A Burning Issue - NPR Interviews the Flanders Family

[Guest guest]

http://www.loe.org/thisweek/thisweek.htm

IAQ List Moderator, Flanders and her husband are the subjects of an

interview on NPR. For those of you who have been stationed in siberia for

the last year and don't know , she has been fighting the big boys - GAP

over candles they sold her that had lead in the wicks. Even though

has been assured since then that there are no candles for sale in the US

with lead-core wicks, she has proven otherwise.

Knowing 's determination, the candlemakers better get their act

together right now and stop selling a hazardous product. Read the

interview.

" A Burning Issue "

CURWOOD: I'm Steve Curwood.

Candles provide gentle light and can fill the air with wonderful aromas. But

some of them also contain toxic wicks made with lead that can be hazardous

to health.

C. FLANDERS: And what makes me so mad is that had this product been

labeled --

K. FLANDERS: She wouldn't have bought them and burned them.

C. FLANDERS: ... contains lead, there's no way it would have made it through

my front door, much less been burned and floating through the air.

CURWOOD: That story and more this week on Living on Earth, right after this

news.

CURWOOD: This is Living on Earth. I'm Steve Curwood. The candle business is,

well, hot these days. According to the National Candle Association, annual

sales in the U.S. are at about $2.5 billion and rising. Almost half comes

from scented candle sales, thanks to interest in aromatherapy. But some new

research is raising some serious concerns about safety. In the fashionable

North Dallas suburb of Plano, Texas, there's a family living what they call

a three-year nightmare. And they blame it on aromatic candles. From member

station KERA in Dallas , Bill Zeeble reports.

(Crickets)

ZEEBLE: I'm Bill Zeeble.

FLANDERS: Tim Flanders. Come on in.

ZEEBLE: and Kip Flanders, with their 14-year-old son and two

cats, have lived in their Plano home nearly 16 years. Framed needlepoint

pieces and family heirlooms fill the house and flowered paper walls. The

aroma of potpourri permeates the home. But so does something else: an

unpleasant, almost imperceptible gray-black powder they didn't really notice

until three years ago. Kip Flanders says he, his wife, and her grandmother

all had colds at the time.

FLANDERS: This was just shocking to me. It's just so -- ugh sounding. But I

remember blowing my nose, and my mucus was dark. And I thought wow, there's

something really wrong with me. This is kind of scary. And I mentioned it to

my wife, also, and she said she and her grandmother were experiencing the

exact same thing.

ZEEBLE: What were the odds, they thought, of their all showing the same

symptoms? Then, Kip Flanders says they noticed soot on a white bathrobe,

around air vents, on the bottom of white socks that had only tracked across

apparently clean carpet. Kip Flanders says soot insidiously appeared like

cobwebs.

K. FLANDERS: Everything you see here is penetrated with this submicron

particulate matter. All of our furniture, all of our rugs, all of our

clothing. Many things that we've collected over the years, ruined inside our

home. Literally.

(Pounding)

ZEEBLE: Kip Flanders pounds a sofa pillow, raising a small black cloud.

(Pounding)

K. FLANDERS: You see it going out, just like any pillow. I just saw it.

(Pounding)

ZEEBLE: The Flanders had burned aromatic candles in their home for years,

three to four at a time in different rooms for roughly three hours a day,

with no apparent problems. But after seeing soot, a test by a local lab

revealed it came from the candles.

EDMOND: She must have gotten a batch of candles from hell, because they

apparently caused significant damage.

ZEEBLE: J.C. Edmond with the General Wax Company has been in the candle

business 35 years. Representing the National Candle Association, he says

people can safely burn candles if they follow directions stuck on the bottom

of every one. Burn them away from drafts, children, and flammable items. And

keep an eye on them. The Flanders says they followed the rules.

K. FLANDERS: And then we find out as we're going down the road and having

them tested, that we released lead into the air of our home. Lead that we

breathed in, lead that our child at the time, who was 11, has breathed in.

Lead that is pretty much covering everything you see in this home.

ZEEBLE: A second local EPA-approved lab showed the lead came from lead-core

wicks, used to keep candles burning above a pool of liquid wax. It estimated

lead in the house at 80 times EPA limits. The National Candle Association's

J.C. Edmond says it should not have happened, because his members supposedly

stopped using leaded wicks a long time ago.

EDMOND: The National Candle Association, and all the manufacturers at that

time, voluntarily abandoned the use of a leaded core wick. That was 25 years

ago. We encourage our members to comply with our recommendations, but they

are voluntary recommendations.

ZEEBLE: A recent Internet search found several suppliers pushing lead-core

wicks in spite of--or unaware of--the Candle Association policy. In fact,

the nation's largest seller of candle wicks and supplies, Atkins and Pearce

in Kentucky, was still selling them a year ago, according to the company's

president. But this should not be cause for worry, according to J.C. Edmond.

EDMOND: I would say to be more politically correct and environmentally

compliant, we felt that it wasn't going to be difficult for us to abandon

the use of leaded core wicks. Candles are safe. If used properly, you can

use them without any fear whatsoever that you're going to have problems with

them.

ZEEBLE: The Flanders say their house challenges that safety claim. So does

recent research. A study from the University of Michigan found lead core

wick candles, burning five hours in a closed room, filled it with 30 times

EPA's lead limits. Last month, Australia banned lead wick candles and

ordered a continent-wide recall. Krause, an indoor air quality

consultant in Florida, recently tested commonly sold candles and discovered

numerous problems.

KRAUSE: found over a dozen different aromatic compounds that are

potential carcinogens. identified lead emissions, which we know to be

toxic to children. It is believed to cause neurological deficits at very low

concentrations.

ZEEBLE: Scientists suspect lead impairs development and mental abilities,

especially in children. The Flanders tested their child, and say doctors

found only slight elevations of lead in his blood. They tried bringing a

class action suit against The Gap, the retailer they bought their candles

from, but could not get the class action certified. The Gap says it does not

sell lead wick candles any more. But other sellers are out there, and the

Flanders are trying to warn buyers. Flanders has launched an

information web site and bulletin board.

C. FLANDERS: And what makes me so mad is that had this product been

labeled --

K. FLANDERS: She wouldn't have bought them and burned them.

C. FLANDERS: ... that contains lead, there's no way it would have made it

through my front door, much less been burned and floating through the air.

ZEEBLE: The Flanders want labeling on candles so they know what's in the

wick and the aromatic wax. Some tests show they contain chemicals including

toluene, lymonene, styrene, and, notably, benzene, a carcinogen. Consumers

can spot a metal core wick by looking closely at it. But researchers say

there is really no way to tell whether it is lead, zinc, or tin. The

Consumer Product Safety Commission says it's looking into health concerns

raised by aromatic candles, but has made no decisions about them. For Living

on Earth, I'm Bill Zeeble in Dallas.

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If you want to get involved, write to the Candle Makers Assn. Their website

is:

http://www.candles.org/

and their e-mail address is

National Candle Association

1030 15th Street, Suite 870

Washington, DC 20005

202-393-2210

nca@...

I am also writing the Consumer Product Safety Commission and asking them to

investigate. We have enough problems with indoor air quality and the LAST

thing we need are candles that release lead into our breathing air.

The web address of the CPSC is:

http://www.cpsc.gov/

They have a category called, " report unsafe products "