Thanks for posting this. I read a short article about it in a commuter paper yesterday and was horrified. Good for the AP for using a FOIA request to clarify what was really going on. I hope we see more coverage of the full story.

The major question is who were the scientists working for.
Blaming scientists rather than the body that commissioned or sanctioned them isn't doing much to establish who was willing to place poor kids in harms way.

I encourage you to read the original study (which I would be happy to send you if you email me). I think the ABC/AP journalists are taking advantage of American scientific illiteracy and our country's unfortunate history of screwing over the poor and minorities to push a sensationalist piece that seems to reflect reality very poorly. I actually read the original scientific article (and blogged about it over at http://bio-rocks.blogspot.com). Before it ever reaches lawns (or the store, this product is commercially available), it is composted for 45 days and then pasteurized (which is how we make milk safe to drink). The substance they used is actually an organic compost fertilizer and not "sludge", as the article claims. As part of the study, the researchers measured the amount of toxic chemicals (actually: trace amounts of lead, zinc, and other substances found naturally in soil) in the compost fertilizer (which turns out to be extremely below the EPA's safe limits, and also negligible compared to what was already in the soil).

One reason I wish more journals were open-access is that the media couldn't exploit people who don't have access to the original research and make false claims. What we have here is an environmentally-friendly, organic way to deal with human waste, that has been on the market for many years. These journalists make it seem like the scientists poured raw sewage on poor people's lawns. They did not.

This is to comment on AP article about government program to expose poor, minority children in Baltimore to sewage sludge in their yards to remediate lead poisoning from contaminated inner city soil.

Rufus Chaney of USDA says the iron and phosphorus in the sludge will ensure that the lead passes right through the children's bodies. So apparently he anticipated that the children would be eating the sludge. These people should be jailed for their callous disregard for human health.

The bottom line is that it is official government policy to allow businesses and industries to dump their toxic pollutants into public sewers to avoid burdening them with the expense of properly disposing and/or recycling the chemicals. The wastewater treatment process preferentially concentrates the hazardous pollutants in the sewage sludge.

For that reason, sewage sludge should not be spread on land or anywhere near where people or animals live. New technology is widely available to convert sewage sludge from a toxic/pathogenic environmental time bomb into a valuable and inexhaustable resource by drying it, and converting it into clean fuel. European countries are rapidly discontinuing land application and using sludge to produce biogas and other energy, thereby reducing dependence on expensive foreign oil and eliminating greenhouse gases and other air and water pollution.

Helane Shields, PO Box 1133, Aton, NH 03809 Sludge researcher since 1996

Another name for biosolids is human sewage. And it's spread on farm fields and used to grow crops for animals AND people.

Not necessarily dangerous. They say it passes all kinds of tests for diseases, etc. But nasty, yes.

Biosolids is apparently a term created by a PR firm to lessen the sting of "sewage sludge."

Jeff.

#1) there is a problem with lead contamination in soil that is more significant in "poor black neighborhoods". The deleterious effects of lead are well documented.
#2) there is considerable controversy regarding the dangers of the use of sewer sludge as compost for agriculture. Let's assume that there is merit on both sides of the debate. Reasonable people are disagreeing, but it might be premature to say that the deleterious effects of sewer sludge are well documented.
#3) a group of researchers, in an effort to address the well documented problem of lead contamination in urban soils, with a technology that might pose new problems, but might in fact be a great boon to this soil.
#4) someone who most likely doesn't know shit about the group doing the work in Baltimore, writes a snarky post implicitly linking said researchers to the tuskagee experiments.

I'm not one of this group, so I'm not personally offended. Can you imagine a scenario in which this group is a compassionate bunch who really believes they are doing good work to try to limit the well documented lead problem in the rough-and-tumble neighborhoods of Baltimore. I wouldn't want to call members of that group a bunch of racists, would you?

#1) there is a problem with lead contamination in soil that is more significant in "poor black neighborhoods". The deleterious effects of lead are well documented.
#2) there is considerable controversy regarding the dangers of the use of sewer sludge as compost for agriculture. Let's assume that there is merit on both sides of the debate. Reasonable people are disagreeing, but it might be premature to say that the deleterious effects of sewer sludge are well documented.
#3) a group of researchers, in an effort to address the well documented problem of lead contamination in urban soils, with a technology that might pose new problems, but might in fact be a great boon to this soil.
#4) someone who most likely doesn't know shit about the group doing the work in Baltimore, writes a snarky post implicitly linking said researchers to the tuskagee experiments.

I'm not one of this group, so I'm not personally offended. Can you imagine a scenario in which this group is a compassionate bunch who really believes they are doing good work to try to limit the well documented lead problem in the rough-and-tumble neighborhoods of Baltimore. I wouldn't want to call members of that group a bunch of racists, would you?

Thank you for making this egregious abuse of impoverished children known. Your posts on architecture are the best on this site. I applaud you for making a stand on social injustice.

I see that Sarah Werner is continuing her defamatory remarks against the AP authors of the Orgro sludge story.

Having lied about the wording of the story and breathless with admiration for the people who put sewer wastes onto the lawns of people with lead contaminated soils, Sarah can't seem to pump her praise of sewage sludge onto enough websites.

It is curious how a woman who claims to be a scientist suddenly abandons all scientific principals and in the absence of data starts proclaiming her love of sludge for lead remediation on every website she can find.

Congratulations to the Associated Press for their story.

Maybe it was Dr. Evil, trying to cleanse the world of those soil-eating african children because he is creating a white super race (white kids never eat dirt, not even accidentally).

In his quest, Dr. Evil hired a bunch of Scientists wearing white lab coats, to spread sewage sludge in poor (white people are never poor) neighborhoods. This is a cheap and cruel trick, because the sewage is normally sent to the dark side of the moon, as it will never decompose if left here on earth.

Horror stories for hungry readers.

Sarah Werning, I wish I could dump this sludge in your backyard, and make your kids eat it. Stupid, heartless witch. I'll bet you work for one of the parties involved in this genocide of poor black children. I hope you get morgellons.