State Methyl Bromide Study Triggers New Concerns

As methyl bromide fumigation hits its peak season in Ventura County’s strawberry fields, a newly released state study fuels concern over the use of the popular but toxic fumigant in Ventura County.

The study, conducted by the state Department of Pesticide Regulation, shows that the agency’s regulations have been insufficient in some cases to protect people who live adjacent to areas where methyl bromide is used.

The agency monitored application of the fumigant on six California farms in December and January. In four of those cases, concentrations of methyl bromide in the air were detected above state health standards.

The study, which was released Friday, has garnered particular interest in Ventura County, where methyl bromide is injected into roughly 4,800 acres of soil each year. Residents of an east Ventura neighborhood whose homes border the fields have complained of being sickened by drifting fumes after summertime applications during the past two years.

The study “certainly lends credence to what those people out there have been telling us,” said Steve Offerman, an aide to County Supervisor Susan K. Lacey.

The supervisor has urged county Agricultural Commissioner Earl McPhail to write more stringent restrictions into methyl bromide permits. McPhail was unavailable for comment Monday.

But state officials were quick to downplay the impact of the study on fumigation of Ventura County fields.

The study, officials said, was conducted to test buffer zones between farm fields and homes during winter months, when weather patterns are more stable and concentrations of methyl bromide in the air would be higher.

Before the study, state pesticide regulation officials had believed that cooler soil temperatures in winter kept much of the gasses from escaping. The study proved otherwise.

But the study should not create undue concern in Ventura County, where the majority of the fumigant is injected into farm fields during August and September, when methyl bromide gases dissipate more quickly in the warmer air and wind, state pesticide officials said.

Such assurances have done little to assuage fears in Ventura County, where residents in east Ventura and Camarillo continue to fight the use of methyl bromide on fields adjacent to their homes.

“Weather conditions may be different,” said Lori Schiraga of the Environmental Defense Center, an environmental advocacy group with offices in Ventura and Santa Barbara. “But given the fact that you were wrong in your assessment in the winter, how do we not know you’re wrong in the summer?”

Depending on how much of the fumigant is being used, state law requires a minimum of a 30-foot buffer zone between the edge of a farm field and nearby residential areas.

The study found that during winter months standard buffer zones are not wide enough to protect people from a new application technique where methyl bromide gas is pumped through a drip irrigation system. In the wake of the study, state officials immediately required buffer zones of between half a mile and a mile for the so-called “hot-gas” method.

The study also found that a method of applying the fumigant by injecting it under a dense plastic tarp--commonly used in Ventura County--allowed fumes in excess of state health standards to drift some 250 feet from the fields and well into nearby residential areas.

“It’s further confirmation that the way they have been conducting business and the means in which they’re protecting the public health is flawed,” said Kert Davies, an analyst with the Environmental Working Group in Washington.

However, Paul H. Gosselin, assistant director of the state’s pesticide regulation agency, said the study results were at times ambiguous and in some cases did not produce sufficient data to draw firm, scientifically based conclusions.

Gosselin added that California’s methyl bromide standards are about 30 times more stringent than federal regulations.

“We are restrictive in this state,” he said.

Still, he said, the agency plans to enlarge buffer zones before allowing fumigation in the winter and will step up its monitoring efforts during the summer.

On July 30, the agency will begin a six-month monitoring program across the state. It will begin in Camarillo, where residents of Lamplighter Mobile Home Estates are fighting the use of methyl bromide on a 90-acre field next to their park.

Agency officials may also conduct a one-day monitoring of a strawberry field off Ramelli Avenue in east Ventura, where residents have appealed a methyl bromide permit to fumigate an 86-acre strawberry field.

Last summer, those living in the neighborhood complained of burning eyes, nausea, dizziness, headaches and extreme weakness.

Meanwhile, the Environmental Working Group will follow behind state pesticide officials and conduct its own monitoring with what it considers to be more sophisticated monitoring techniques.

“We welcome their participation,” Gosselin said. “As long as people use valid scientific protocols, the data should come out the same.”