Environmental concerns are not a new thing around Calvert City. The small town of Marshall County is home to an industrial park which houses more than half a dozen chemical factories and manufacturers and, over the years, residents of the region have raised fears that these companies could endanger their health.
Now, researchers from the University of Louisville and the State University of Murray are carrying out studies to assess the exhibition in the Calvert City region in response to these concerns in order to assess the impact emissions of chemical factories on its residents and wildlife.
Representatives of the U of L Center for Integrative Environmental Health Sciences held a meeting in Grand Rivers Thursday to give an overview of their plans for the research project and take questions to the residents about the scope of their investigation.
In partnership with Murray State, CIEHS researchers plan to look at community exposure to chemical emissions by testing wastewater samples and populations of birds and amphibians, as well as the collection of blood and urine samples of certain residents of the counties of Marshall, Livingston and McCracken.
The Calvert City industrial complex houses several chemical factories. Last year, the environmental protection agency published a report that found high levels around the city of Calvert of volatile organic compoundsor cocs. According to the reportThe high VOC levels that she was measuring Calvert City could lead to higher chronic cancer levels over a life of 70 years of continuous exposure.
This report followed A propuplica investigation This discovered an air instructor in a local school play area in the county of Marshall has captured high levels of toxic industrial air pollution for years.
Matt Cave, professor of medicine at the U U, said that community residents had contacted CIEHS with concerns about the potential hazardous health effects related to chemical emissions from some of Calvert City plants.
“We will not directly look at cancer (rate) because it takes a long time. You know, it can take 10, 20, 30 years or over so that someone develops cancer,” said Cave. “But we can look at the short -term substitution biomarkers, from things like blood tests or urine tests, and we can do it both in humans and in fauna.”
The research team focuses on three chemicals: ethylene dichloride,, vinyl chloride And benzene. Vinyl chloride and benzene have been identified as substances that can cause cancer in humans. The EPA lists ethylene dichloride as a “probable human carcinogen”.
The study of EPA 2024 identified ethylene dichloride as the chemical creating the greatest risk for residents who lived near the agency’s test sites. The installation of Calvert City Westlake Vinyls was responsible for 96% of ethylene dichloride air emissions during the study period – The The greatest unique source Air EDC emissions in the United States, according to the national inventory of EPA emissions in 2020.
Lauren Anderson, researcher at the U of L Medicine School, said that researchers could see the rates of these chemicals in community members is to test wastewater samples. When the human body treats certain substances, it creates by-products called metabolites. Anderson said that researchers can then test the levels of certain metabolites in wastewater to have a wide idea from the community affected by chemical exposure.
The research team began to take samples from wastewater treatment facilities in Livingston County in March. The researchers said Thursday that Livingston County is the only place where the research team had received authorization to take wastewater samples for tests.
Ciehs staff have told the crowd of Grand Rivers that they would like to test Calvert City wastewater due to the proximity of the community with several chemical factories, but said that city leaders had not granted authorization to these tests. The mayor of Calvert City, Gene Colburn, did not respond to a request for comments on Friday afternoon.
Another aspect of the research project is to test certain species of birds and amphibians in parts of the extreme-west of Kentucky to see if they have been affected by chemical emissions.
Keegan Abeson, a doctoral student at the U of L, said that Ciehs had received reports from certain residents about the birds that died in the Calvert City region, and fears that these deaths are linked to chemical emissions. Abeson said that, in addition to studying the potential reasons for the death of these birds, studying them could also help researchers apply some of the results to humans.
“(Birds) react to pollution and other stress factors in a way that could be similar to humans, and sometimes they are even more sensitive, so that they can tell us what might need to come or how we can respond to humans,” said Abeson.
Howard Whiteman, director of the Watershed Studies Institute in Murray State, said that the study of amphibians in the region could also help researchers find an “early alert signal” if a pollutant has an impact on the ecosystem.
“Before things happen in humans, it often affects amphibians and you see this in fact global, because amphibians have decreased. This can be part of environmental pollution as well as diseases and things like that affecting them,” said Whiteman.
In addition, CIEHS researchers are applying to start testing blood and urine samples. These samples would be used to test chemical exposure rates on a more individual scale compared to wastewater tests.
Cave said that the sooner that this study would be able to start would be from the end of the summer to early fall.
However, the calendar and the scope of the project research team depend on funding. The researchers asked for a subsidy of $ 250,000 from the National Institutes of Health, and are waiting to bring the federal government back to these dollars, as many research institutions are waiting to see if The Trump administration cuts to the NIH will have an impact on their work.
Cave said Ciehs is also in a renewal period for its NIH financing. Currently, the ministry has $ 20,000 planned for the project – half of which is planned for the bird research part.
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