Cheshire Firm Study:

Artificial Turf No Health Threat

A Connecticut firm which has contracted on several Parks & Recreation projects in Newtown has concluded that artificial turf made from crushed rubber does not pose any health risks, but an environmental group is questioning the methodology and the firm’s objectivity.

Concerns have been raised across the country about the safety of artificial turf made from crushed tires because of the industrial chemicals it contains.

Cheshire-based Milone & MacBroom Inc, an engineering, environmental and landscape architecture firm, studied synthetic turf so it could inform clients about any safety issues, said Vincent McDermott, a senior vice president at the firm.

Milone & MacBroom’s clients have included Yale University and other schools that have installed artificial turf fields, as well as schools that have opted for natural grass fields. The firm released the study’s findings last month, and it found no health risks.

“At this point, based on the data we have before us, we are not going to say to stop using this product because of health problems,” Mr McDermott said. “What we published is really totally unbiased, in my opinion.”

Nancy Alderman of North Haven-based Environment and Human Health Inc, is questioning Milone & MacBroom’s conclusions and the firm’s objectivity. The nonprofit group, which includes doctors, has concerns about artificial turf’s effect on children’s health and says more studies are needed.

“I think it’s important to know that they are installers of those fields,” she told The New Haven Register.

Milone & MacBroom’s study focuses on whether synthetic fields become excessively hot in the summer, whether they affect air quality, and whether the materials leach from the turf and affect water quality.

The firm found that artificial grass blades reached 156 degrees on a hot summer day, but the air two feet above the field was only one to thee degrees above the air temperature. The firm noted that artificial fields are not usually played on in the middle of summer.

The firm also tested levels of toxic chemicals benzothiazole and 4-tert-octylphenol and found “no detectable concentrations of either compound.” It also found only “a very low concentration” of volatile nitrosamines in one location.

Ms Alderman said Milone & MacBroom should have tested several other compounds, and the firm’s air samplers took in only 75 liters per hour while people breathe in 1,000 liters per hour.

“The samplers were simply too small,” she said.

The firm also found that crushed rubber has the potential to leach metals, but at concentrations under limits established by state environmental regulators.

“From a liability point of view, if I found there was a water problem I’d want to know about it because I’m not about to recommend something I know is bad,” Mr McDermott said.

The state Department of Environmental Protection is planning its own study of synthetic turf fields, and state lawmakers are debating a proposal to ban any new artificial fields until that study is done.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.