Elsevier

Atmospheric Environment

Volume 43, Issue 1, January 2009, Pages 170-181
Atmospheric Environment

Endocrine disrupting chemicals in indoor and outdoor air

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosenv.2008.09.025Get rights and content

Abstract

The past 50 years have seen rapid development of new building materials, furnishings, and consumer products and a corresponding explosion in new chemicals in the built environment. While exposure levels are largely undocumented, they are likely to have increased as a wider variety of chemicals came into use, people began spending more time indoors, and air exchange rates decreased to improve energy efficiency. As a result of weak regulatory requirements for chemical safety testing, only limited toxicity data are available for these chemicals. Over the past 15 years, some chemical classes commonly used in building materials, furnishings, and consumer products have been shown to be endocrine disrupting chemicals – that is they interfere with the action of endogenous hormones. These include PCBs, used in electrical equipment, caulking, paints and surface coatings; chlorinated and brominated flame retardants, used in electronics, furniture, and textiles; pesticides, used to control insects, weeds, and other pests in agriculture, lawn maintenance, and the built environment; phthalates, used in vinyl, plastics, fragrances, and other products; alkylphenols, used in detergents, pesticide formulations, and polystyrene plastics; and parabens, used to preserve products like lotions and sunscreens. This paper summarizes reported indoor and outdoor air concentrations, chemical use and sources, and toxicity data for each of these chemical classes. While industrial and transportation-related pollutants have been shown to migrate indoors from outdoor sources, it is expected that indoor sources predominate for these consumer product chemicals; and some studies have identified indoor sources as the predominant factor influencing outdoor ambient air concentrations in densely populated areas. Mechanisms of action, adverse effects, and dose–response relationships for many of these chemicals are poorly understood and no systematic screening of common chemicals for endocrine disrupting effects is currently underway, so questions remain as to the health impacts of these exposures.

Section snippets

Background

The rapid development of new building materials, furnishings, and consumer products over the past 50 years has resulted in a corresponding increase in new chemicals in the built environment (Weschler, 2009). Indoor concentrations are largely uncharacterized, but they have likely increased over time as a wider variety of chemicals are used and air exchange rates in buildings decrease to improve energy efficiency (Weschler, 2009). Chemical concentrations are often highest indoors because many of

Polychlorinated biphenyls

Polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) use in the US began in 1929 and peaked in the 1970s (Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, 2000, Vorhees, 2001). The mixtures of 209 possible PCB congeners based on the number and position of chlorine atoms were valued for their low flammability and vapor pressure and used extensively through the 1970s in a wide range of consumer products such as flame retardants, paints, plastics, adhesives, lubricants, sealants, hydraulic and heat transfer fluids,

Conclusion

Ongoing research shows that indoor environments provide important opportunities for exposure to a wide variety of chemicals in commercial use, including pesticides (Rudel, 2008b, Rudel et al., 2003, Zota et al., 2008). Indoor environments are well documented as important opportunities for exposure due to the fact that so many chemicals have indoor sources, indoor concentrations of many compounds are much higher than outdoor, and a majority of time is spent indoors (US General Accounting Office,

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by grants from the US National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), NIH grant 5R25ES13258-4 and from appropriations of the Massachusetts Legislature administered by the University of Massachusetts-Lowell and the Massachusetts Department of Public Health. The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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