In Memphis, the southwest portion of the city boasts some of the nation’s oldest Black neighborhoods, monuments to music and soul food, while housing about 100,000 people.
This part of the city also has a dense industrial area, locally known as “Pollution Island,” with an oil refinery, a coal ash dump, a Tennessee Valley Authority methane gas plant and asphalt factories — towering archetypes of pollution that reflect historic and ongoing environmental racism.
But the city has also hosted some less obvious threats: Sterilization Services of Tennessee, a simple brick building nestled between a railroad and interstate, quietly raised cancer risks in nearby communities for nearly five decades before shutting down this year.
“It was just another warehouse,” said Yolanda Spinks, a lifelong southwest Memphis resident and spokesperson for the environmental group Memphis Community Against Pollution.
This facility polluted local air by using ethylene oxide, a pesticide derived from fossil fuels that sterilizes medical equipment. It is one of two such facilities in Tennessee.
How ethylene oxide harms human health
Ethylene oxide — a colorless, faintly sweet-smelling gas — can damage DNA and increase cancer risks.
Short-term exposure to the gas can cause lung injury, headaches, nausea, vomiting, shortness of breath and cyanosis, the bluing of skin from a lack of oxygen.
Chronic exposure increases risks for lymphoma, leukemia and breast cancer. The gas is also associated with stomach cancer, according to the National Cancer Institute, as well as reproductive problems, neurotoxicity and heightened allergic reactions. Animal studies have also linked gas inhalation to tumors in the brain, lungs, connective tissue, uterus and mammary glands.
Last week, a study from Johns Hopkins University found that ethylene oxide facilities in Louisiana were causing pollution at levels far exceeding prior federal estimates — even six miles downwind from facilities.
“We saw concentrations hitting 40 parts per billion, which is more [than] a thousand times higher than the accepted risk for lifetime exposure,” Peter DeCarlo, the study’s lead author and environmental professor at the university, told the Johns Hopkins Hub.
A ProPublica analysis of cancer hotspots found that the gas was the single biggest contributor to excess industrial cancer risk from air pollutants in the U.S.
Ethylene oxide: from World War I chemical weapon to ubiquitous chemical
Ethylene oxide is used today to manufacture other chemicals put in cleaners, laundry detergents, soaps, cosmetics, antifreeze, clothes, asphalt, cement, batteries, plastic and more. The gas is also used to sterilize food — which has resulted in the European Union banning some U.S. food imports — and as much as 50% of medical equipment in the U.S.
The gas was first used on an industrial scale during World War I, when ethylene oxide was used to create the chemical weapon mustard gas and explosives. After the war, the fledgling industry found other ways to survive.
By the 1930s, the gas was being used as an insecticide to fumigate hospitals.
Ethylene oxide is a product of the fossil fuel industry
Ethylene oxide is closely intertwined with the fossil fuel industry: It is derived from fossil fuels and is used in many petrochemical products like plastic bottles and polyester clothing.
Ethylene oxide is produced from ethylene, which is produced from petroleum hydrocarbons, namely crude oil. The oil corporation Shell is one of the largest global producers of ethylene oxide, according to Shell.
The ethylene oxide industry also mirrors the fossil fuel industry in a few key ways. Production and use of the gas have serious health consequences, which have been known for 70 years. In 1981, a Shell executive said ethylene oxide was the “biggest problem” regarding industrial carcinogens.
Some government agencies and industry groups like the American Chemistry Council have denied its harms and actively opposed environmental regulations.
Where is ethylene oxide produced and used?
Last year, just 17 facilities owned by 9 companies produced ethylene oxide, primarily in Texas and Louisiana, according to the American Chemistry Council.
There are also 88 facilities across the U.S. and Puerto Rico that use ethylene oxide to sterilize medical equipment.
In 2022, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency identified 23 high-risk medical sterilization facilities. Both of Tennessee’s facilities were on that list: Sterilization Services of Tennessee in Memphis and DeRoyal Industries in New Tazewell, a town north of Knoxville in Claiborne County, where there is still coal mining and possibly oil drilling. Both facilities opened in the 1970s.
The Memphis facility closed down this year following community pressures and will move to a new location. Some residents have filed a class action lawsuit against Sterilization Services of Tennessee, which is owned by Altair Engineering.
Spinks, of Memphis Community Against Pollution, said her organization is not part of this lawsuit but agrees that the company should be held accountable for this pollution.
Despite living near the facility, Spinks was unaware of the dangers until EPA issued its list of risky facilities. She said it added to the evidence that industries are causing cancer in Memphis.
And Spinks has seen a lot of cancer in her community. Her mother, who grew up in the same area, died of stomach cancer. She has a family friend who got breast cancer twice.
“Cancer doesn’t run in my community. Toxic release facilities do though,’” Spinks said.
A new EPA rule
Earlier this year, EPA issued a new rule to reduce ethylene oxide emissions, requiring companies to install air monitoring devices and take corrective action if they exceed certain levels. EPA said its new rule will reduce ethylene oxide emissions by about 90%.
This rule came nearly two decades after EPA first drafted a report on the cancer risks of ethylene oxide. In 2016, EPA finalized a report, using methodologies largely unchanged from the 2006 draft, that found ethylene oxide was 30 to 60 times more toxic than the agency previously established in 1985.
There are alternatives to ethylene oxide, and some environmental groups have called on EPA to phase out use of the gas in sterilization. Alternatives include radiation, vaporized hydrogen peroxide and vaporized peracetic acid.
Spinks is happy that Memphis has closed this chapter but is gearing up for the next. Memphis has more than a dozen other toxic release inventory facilities, and 200 companies are operating in Pidgeon Industrial Park, or “Pollution Island.”
Spinks is monitoring the fossil fuel expansion of the Tennessee Valley Authority, which has announced plans for a second gas plant in Memphis. The Memphis Community Against Pollution has a petition to the White House asking President Biden to hold the TVA Board accountable for cancer-linked pollution that scientists say could be avoided with renewables.
“We have to do a better job of doing what is right by people,” Spinks said.
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