Keith wrote:

> So presumably as you go inland, the levels drop off.
> How fast do they do so? And what numbers did you measure?

I never made any inland measurements.  I just got a bug up
my *** one day when I was taking my boat out and took the
chromatagraph with me.  I was damn lucky I didn't drop it
over the side.  I'll have to fire up the old air sucker again
to see what I can measure inland.  I wish I'd thought of it
when the fires were burning and the air around my house was
difficult to breathe. I have to keep the chromatagraph attached
to its original laptop running Win98.  When I try to run it on
a later operating system, I get some strange error relating to
clock speed. Hope it still functions well.

> To be clear, most sources ( including the EPA ) back
> your claim. Here for example, the evil socialists of Sweden (grin) say...

>>Methyl chloride (CAS No. 74-87-3) is released mainly to air
>>during its production and use and by incineration of municipal
>>and industrial wastes. How ever, natural sources, primarily
>oceans and biomass burning, clearly dominate over anthropogenic sources.

>http://www.inchem.org/documents/cicads/cicads/cicad28.htm

> I'm also sure that the burning biomass in your backyard
> has released a slew of toxic chemicals. Should we
> revise the numbers to make these levels acceptable because
> they occur in nature? I do agree that folks are generally
> paranoid about chemical exposure, but if animal studies
> show harm with low concentrations then harm will
> be caused by low concentrations, regardless of the source.

You point out why I'm so concerned with this.  Methyl chloride,
while I have no use for it, has become my personal poster boy for
why environmental extremists and government agencies have got it
all wrong.  There are serious toxic substances about that need 
highly watchful regulation.  But you can't do a good job of it if
you try to act as if everything is dangerous.  Case in point, if
you buy sodium chloride from a chemical company, it comes with an
MSDS sheet, ditto SiO2. If vast government agencies and industrial
enterprises have to waste time and resources telling us that salt
and sand are dangerous, there's precious little left to address
real problems.  Furthermore, this sort of thing is a needless
drain on the economy and yet another source of income for lawyers.

BTW, Keith, good to know you're still lurkin' out there.

M.


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