EPA-Banned Wood Preservatives Still on Retail Shelves

Two pesticides used to preserve wood are still being sold by some area hardware and home improvement stores despite a federal ban on such sales imposed six weeks ago, a spot check by The Times has found.

Due to concern about health risks, the federal Environmental Protection Agency announced last January that the chemicals--creosote and pentachlorophenol, or penta--would be banned from the consumer market and would be available only to certified pesticide applicators after Nov. 10.

However, one or both of the wood preservatives were being sold and, in some cases, were purchased by reporters at 15 of 51 stores, or more than one-fourth of those checked. Stores in the Los Angeles area, Orange County and San Diego were visited between Nov. 21 and Dec. 19.

“No kidding?� said Sara Segal, an environmental scientist with the EPA in San Francisco, when told the results of the survey. “There was 10 months of knowing this thing (the ban) was coming down the line.�

Checking for Compliance

Segal and other EPA officials speculated that distributors or retailers may erroneously have thought it legal to sell existing stocks to consumers if they were on store shelves by Nov. 10.

Agency officials said they are asking California and other states that handle enforcement of federal pesticide regulations to begin checking for compliance with the wood preservative rules.

According to EPA officials, “stop sale� orders will be issued if creosote and penta are found without the “restricted use� limiting sale to certified applicators, those who have passed a county- or state-administered test on pesticide safety. They said the EPA also could seek financial penalties from pesticide producers, distributors or retailers for any products not carrying proper labels.

Penta and creosote are highly effective in protecting utility poles, railroad ties, sheds, fences, barns, decks and other wood structures from termites and rot-producing fungi.

The two chemicals--along with inorganic arsenicals, a third type of preservative covered by the new federal rules--until recently accounted for virtually all wood preservative use and more than one-third the total volume of pesticides used by agriculture and industry in the United States. Millions of people have used the pesticides without apparent ill effects.

But creosote and penta are both highly irritating to the skin and eyes. Creosote is suspected of causing skin cancer in humans and is classified by the EPA as mutagenic, or able to change the genetic makeup of cells.

Penta has been shown to be toxic to the fetus in laboratory animal studies. It is also considered a possible human carcinogen because it contains trace amounts of a dioxin compound and hexachlorobenzene contaminants, both of which are unavoidably formed during manufacture of penta. In several documented cases, penta also has caused human deaths due to overexposure.

8 Years of Public Hearings

The regulations taking penta and creosote out of the hands of home handymen follow eight years of public hearings and legal scuffling between the EPA and the chemical and wood-treating industries. The new rules also stiffen protective clothing requirements and other safeguards for thousands of workers who still may use the preservatives--including employees of commercial wood treatment plants and commercial pest control firms.

Substitute preservatives for the do-it-yourself market--such as tributyltinoxide and copper-8-quinolinolate--also are toxic, as they must be to ward of attacking bugs and rot. However, EPA officials say the substitutes appear to be safer or at least have not been linked to serious health problems.

Al Heier, a spokesman at EPA headquarters in Washington, said retailers generally rely on chemical companies and distributors for information on pesticide restrictions.

“They have to,� Heier said. “They (the retailers) don’t read the Federal Register,� he said, referring to the government publication in which federal regulations are printed.

But some companies whose creosote and penta products are still on the market said they had informed their distributors of the Nov. 10 ban.

Robert Toomey, part owner of Stay & Day Paint Materials Co. of Los Angeles, whose Stadco brand creosote was available at a number of stores surveyed, said his firm had “been sending out advisories to all our distributors.�

‘Piles of Inventory’

As a result, Toomey said, “I’m just sitting here with piles of inventory. . . . I’ve got tens of thousands of dollars of creosote.�

Cori Tanner, an accounts officer with JASCO Chemical Corp. in Mountain View, whose Jasco Penta-5 preservative was found at a few stores, said that “everyone that purchased from us was informed� of the November deadline.

A penta preservative produced by Roberts Consolidated Industries of City of Industry was also found on a few shelves.

However, officials with Beecham Home Improvement Products Inc., an Ohio-based firm that owns Roberts, said the company stopped supplying penta for the consumer market in the fall of 1984 because of public concern about health risks.

In addition, said Beecham President Les Wilde, the firm earlier this year sent a letter telling former penta customers that they “should be aware that this (ban) is happening, and if you should have any inventory left, please contact us.�

Nonetheless, Wilde said, it is not surprising that some products slipped through the cracks.

Three of the stores where the restricted products were found were Ole’s or Builders Emporium outlets.

Steve Stern, manager of corporate relations for Wickes Companies Inc., owner of both chains, said he was not aware of the new rules. But Stern said he is “sure we make a very determined effort to police and comply with all federal and state regulations.�

“If the products are still on our shelves,� he said, “the information may not have filtered down.�

Contributing to this story were Times staff writers Marcos Breton, Jaxon Van Derbeken, Adrian Havas, Maudine Newton, Henry Rivero and Deborrah Wilkinson.