Mo' Mold, Mo' Problems

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Mo' Mold, Mo' Problems

Fungi may pose health risk

K. Fair

College of New Jersey Signal - Ewing,NJ

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Documents provided to The Signal last week through the state

attorney general's office have revealed that mold species discovered

in the Metzger Student Apartments could pose a health risk to the

surrounding community. The College maintains, however, that it is

taking every precaution to make sure that students and Ewing

residents are safe during the demolition process.

The Microbial Investigation Report, a document prepared for the

College in September 2006 by Langan Engineering and Environmental

Services, identifies seven distinct varieties of fungus present in

the apartments that could pose a health risk.

While another company, Innovative Decon Solutions (IDS) of Tampa,

Fla., was contracted to conduct remediation to kill live mold in the

building, mold spores can still be released into the air during

demolition.

" It doesn't make (spores) go away, but it's no longer capable of

reproducing, " Bill Simms, owner of IDS, said in an interview last

week. " The good thing about the dead mold spores is that they're not

going to drift somewhere and start growing again. "

The growths found in the apartment - acremonium, aspergillus

versicolor, penicillum, cladosporium, paecilomyces, stachybotrys and

trichoderma - are described in an attachment to the report. The

attachment was prepared by EMSL Analytical Inc., a New York-based

microbiology lab charged with analyzing the results of the cultures

gathered from the apartments in August.

According to EMSL's attachment, the molds have the potential to

affect health, particularly the respiratory system. According to the

report, aspergillus versicolor mold has the potential to produce a

certain mycotoxin - a toxin produced specifically by fungi -

which " is reported to be carcinogenic to the liver and kidney and it

can cause such symptoms as diarrhea and upset stomach. "

Stachybotrys growth, according to the report, is also " significant

because of the mold's ability to produce mycotoxins which are

extremely toxic. "

Officials at Langan, however, were quick to downplay the threat of

toxicity from mold spores from the site.

" I think you should be careful with the word 'toxic,' "

Steiner, professional engineer for Langan, said in a teleconference

last week. " (By fogging) you're killing the living stuff. Mold

spores are very resilient. They can go into a dormancy state. We

want to decrease the concentration so that when we do the demolition

we can make sure it's not becoming airborne. We're not dealing with

a toxic substance. Someone is not going to die because they live

next to this process. "

Fogging is the process by which a gas biocide is sprayed within the

building.

According to " Shorty " Schultz, owner of Schultz Demolition,

the company contracted to carry out demolition of the apartments and

who subcontracted IDS, the College - rather than applying a

conventional spray-on biocide to kill mold - pushed for fogging the

mold.

" They wanted to do fogging, which gets into all the cracks. There

are only a few companies that can do this fogging, " Schultz said.

Questions over remediation methods and, more simply, how to even

describe the conditions within the buildings point to the lack of

regulation within the industry. According to Sen. Shirley K. ,

there are no state or federal statutes to oversee mold remediation.

" It seems as if this is a relatively new issue, " said. " There

are no state governmental regulations to address the issue. "

The state's Department of Community Affairs (DCA) has confirmed its

role in overseeing the project, but according to Donnelly, a

communications officer with DCA, " We make sure that any asbestos

that might become … pulverized and airborne is removed and that all

utilities are disconnected. " Donnelly made no mention of DCA's role

in monitoring airborne mold.

Bill Rudeau, director of construction in the College's office of

Campus Construction, sees the lack of regulations as offering the

College the freedom to take whatever precautions are necessary to

protect the workers, students and neighbors around the site.

" Since it's not a regulated industry, we took the most stringent of

protocols, " Rudeau said. " They're taking the buildings down in an

operating room environment. (The level of mold spores) are below the

level that is considered acceptable within an operating room. "

In addition to fogging the buildings to kill live mold, five air

monitoring stations have been set up around the buildings.

Van Sweden, a staff engineer with Langan, is on site during all

demolition activities. Each of the five monitoring stations produces

three samples per day.

At the end of the day the samples are transported to a lab for

analysis. According to Langan officials, the test results have so

far shown nothing that could pose a health risk to the community.

" We've just started to get data, but the stuff so far has been

pretty good, " Steiner said.

" If we had consistent high concentrations that we felt were

unusually high, the work would probably stop and we would re-

evaluate the situation, " Kelley, an official at Langan, said.

In addition to monitoring air quality throughout the demolition

process, Schultz workers are spraying the buildings with water as

they are being torn down and also as demolished material is being

removed from the site. This prevents dust and other particles such

as mold spores from becoming airborne.

" This is an unregulated industry we're in. There's nothing to say

this number is good and this number is bad, " Steiner said, referring

to mold spore counts from the air monitors. " The College has gone

above and beyond what might be considered to be right, and that

would be simply to tear down the buildings. They did not have to fog

the buildings and kill it all. They did not have to take daily

measurements. They did not have to do it in the wintertime, " Steiner

added.

Doing demolition in the wintertime helps make sure that mold spores,

which thrive in warm, wet conditions, stay dormant.

Nonetheless, the lack of regulation has been troubling to Ewing

community members.

" Unfortunately, there isn't a body of law on mold, " Jack Thomson, a

Ewing resident whose house sits close to the demolition site,

said. " There's nothing there to back this process up. "

The concern over this aspect of the project has prompted Sen.

to sign on to a bill, the Toxic Mold Protection Act, submitted to

the state legislature by Sen. Bucco in 2004 and reintroduced

on Jan. 17. The bill would create a mold task force, made up of

members from the health, environmental, insurance and construction

fields to help create standards for permissible exposure to mold for

the departments of Health and Senior Services and Community Affairs.

The task force would also create standards for remediation in

projects like the one at the College.

Meanwhile, Langan officials continue to defend their practices,

claiming they do not need government intervention to ensure that

they are keeping people safe from mold.

" Our job is to protect the community, whether it be the College or

the people who live around there, " Feury, a Langan engineer,

said. " That's the engineering oath we take and that's the oath we

live up to. "