Vantage Specialty in Gurnee is one of two Lake County sites that was part of a four-year study on ethylene oxide emissions. (Photo by Gregory Hartunian/For Chronicle Media)

The results of a study measuring ethylene oxide emissions and the surrounding air quality near two Lake County sites that use the chemical in its processing methods indicated

acceptable emission levels.

Pushback has occurred over probable insufficient data and a lack of ongoing blood testing for nearby residents.

The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, a research arm of the Atlanta-based Center for Disease Control, released the findings during a public forum. Its

report analyzed EtO concentrations near the Medline Industries medical sterilization facility in Waukegan, and the Vantage Specialty Chemicals manufacturing plant in Gurnee.

Conducted from June 2019 through September 2023, data was collected from sampling canisters placed in proximity to the facilities and in a wider circumference pattern. The

warehouses storing the chemical were not included.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency changed the designation of EtO, from a potential to known cancer-causing chemical, in 2016. It concluded that EtO exposure to

humans over long periods increased risk for lymphoma, leukemia, and breast cancer. EtO can also change the DNA in human cells once it leaves the bloodstream.

In its report, ASTDR used the most recent collected data from 2023 to “suggest that EtO levels were low enough to not pose a cancer risk to offsite workers near the Medline

plant.”

However, the agency refused to rule out that breathing EtO at levels measured near the Medline plant, starting three years earlier, could slightly increase cancers for people

living within a mile of the plant, located near Route 41. The plant utilizes the chemical in the sterilization of medical equipment.

In 2019, Dr. Susan Buchanan through the University of Illinois-Chicago conducted blood draws on a non-randomized basis of people in the area and went outside the

one-mile zone. Subjects that smoked cigarettes were separated from non-smokers. Her findings were presented at a 2020 meeting, held at the Warren Township Library in

Gurnee. They showed a statistically significant difference of EtO concentrations in the blood of the non-smokers.

“This (ASTDR) study is incomplete,” said Dr. Thomas Rudd, a pathologist and former Lake County coroner. “Without current and ongoing analysis for EtO in the blood of

citizens that live within the vicinity of these businesses, the study is worthless.”

Air-quality monitoring has also presented problems, as with the Vantage Specialty facility showing “zero” emissions, when the value was inadvertently entered at the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency

level on a report, where an area was left blank.

“The National Air Toxic Assessment and the National Emissions Inventory, two separate indexes, are a comprehensive and detailed estimate of air emission of criteria pollutants,” said U.S. EPA spokesperson Francisco Arcaute. “Their EtO emissions were not reported in developing the NATA.

“The state and federal agencies have been in discussions with Vantage Specialty, and they have shared its recent emissions calculations,” he said. “Both the federal and state

EPAs are working to review the methodology for those.”

Austin Pollack, Gurnee’s assistant to the village administrator, said, “Vantage Specialty is regulated by the state of Illinois, and continues to be in compliance with their IEPA

permit. The village continues to support any efforts aimed at the further reduction of EtO emissions.”

John Aldrin is a consultant investigating the concerns, alongside “Stop EtO,” a volunteer

group tasked with raising awareness about carcinogenic emissions in Lake County.

Aldrin leveraged his experience in the field of non-destructive testing to understand the permit models, and canister data, of the ASTDR study.

“I give ASTDR credit for their report, but one of the glaring deficiencies is that Illinois had no interest in testing the warehouses, where these sterilized medical devices are

stored,” Aldrin said. “Medline is allowed to emit to 150 pounds per year, from their sterilization plant. I just have a hard time believing (that).”

Aldrin indicated there were nearly 30 exchanges with IEPA Director John Kim, who contended the warehouses were not an issue. Medline also reports its finding directly to

the IEPA, not the public. That information was contained in the ASTDR study but obtained through the Freedom of Information Act.

“We were supposed to get a ‘third phase’ that showed emissions at both facilities were OK,” he said. “However, the collected data from the air sampling canisters indicated that

some of the results could be wrong. My perspective is that we never got that final component of testing, and the warehouses were never tested.”