McLibel Trial Testimony on Polystyrene

McToxics Campaign History and Styrofoam Bans

McDonald’s was identified by Grassroots groups as an extravagant user of

foam food packaging. These leaders were aware McDonald’s was using the foam

food package primarily through the company’s own promotional advertising

that called attention to the foam food package as a marketable component of

their product. McDonald’s became known as the largest single user of the

styrofoam food package.

The foam campaign was essentially related to an effort by local

community activists and community groups to link in

the public mind the issues of manufacturing and disposal. So that when we

deal with a particular product, when we think about in the public sense a

particular product, we understand that we are not just talking about the

use of the product in the middle of its life-span, but we are also talking

about the manufacturing process that goes on at the beginning of the

product’s life-span, and an understanding of problems associated with that

product once it has passed its useful lifetime.

The idea was to bring this kind of issue into the public view

and McDonald’s, because of its own profligate use of foam food packaging,

became the target because of its widely recognized name, its use through

advertising of the foam food packaging and the identification of this type

of foam packaging as an extremely useless and dangerous product.

First McToxics Protests: Vermont

The original, first action by a local community group involved in the

McToxics campaign occurred on August 1, of 1987. I think that is a

significant date. On August 1, 1987 McDonald’s restaurants in certain

communities in Vermont were picketed by local community activists from an

organization called Vermonters Organized for Clean Up.

Four of the communities that passed orders to bar the use of foam:

• Freeport, Maine
• Berkeley, California
• Portland, Oregon
• Suffolk County, New York

Packaging Industry Fights Back as Companies & Communities Ditch Foam

A group of organizations associated with food packaging manufacture sued

Suffolk County, New York, to stop them from carrying out the foam ban.

The vice president of McDonald’s Shelby Yastrow in 1989, during a meeting

with members of CCHW, passed on a copy of a list about five pages long of

local municipalities across the country engaged in or carrying out or

considering the use of foam food packaging bans.

Besides that, in 1990 the Society of the Plastics Industry circulated a

document internally a confidential memo that CCHW found. It said 49 or 50

states in the United States were considering or had enacted restrictions on

foam food packaging or certain types of food packaging, plastic food

packaging.

Many corporations during this period announced that they were going to

cease using foam food packaging. Caesar’s Pizza, Wendy’s, and Burger King

released public comments about their decisions not to use foam as a food

packaging material in their food services. The coast guard announced that

they would not use foam food packaging on their ships. The United States

Park Service announced they would not use foam food packaging in their

cafeterias and restaurants on park land.

There were at least 3 stages to the way in which McDonald’s responded

to the campaign.

The plastics industry came to McDonald’s aid in promoting the value of the

food packaging product through various public relations efforts and

advertising efforts that were national in scope. McDonald’s itself relied

upon the same kind of technique internally by having people respond to

phone calls about foam. Lorna Ersam is an example of somebody whom

McDonald’s used to respond to these concerns as they were raised in the

public and through the news media.

Lorna Ersam is identified in various accounts as a public relations

specialist for McDonald’s Corporation.

In the initial stages, McDonald’s relied on various types of public

relations techniques to deal with public concern. It later modified these

techniques at the time or immediately following a meeting in 1989 in which

Shelby Yastrow met with representatives of CCHW at a hotel in Washington,

D.C. to discuss the foam issue.

Then, Yastrow agreed to 2 things:

• that McDonald’s would begin a recycling project on foam; and
• that McDonald’s would pay the air fare for local community activists

  from around the country to fly to McDonald’s headquarters and meet with Yastrow (as CCHW requested).

As a response to that, the Clearinghouse agreed we would not picket the

opening of their 10,000th restaurant in Dale City, Virginia, which

McDonald’s had planned to use with a great deal of fanfare. So, at that

point the Clearinghouse and foam activists agreed not to picket that

restaurant openly.

After the opening of the restaurant and following Mr. Yastrow’s return,

McDonald’s Corporation refused to meet with local community activists. So

in the second stage McDonald’s acknowledged at least that the Clearinghouse

was an organization that existed and had a viable issue that it was trying

to put on the table and, in response, McDonald’s offered to recycle foam.

The experience that we had with McDonald’s up to that point led us to

believe that through their recycling (or McRecycling) program, McDonald’s

was pursuing another public relations ploy. It may even be a hoax; if it

was not a hoax, it was probably going to be unworkable, but in spite of

that, it would be worth showing in some fashion that McDonald’s was planning

to recycle foam.

Prior to the third day of action which was on Earth Day in 1989 — the

Clearinghouse circulated peel-off labels of the address of

Shelby Yastrow at its corporate headquarters in Illinois and called on

members to mail foam food packaging to McDonald’s corporate headquarters to

Shelby Yastrow, so they would be able to better afford, because of the

volume, to recycle foam.

Consequently, many local groups around the nation responded by mailing foam

to McDonald’s Corporation headquarters to Shelby Yastrow. That action was

called Operation Send It Back. We understood from anonymous sources that

there was a great deal of foam packaging piling up in McDonald’s mail room.

It is also true that in various accounts published in the media Shelby

Yastrow acknowledged McDonald’s had received foam, but it is essentially

true that Mr. Yastrow denied the degree to which we believed the foam was

reaching McDonald’s headquarters through the mail.

The campaign ended in 1990, in November, shortly after McDonald’s announced

they would no longer be using styrofoam food packages; they were going to

virtually eliminate all their foam food packaging within a certain period.

Grassroots leaders around the country concurred that McDonald’s had

complied with the central issue in the campaign. They had withdrawn their

use of foam food packaging from the US market. There were concerns raised

at the time (and maintained to this day) that McDonald’s did this only in

the United States, primarily, that it was probably going to continue to use

foam food packaging elsewhere.

At least in Germany in 1991 in Bavaria they were using foam food packaging.

Through various accounts it is apparent they continue to use foam food

packaging elsewhere in the world as well to this day.

They probably had not withdrawn the foam in other parts of the world

because McDonald’s did not come under the same kind of pressure in other

countries that the McToxics campaign placed on McDonald’s in the United

States. If that campaign had never existed, McDonald’s would probably

continue to be using styrofoam food packaging in the United States as well.

Polystyrene Production, Hazardous Chemicals & Worker Safety

The scientific name for styrofoam is polystyrene foam. There are a variety

of polystyrene foams in use. One is for food packaging.

The first part of the process is extraction. Polystyrene foam is based on

several petroleum derivatives. Petroleum derivatives comes from crude oil

extracted from the earth. That process of extracting these materials from

the earth produces waste, some of which is now coming under increasing

scrutiny in the United States because of its hazardous nature, so-called

oil field waste; at that point of extraction there are problems associated

with the mining or extraction of petroleum chemicals, crude oil.

Once crude oil has been extracted, it is necessary to crack it, to split it

into various components, then subsequently to recombine various products in

controlled reactions; so that in manufacturing polystyrene foam, you need

to rely on certain chemical precursors, benzene or ethyl benzene. From that

point, styrene, and from there you create polystyrene.

The processes are very technical to describe and they are encompassed in a

variety of literature, particularly literature associated with food

packaging. The Encyclopedia of Food Packaging is an example of such. Page

540 is the page that refers to the variations in the manufacture of foam.

It refers to different types of foam packaging that are also elaborated in

other materials that are in the McToxics fact pack. It describes with some

clarity in a brief sense the nature of manufacturing of foam.

The manufacturing process of styrofoam produces several wastes, identified

in research conducted by the Federal Government in 1987, Minimization of

Hazardous Waste Report (1986 October).

No. 4 on that list is ethylene

No. 5 on that list, polystyrene/ABS.

No. 6 is Benzene.

CCHW’s research showed that Ethylene and Benzene were chemical precursors

in the manufacture of polystyrene, so with this kind of report it was

possible to identify styrofoam food packaging as a product related to the

manufacturing process so that large amounts of hazardous waste were

generated in the manufacturing process of this type of material.

Benzene is a known human carcinogen; it has been linked to leukemia. The

Federal Government has done several studies, and a variety of literature

has identified it as such. It is what you might say common knowledge within

the United States public policy process that benzene has these properties

and these health consequences, when people are exposed to it. Benzene is

also a disposal problem and must be treated as a hazardous waste.

There have been studies of the implications for working conditions inn the

production of polystyrene. During the 1980s, the executive branch of the

Federal Government cut funding to the regulatory agencies, the

Environmental Protection Agency, the Occupational Safety and Health

Administration, particularly in the area of inspection. It became more

difficult for the inspectors to cover the number of facilities they needed

to cover. There are several studies that have documented this. There are

some studies that have documented this pattern in Great Britain.

On July 5, 1990, the Arco polystyrene plant in Texas provided an example of

volatility in the production process for polystyrene. It blew

up, and 17 employees were killed in that accident. Then the government

found that there were no violations — the corporation agreed to pay a

penalty, but denied any guilt related to problems associated with their

safety procedures and so forth. The members of the families of the workers

testified that the workers at the plant “Lived with the fear of losing

their jobs if they refused to work” under unsafe conditions. It is also

noted that the explosion created a shortage of foam in the marketplace

because it was such a large manufacturing facility.

To create a foam package, it is necessary to blow gas into the foam, into

the polystyrene itself, so that it will become lighter and will have

certain properties that are desirable in the foam food package itself. To

be specific, early in the campaign in 1987 the Vermonters Organized for

Clean Up targeted McDonald’s use of foam based in part on the fact that the

foam food package blowing agent, CFC, or chloro-fluorocarbon, caused damage

to the ozone layer. On August 1 of that year the Vermonters Organized for

Clean Up acted and picketed restaurants in Vermont. Five days later, in

concert with several manufacturers, McDonald’s announced that they were

going to no longer use or they were instructing their suppliers to no

longer use CFC agents in the manufacture of their foam food packages.

Linguistic Detoxification: HCFCs & CFCs are the same!

In 1978, a ban enacted by the United States Congress prohibited the use of

chloro-fluorocarbons as propellants in consumer products in aerosol sprays.

On August 5, 1987, McDonald’s announced, “We required our suppliers to

switch to a non-CFC blowing agent.” At the time of this pronouncement, the

manufacturers and McDonald’s mentioned the substitution of a blowing agent

gas, which they said was not a CFC.

The chemical in question is HCFC-22. Before January 27, 1988 the chemical

HCFC-22 was officially known as CFC-22. It was part of the CFC family. In

a letter dated January 27, 1988 from the EPA office on air and radiation

stated: “Somewhere along the way, some group hit on a nifty solution. They

simply changed the name of one CFC. Instead of continuing to call it

CFC-22, as they had for half a century, they renamed it ‘HCFC-22’. Voila!

They had their cake and ate it too.”

“In a letter dated January 27, 1988 and addressed to the plastic-foam

industry’s Washington based trade group, the EPA Office of Air and

Radiation sought to ‘clarify’ the move to CFC-22: ‘Chemicals such as

HCFC-22 contain hydrogen . . . Thus HCFC-22 is not technically a CFC.’”

So before that is it correct to say that the EPA had considered that HCFC

or CFC-22, as it was and became HCFC-22, had been restricted or banned

under the previous legislation.

The packaging, the plastic packaging trade groups were looking for a means

to substitute alternate blowing agents for CFCs, because it was becoming

increasingly apparent by actions like the group, Vermonters Organized for

Clean Up, and the growing literature circulated regarding the coming

campaign, that it was necessary to recognize or in some way shift attention

away from the blowing agent CFC-22 because of its presumed qualities, in

that it damaged the ozone layer. It is a piece of “linguistic

detoxification.” This substance, known as one thing for 50 years, now

became another thing, when it was suitable for the industry.

There was a substance called CFC-22 that was the same as HCFC-22s.

“Consumption of HCFC 22 increased at an average of 4 per cent a year even

before it was utilized as a substitute for – 11” – that is presumably the

CFC level – “or CFC-12 because of its hydrogen atom. It is not regulated

by the EPA or listed in the Montreal Protocol roster of chemicals to be

controlled. Consequently, as rate of use is bound to accelerate and with

it the total amount of ozone that 22 destroys.

That effect is not disputed. ‘CFC-22 and HCFC-22 are the same chemical and

that chemical is capable of destroying ozone in the stratosphere’ says

Michael Oppenheimer, a senior scientist with the Environmental Defense

Fund. Even the leading manufacturer Dupont agrees, says spokesperson Kathy

Forte, ’22 HCFC and 22 CFC are the same’. The term ‘HCFC’ was not used

publicly until Jan. 5 1988, she says, and the name change was required to

‘avoid confusion’ because of CFC-22’s hydrogen atom.”

Environmental Defense Fund sells out McToxics Campaign

The statement of the McDonald’s representative is dated in August 1987 and

the Environmental Defense Fund, along with other organizations,

environmental organizations, Natural Resources Defense Council and a couple

of other organizations, joined in a press conference with the manufacturers

and the trade group, the plastic packaging trade groups, to announce this

new change, this shift to an alternative blowing agent.

Then, we criticized the Environmental Defense Fund for joining with the

food packaging industry on the CFC issue, because we recognized — we did

not know at the time that HCFC-22 was the same thing as CFC-22, but what we

did know is that the blowing agents still caused harm to the environment.

It was acknowledged to be less harmful to the environment than the other

types of CFC, but that the alternatives were not acceptable. The real

issue was the use of the foam package itself and not the blowing agent in

particular. That was just one component of the product.

We were critical of the Environmental Defense Fund for engaging in this

activity. After that, we contacted them following the publication of the

Washington Post article and asked them to explain what they had been

engaging in, and they responded. Those organizations wrote us letters and

responded. They described their ideas engaging in this press conference to

announce the phasing out of CFCs.

A document signed by several environmental organizations, concerning a

Washington Post article of December 1989, reads as follows: “Moore is

right” – Curtis Moore being the author of the Washington Post article –

“Moore is right to be incensed by McDonald’s ‘CFC-free’ claim in its

placemat advertising, but he is wrong in implying that environmentalists

have sanctioned that claim. In our negotiations with the food packagers, we

specifically rejected any description of HCFC-22 as ‘not a CFC’, precisely

because it would mislead people.”

He then says “it is still an ozone depleter and thus only an interim

solution,” which is what McDonald’s have said so far. In that process of

environmental groups sanctioning in some way that change, they specified

that industrialists, according to Mr. Doniger, that HCFC-22 should not be

described as “Not a CFC” precisely because it would mislead people.

Save the Ozone Layer: Create Smog?

McDonald’s also used pentane as a blowing agent in the United States. The

issue with pentane is associated with its hazards in the manufacturing

process. Many foam package producers would have difficulty switching to

the use of pentane because of considerable up front cost associated with

the electric fireproofing or explosion proofing, their electrical circuitry,

to avoid problems associated with the flammability of pentane. It is also

noted in other documents that pentane is extremely difficult to contain in

the manufacturing process, and that is why it is necessary to explosion

proof electrical circuitry. This substance poses workplace hazards in its

usage and, in addition, these substances, when they escape from the

manufacturing process, contribute to ground level ozone problems. Those are

issues we raised in 1987. At the time McDonald’s said they would no longer

use the CFC blowing agents in their foam food packaging.

In 1987, we were saying McDonald’s should stop using foam food packaging

because substituting blowing agents was not going to solve environmental

problems associated with the food package, but was going to transfer the

problems to other levels of the stratosphere. Pentane, at a low level, as

a gas at the lower levels of the atmosphere, is a hydrocarbon that would

contribute to smog. It is identified as a greenhouse gas as a

hydrocarbon.

“As much as 50 to 60 per cent of polystyrene food containers are, in fact,

foamed with hydrocarbons, processors say; and many of McDonald’s

food-packaging suppliers, including Mobil, the largest, use hydrocarbons.”

Quote from a processor: “‘A substantial portion of McDonald’s containers

have been made with isopentane. That is why we are confident there will be

no problem in phasing out CFC-12′.” The next paragraph in the middle of

it, the statement, the article continues: “Chief among the cost.”

Conversion to hydrocarbons, however, carries with it costs that even the

largest processor might find formidable. Chief among these is the expense

of outfitting a plant to safeguard against the materials’ flammability and

to contain their vaporous emissions. Processors who convert will need to

‘explosion proof’ electrical connections on their machinery, make special

provisions for storage of the chemical, and increase the number of fire

safety devices in their plants, users and suppliers of the chemicals say. ”

It goes on: “Because hydrocarbon emissions are linked with low level

atmospheric pollution, processors must also have recovery systems in place

to vent fumes from the air. Hydrocarbon emissions are also subject to the

EPA’s clean air standards, thus adding a regulatory dimension to the

chemical’s use . . . In some parts of the US (notably southern California)

there is concern that hydrocarbons could be restricted if EPA prescribed

clean air goals for an area are not met.” Clean air goals have been coming

into effect in various parts of the United States requiring that these

municipal areas come into compliance with clean air standards and because

of their smog problems they are not in compliance. These blowing agents,

pentane blowing agents, can cause smog.

A change of direction to pentane would have involved a great outlay of

capital cost to their suppliers.

Junk Culture

The polystyrene foam food package was only of use to the customer for a

very brief time. From the time that the person purchases the food to the

time the person disposes of the package; that process could take anywhere

from ten minutes to half an hour. For McDonald’s, it is likely to have been

a very short time. It was a wasteful product. It was a wasteful package

material. It was nothing particular. It was not a particularly useful

package, except it was a vehicle for McDonald’s to put its name on its

product. In as far as they relied upon the package to use as an

advertising device on television, they were, it was a series of

advertisements that ran in the United States that referred to the package

under the guise of the “keeping the hot side hot and the cold side cold,”

and subsequently using the package for the brief period that the customer

would contact it. It was more of an advertising or promotional tool than

anything else.

Styrene from Polystyrene gets into the Food

There is a document related to the migration of various types of materials

from plastic packages into food contained by these packages. The author was

specifically interested in those studies that focused on styrene migration.

These issues, I suppose, go to — at least in the second paragraph — are

related more generally to storage as opposed to migration. The last

sentence in the second paragraph says: “One of the only problems with

storing large quantities of polystyrene in a closed building is emissions

from residuals of styrene monomer”. He refers to item 10 in the reference

list; item being Polystyrene Safety Data Sheet, Canadian Center for

Occupational Health & Safety.

On page 4 under the heading: “What about Migration of Monomer into Food

Products”? By monomer, Mr. Baggett is referring to the styrene monomer that

is the precursor to polystyrene, in which he states: “Migration of

monomers” — this is the second paragraph — “into food and cosmetics came

to a head in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s with the discovery that vinyl

chloride monomer is a carcinogen. It continued in the 1970’s with the

suspicion that acrylonitrile used in beverage containers was a carcinogen,

which resulted in a 1975 ruling restricting use of these monomers. The

earliest work on styrene migration I found was done in 1972. Therefore the

topic is not new. A preliminary search of the literature suggests that the

topic of migration of styrene monomer was addressed in a 1976 symposium on

health hazards in the plastics industry. In the last couple of years since

the results of the adipose tissue survey were released to the public there

has been renewed interest in monomer migration. There have been six world

symposiums on the topic. The latest was held in 1990 in London, England.

Over the years it appears that physical chemists have shown considerable

interest in migration”.

Next paragraph: “In packaged foods with the addition of heat (such as

microwave temperatures) vitamin A will decompose and produce m-xylene,

toluene, and 2,6-dimethylnaphthalene. Toluene will aggressively dissolve

polystyrene and render polystyrene as an unsuitable package for containing

or microwaving products that contain vitamin A.”

You can taste styrene in a food container, in the food product contained in

a styrofoam food container; this has been acknowledged by the plastics

packaging, by at least one plastics packaging trade group.

Several studies have shown that styrene does migrate from polystyrene foam

cups into food and drink: K. Figge, “Migration of Additives from Plastic

Films into Edible Oils and Fat Stimulants; “Total Migration From Plastic

Yoghurt Pots” which is a Spanish document; Joseph Miltz, “Migration of Low

Molecular Weight Species from Packaging Materials: Theoretical and

Practical Considerations”; “Migration of Packaging Components to Food:

Regulatory Considerations”.

The Polystyrene Packaging Council is a trade organization composed of

manufacturers of plastic foam food packaging. Presumably it would not be

in their interests to identify problems with packaging unless it was a well

known established scientific fact. They do not normally campaign telling

people what the problems are with polystyrene packaging. A trade

organization seeks to promote the interests of its members, here foam food

packagers; the issue raised in earlier testimony and within the campaign

that we were engaged in was that foam food packaging is better than

alternatives because foam food packaging does not contain large quantities

of various disease factors as compared to reusable food vessels washed in a

dishwasher.

The issue raised here or addressed here is whether there is an additional

possibility — that is the food packaging trade group is acknowledging the

possibility that these components migrate into or can migrate into the food

products contained within the polystyrene food package.

There is a pamphlet is headed Polystyrene Food Service Packaging: A Health

Profile. It reads as follows: “The more important question is how much

styrene migrates into food. Polystyrene packaging is designed to reduce the

migration of styrene into food, which can impart an off taste at very low

concentrations. Independent studies have shown that residual styrene

concentrations in polystyrene of 500 parts PPM (parts per million) produce

migration levels of styrene into food in the five to 50 parts per billion

range.”

Next paragraph: “The issue is addressed as to whether or not there are any

adverse health effects”, and here the representatives or the material

distributed by the polystyrene packaging council makes statements claiming

that “scientific research does not support the notion that styrene

migration into food products is of any concern”.

A document entitled “The Broad Scan Analysis: Human Adipose Tissue Survey”

was done by the Environmental Protection Agency, a statutory federal body.

It says: “Several compounds, including styrene the xylene

isomers,1,4-dichlorobenzene and ethylphenol were detected in all composite

samples. Styrene is observed 100 per cent at the time in these fact tissue

samples. For the 46 samples, which are 46 people, 100 per cent of them had

styrene residues in tissue. Statisticians will say that the number 30 is a

number that is adequate for a sample size in order to establish some degree

of confidence that your results are not just a random occurrence. Here we

have a 100 per cent record in any case.

The question arises from this type of research, that if there is this kind

of contamination in human fat tissue in the United States might it be

caused by or associated with in any way the use of styrofoam or polystyrene

foam food packages? So the second question is, is there any evidence to

suggest that foam food packaging leeches any substances into food and in

particular if it is capable of leeching the chemical styrene. There are a

number of general concerns regarding the contamination of human fat tissue

with toxic chemicals. They are a matter of a great deal of scientific

debate. You could find experts to argue basically whatever position you

wanted.

The first issue is that there is residue in polystyrene food packaging that

has been acknowledged by the packaging council to be as a contaminant in

the polystyrene food package. The second issue is that it can move from

the package

into the food.

In the second paragraph, Mr. Baggett identifies research in the literature

regarding the ways in which, he identifies a Scandinavian study that he

says examines the movement of styrene in the body, and they use what he

says is aradio-labeled styrene; he further notes that it is not simply a

matter of the styrene itself, but the metabolites of styrene, and here I

quote: “The metabolites”. “The metabolites of styrene are mandelic acid, a

known mutagen and styrene-7, 8-oxide, a known carcinogen.”

T

Workplace: Styrene,” Center for chemical hazard assessment Syracuse

Research Corporation, Syracuse, New York. 41:, 1985. It reads, “Styrene, a

widespread mutagen: Conclusions from the result of testing. That is in the

environmental mutagens and carcinogens 1982.” So the point there is that

the Polystyrene Packaging Council in acknowledging the migration of food,

migration of styrene from the package into the food contained, dismisses

the health concerns by reference to certain studies, and Mr. Baggett raises

certain issues with reference to other studies.

The major concerns involve the health implications, as well as other

implications in terms of waste, production of polystyrene foam at the time

in the campaign for the elimination of polystyrene foam by McDonald’s. We

raised the issue in our news journal.

We examined the waste disposal issue in order to learn to what degree

McDonald’s packaging contributed to solid waste problems. And we observed

various materials, various items, in the literature that we researched that

would help us to identify that, what that volume was.

We derived a calculation of about 1.3 billion cubic feet of styrofoam,

polystyrene foam, food packaging, and that is really the central aspect of

the volume issue, that it was a needless package in that, as far as we

could tell, this was the amount of waste associated with it by this source,

McDonald’s.

There are a number of ways to calculate the total volume. We made our

calculations based on the article in Modern Plastics magazine that referred

to McDonald’s use of 70 million pounds of the product in their

manufacturing — in the manufacturing.

The 1.3 billion cubic feet is a calculation of what the volume would be

once it has been molded into the packaging itself.

Polystyrene foam does not biodegrade at all.

The lightness of a polystyrene foam packaging makes it likely to end up as

litter by virtue of the fact it is easy for the wind to pick it up and move

it. We did review material from organizations that were engaged in cleaning

up litter on beach fronts, and those organizations observed that foam, was

one of the largest single constituents and that McDonald’s foam packages

were identifiable in the material that they picked up off beaches. There is

no specific characterization of the amount of this material that ends up as

litter, but it is clear that it is an issue.

McDonald’s never addressed directly the litter issue. In a general sense,

there are organizations that are set up such as organizations like Keep

America Beautiful which focus on the litter issue exclusively and, have

argued for education of people so that they do not throw things in the

street.

The way that issue is framed, the responsibility is upon the consumer and

is not placed any further up the stream of the product life-span. In

general, we can characterize the way McDonald’s used foam in its restaurants

as part of a means to externalize some of its costs, costs associated with

reusables or costs associated with disposal of materials that were heavier.

It basically became someone else’s problem once it left the store.

In general, recycling is a preferable means of dealing with otherwise what

would be a waste product, but in a more general sense there are actually

three R’s. There is reduction or reduce, then there is reuse and then there

is recycle; recycling being the last option of preference. So that with

regard to the styrene, the polystyrene foam issue, the matter, the issues

we were raising were associated with the use of a product that had problems

across the span of its life cycle, and that the solution was not going to

be effective if what McDonald’s proposed to do was simply recycle the foam

packaging product; that recycling was not the solution to the issues that

we were raising.

In 1989 members of the organization met with Shelby Yastrow at which point

he announced that that would be McDonald’s choice, and that they would

adopt a recycling program for the styrofoam. The meeting was discussed

with Mr. Yastrow, what McDonald’s options were, what they were going to do

and whether or not they would be willing to meet with a number of community

based organizations and their leaders to discuss the foam issue within the

context of those people’s communities, and that Mr. Yastrow’s response was

to offer what came to be called the McRecycling program. At that time

McDonald’s was offering that as the way of dealing with the disposal

problem, or certainly a major way of dealing with the disposal problem.

In areas where McDonald’s was subjected to municipal bans and certain types

of issues were being raised, they would adopt the recycling program which,

essentially, meant setting up a bin for their customers to separate and

place the foam in those receptacles. There was a great deal of promotional

advantage that McDonald’s was seeking to gain through this recycling

program, and it also appeared that the recycling program was exhibiting

a great many problems, notwithstanding the fact that the foam was

contaminated with materials from the food that had been inside the package

before it was discarded in the recycling bin, but then further down the

line with regard to the reprocessing of the plastics in a recycling plant

and then even further down the line with regard to the ability to market a

commodity of made of recycled styrofoam plastic.

Whilst there was a considerable degree of information being generated by

both McDonald’s and foam packaging organisations, it remained very unclear

what was actually being produced at the end of the recycling process and,

generally speaking, if you were to attend a trade show at this time — this

is in the period of 1989, in early 1990 — then there would be

organizations promoting the styrofoam and its recyclability. They would

demonstrate its recyclability with materials made out of plastics which

were generally composed of other types of plastic, polymers, rather than

polystyrene foam. There was a tendency of McDonald’s to use this program

as a public relations exercise.

The point is that whether or not this was merely a public relations

exercise, if McDonald’s foam recycling program was going to be effective,

then they would need the material to begin with and that they would need to

be able to impact on the manufacturing/remanufacturing process in some

fashion, and what we found was that there were some problems with the

relationship that McDonald’s was having with some of its downstream

marketers, the reprocessing operations.

There was an incident in which one of these reprocessors was forced to

reship back a load of foam because McDonald’s had not paid a bill; and

associated with the shipment of this foam back to McDonald’s was also a

bill from the reprocessor to pay for problems associated with exterminating

vermin that were accumulating around this catch of foam.

A further issue is incineration of waste specifically regarding polystyrene

foam. There is a list of chemicals that have been detected in scientific

experiments involving the burning or, if you will, baking of polystyrene

foam. The reference is a list of a total of 69 articles dealing with the

subject that they have identified in their literature research. The

conclusion of this report, simply stated, identifies a number of products

that are related to the decomposition through fire or heat of polystyrene”.

It makes several statements about the material. It also makes note that

there are certain effects related to the burning of polystyrene in the

presence of test animals. It states that the burning of polystyrene in

comparison to other materials appears to be — is among the least toxic.

It, nonetheless, makes note of and the table 1 list of chemicals that are

produced.

This research was undertaken because during the period of the campaign,

McDonald’s began suggesting that they would like to, or that they were

pursuing the option of developing incinerators at their restaurants, and

that this would be an acceptable way to deal with the polystyrene issue.

There are seven conclusions to this report. Amongst them, they note that

there are toxic effects associated with the burning of polystyrene in

laboratory experiments with animals; that there are considerable degrees of

variation in the ways in which these composition products occur, but that

in the specific sense McDonald’s claims that when styrofoam is burnt

properly, it reduces to nothing but water and carbon, carbon dioxide, if I

recall correctly, their claims. They, essentially, were not in keeping with

the findings of this study.

The following comments are from a document by Dr. Paul Connett, a chemist

at St. Lawrence University. “I find it difficult to believe that any

credible expert would maintain that a controlled burn could be maintained

in a trash incinerator akin to the ‘controlled’ burn possible in a

laboratory experiment. There are many variables with a typical municipal

waste stream entering an incinerator which would defy the total control

over the burning process”.

This letter goes on to refer to a number of studies that have looked at the

variables that need to be considered. I just skip to the conclusion, the

final paragraph on the second page: “In my view, the only chance one would

have of getting a controlled combustion with the burning of polystyrene

packaging in a commercial incinerator would be if the incinerator was

designed and built only to burn polystyrene packaging and all other trash

was handled elsewhere. The moment other materials are introduced, even

paper, the chances of maintaining a controlled burn to laboratory standards

are highly unlikely.”

This is a letter from Consumat Systems to McDonald’s Corporation dated

December 8th 1987. It refers to a Consumat model C75-P incinerator and the

State of Illinois operating permit issued for the operator of this

incinerator, and test reports associated with the operation of the

incinerator; and that material, I believe, is also in the collection and it

describes McDonald’s Woodbridge incinerator, C75-P incinerator model in

Woodbridge, the village of Woodbridge. McDonald’s was involved in seeking

incineration permits in the State of Illinois. McDonald’s is engaging, at

this point, engaging in incineration as a solution to the waste issue and

that, in fact, it was part of their response, initial response, to the

McToxics campaign; but that they subsequently, as far as I have been able

to tell, they subsequently abandoned this project, although I would note

that Shelby Yastrow was quoted in newspaper accounts as claiming that he

would like to put an incinerator behind every restaurant in the United

States. The program was abandoned because of public controversy.

On to landfills: It has been stated that is presently the main disposal

option for McDonald’s polystyrene foam. Aside from the lack of

degradeability or biodegradeability with regard to styrofoam or foam food

packaging, the related issues have to do with the possibility that a

package itself can in contact with certain types of chemicals, substances

that are in a landfill, for example, toluene will dissolve the foam

and the foam can move into what is called leeching or into the ground water

through the leaking of this material out of the landfill. Research has

shown that it is possible that it may become part of some kind of chemical

soup that leaks out of the landfill. It is reasonable to assume that it

can happen. It is noted that it does turn up in hazardous waste dumps as a

product.

So either it does not biodegrade, it stays there forever or, if it does, it

is because it interacts with other chemicals and then could leech out into

the water table. There are studies which indicate that it is present in

hazardous waste site disposal facilities that are or were at one time solid

waste landfills. Now, solid waste landfills are required to be monitored.

Monitoring wells are required to be installed. This monitoring that is

done now is a relatively recent phenomenon. Monitoring wells are only

located in specific locations around the landfill, and once there is

something detected in a particular well, it is somewhat difficult to

pin-point where that material came from, where leak in the landfill

actually is, and that the only reason that that well has picked up that

particular contamination in its casing is due to the fact that it happens

to be in the direction the ground water is flowing from the point of where

this material is leaking into the ground water.

The effectiveness of the monitoring done by federal authorities is a matter

of dispute. It is not a particularly effective approach to wait until the

contaminant has reached the ground water and then act on the contamination

once it has reached the ground water. It should be stopped at source

really rather than at that stage.

The viewpoint has been expressed that polystyrene foam packaging in

landfills helps to aerate the landfill and help with the degradability.

Styrofoam or foam is used in potting plants in

the soil. I do not think that in a landfill it is particularly relevant

that McDonald’s foam is going to contribute to beneficial effects on the

landfill. Basically, it is not an answer. They were really clutching at

straws to justify using landfills.

In 1989-90, the McToxics campaign was having a very broad effect on the

industry.

This is an internal memorandum that was leaked which, whilst it does not

refer specifically to the foam, the McToxics campaign, it does state in

general in the first paragraph: “The image of plastics among consumers is

deteriorating at an alarmingly fast pace. Opinion research experts tell us

that it has plummeted so far and so fast, in fact, that we are approaching

a ‘point of no return’.”

Then it goes on to say: “We have an opportunity to correct this situation”.

He calls for a meeting on January 15th 1990 at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in

Washington D.C. for members of The Society of the Plastics Industry. It is

the highest level meeting for that industry. The meeting is to be hosted

by SPI, that is The Society of the Plastics Industry, Polymeric Materials

Producers Division”.

The document also says that: “49 of 50 States have, or are considering,

laws or regulations that ban, limit or restrict plastics and/or products

made from plastics. . . There is a growing consensus among plastics

executives that we must immediately undertake a major program of

unprecedented proportions to reverse this fast-moving tidal wave of growing

negative public perception.”

In the next paragraph in the center it states: “It is estimated that this

effort will cost upwards of $50 million a year for the next three years”.

This is a public relations effort.

The point, simply put, is that the campaign was having a broad impact

beyond just McDonald’s itself, and that the response, in a general sense,

appears to have been largely related to imagery and public relations. The

central issues we were raising were not issues that these executives were

necessarily willing to address except as public relations matters.

The Citizens Clearinghouse for Hazardous Waste and the campaign in general,

McToxics, sought a meeting with McDonald’s over these issues. The campaign began in

October 1987, and at that time we had written letters asking McDonald’s to

meet to discuss the foam issue, and to meet in specifically with local

community groups that were living near disposal facilities, landfills and

so forth, to address the issues that were concerning these people, and

McDonald’s did not agree to a meeting until 1989 — on the eve of their

launching the McRecycle program.

When McDonald’s finally withdrew their polystyrene foam food packaging, we

recognized it as a victory, but we also acknowledged that McDonald’s would

not address or accept the possibility that they had been in any way

influenced by the pressure that had been brought to bear across the nation

by local communities groups; that they instead chose to attribute the

decision to a series of meetings that began with EDF in, I believe, 1990.

We anticipated that we would need to pay attention to McDonald’s

implementation of their withdrawal of foam food packaging; that, in fact,

it might take more time and they might decide not to — they might go back

on what they said. In so far as what they were going to in other countries

at the time, we did not expect that it would affect other countries except

in so far as McDonald’s was willing to extend those policies to other

branches around the globe.

McDonald’s ought to live by the same standards they live by in their home

country, to the extent they wish to be perceived as a model corporate

citizen around the world, that they ought to at the very least live up to

what standards they set for themselves in the United States. They have not

withdrawn polystyrene foam yet in other countries because of the fact that

they have not been subjected to the kind of Grassroots community pressure

that was brought to bear on them in the United States.

As an alternative packaging system for McDonald’s, we recommended that they

consider alternatives such as packaging that was made from recycled

=00=00=00=00=00=00=05=BFr that they consider maximizing their use of=

reusable materials in

their restaurants. At various stages McDonald’s did respond to those

issues, although not necessarily directly to us, to the organization.

McDonald’s has put forward the argument that reusable packaging would be

more damaging to the environment than polystyrene foam packaging, saying

that, for example, if they had to use dishwashers, it would be a large

energy use. The truth is, the idea that a disposable package is less

wasteful in terms of energy consumption is rather questionable, it seems to

defy common sense. It also defies the laws of physics. These arguments do

not fully account for the energy consumption that is required from the

beginning of the extraction process to the end of the disposal process, and

even necessarily beyond the clean-up process associated with toxic

disposal.

If you are going to claim that the energy consumption that begins somewhere

in the life cycle of a product and ends when it is disposed of, shows it is

more beneficial to extract resources continually, pass them through

people’s hands and have them wind up in a landfill, that this is somehow

less exhaustive of energy resources than reusing items in the middle of the

product’s life cycle. It would be necessary to fully account for all of

these points in the process of the life cycle of the product or the food

packaging or the vessel for food. It seems to defy the laws of physics.