Marko Hanželic
Since 1986 California classifies hexavalent chromium as a toxic air pollutant for which there is no safe exposure level. Nevertheless, it remains important element, which is used in chrome plating automotive parts. California lawmakers are now working to ban the use of hexavalent chromium altogether.
Chrome in solid form is harmless, meaning you don't have to worry if you're near a chrome bumper or any other part of your old timer. On the other hand, chrome plating is a process in which they are released toxic gases, which escape into the atmosphere, and are particularly dangerous for workers in the activity itself.
Namely, the vapors produced in the process of electrolysis with chromium are carcinogenic and according to official data, as many as 500 times more toxic from diesel fuel vapors produced during the operation of the diesel engine. It is particularly alarming that many companies dealing with chroming, are located in the immediate vicinity of schools, he reports Los Angeles Times.
"We would be the first legislator in the world to phase out hexavalent chromium in industrial electroplating," she told the LA Times Jane Williams, executive director of the California Communities Against Toxics Association. "Even the EU didn't do it because they couldn't find a substitute for key uses. We would work with industry and the military to actually identify new opportunities to replace chromium in industry. This is a precedent in this field."
Po according to industry representatives the chrome plating of the metal contributes only one percent of the total emissions of hexavalent chromium, which the defenders of this ban recognize as a fact, but at the same time claim that this is less important than the impact of the high concentrations they perceive in the vicinity of facilities for chrome plating.
Experts also claim that the industry is not yet ready to abandonment of use of hexavalent chromium. Trivalent chromium, which they suggest as a substitute, requires expensive changes in the production itself, and the result of chrome plating is large darker as with hexavalent chromium, which raises concerns about aesthetics.
They also have concerns at aviation in military industry, because the hardness and durability of chrome plating with trivalent chromium is not the same as that provided by chrome plating with hexavalent chromium, and at the same time, a piece of metal processed in this way is much less resistant to corrosion. The path to the ban they set themselves in California, will therefore be anything but simple.
