will not make money because people will not buy a dangerous product. The federal government provides economic incentives if they actively participate in promoting safety on the job, and develop and meet compliance requirements.
Pat Mooney of the Ottawa-based citizen's organization ETC Group was also critical of the group's claim to be "international," saying that "it doesn't cut it to have Mitsubishi from Japan and L'Oreal from France. Two-thirds of the globe is left out in this process, including most of the world's poor." He declined to join because "the whole tone of the approach is 'How can we convince society we're nice guys?'" and he said "that's just not going to fly."
However, this is exactly what industry must do. Industry must prove to their potential customers that they are nice guys, otherwise we, the public, will not buy their products and they will not make money to enable their existence and provide products that we need. When the Exxon Valdez - in the worse oil spill in U.S. history - accidentally dumped over 11 million tons of crude oil along the Alaskan coast, we the public showed our displeasure for their lack of an expedient cleanup by boycotting their gasoline. We the public also work for these corporations. Each one of us, as human beings and citizens - not just of our countries but of the world - has a responsibility to monitor our work place to ensure that it adheres to its obligation to a safe environment and society.
When high performance composite technology was introduced, composites - which are a billion-dollar industry - were never targeted. This is interesting because carbon/graphite fiber and fiberglass were never targeted as potential environmental problems, though it seems they exhibit similar issues and dangers as with nanoparticles. Big business, academia, the EPA and OSHA did advise on how to handle these materials safely, at least when I was working with these materials as a graduate student. Perhaps composites were not as high profile to the media as nanotechnology to bother making a fuss about?
There are fears that some nanoparticles appear to be toxic and many are not covered by environmental and occupational health regulations. However, produced in large enough quantities, even naturally occurring nanoparticles, such as soot and carbon black, could endanger the environment and be harmful to humans, as was the case with coal miners' Black Lung Disease. Even asbestos is a combination of naturally occurring fibrous type minerals. Perhaps all that needs to be done to minimize safety hazards of nanoparticles is to modify existing OSHA standards?
Carbon or glass fibers, like nanoparticles, may be dangerous and useless on their own, but when they are typically mixed with something or encased in a supporting medium or matrix such as epoxy in a tennis racket, surf board or golf club shaft, they are relatively harmless. The point is not that the B2 Bomber or F16 fighter jets are harmless to society even though their composite structures are relatively harmless environmentally. The point is that nanoparticles confined either physically or chemically in another medium are as harmful to the environment as the current commercially available composite products in the market.
Do any of these activists own graphite fiber tennis rackets or golf clubs with graphite fiber shafts, or automobiles with fiberglass bodies? Even natural degradation over many years of even just the old wooden (wood is one of nature's composites) tennis rackets may release fine particles into the environment, but by then the tennis racket would probably have been disposed of for diminishing performance. I hope no one decides to chew on their tennis rackets to try and deliberately release carbon fiber particles into the air. They might break their teeth doing it.
I may seem to be harping on composites, but I do so as an example, as it was one of my areas of research expertise as a Ph.D. graduate student. The nascent nanotechnology concerns are not that different from what should have been concerns for now commonly accepted composite technologies that were revolutionary at the time.
Why do activist groups fan the fires of our fears? Perhaps their existence hinges on our having fear? In other words, without the fear, they would be out of a job. Without the fear, they would have no influence and no one would interview them for the public media about what is going to kill us next.
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Dr. Pearl Chin has an MBA from Cornell, a Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering from University of Delaware's Center for Composite Materials and B.E. in Chemical Engineering from The Cooper Union.
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This is another monthly column contributed by Dr. Chin to Nanotechnology Now. The full article appears in our November 2004 Premium Newsletter, along with other outstanding pieces by leaders in the field.
Read all her articles.
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