BPA in paper compost sources

A few weeks ago I was reading Slow Death by Rubber Duck by Rick Smith, Bruce Lourie
One troubling point they bring up is the prevalence of BPA in non-plastics. Given the popularity of cardboard mulching, and the essential nature of 'brown material' in vemicomposting, I thought I would share:

All the more reason to use slow, cool fungal composting instead of hot bacterial composting. Bisphenol A looks like lunch to almost any fungus hungry for a meal.

"Elimination of endocrine disrupting chemicals nonylphenol and bisphenol A and personal care product ingredient triclosan using enzyme preparation from the white rot fungus Coriolopsis polyzona"
(and a 2013 followup: Elimination of Bisphenol A and Triclosan Using the Enzymatic System of Autochthonous Colombian Forest FungiElimination of Bisphenol A and Triclosan Using the Enzymatic System of Autochthonous Colombian Forest Fungi)

"Biodegradation of dibutylphthalate by white rot fungi" "and evaluation on its estrogenic activity"

some related reading

Nice find, Rusty!

What about dioxin content of paper?

I've heard that paper contains dioxin, so composting large amounts of it can concentrate it.

Johnny Niamert wrote:What about dioxin content of paper?... composting large amounts of it can concentrate it.

Sanro Tachibana, Yukinori Kiyota and Michifusa Koga, 2007. Bioremediation of Dioxin-Contaminated Soil by Fungi Screened from Nature. Pakistan Journal of Biological Sciences, 10: 486-491.
abstract, emphasis mine:
"To degrade dioxins in contaminated soil, bioremediation was conducted with two fungi (PL1 and 267) screened from nature. A comparison of the concentration of dioxins (Toxicity equivalent quantity) before and after the bioremediation revealed 20 to 90% of dioxins in the soil to be degraded in 15 and 30 days, respectively. Maximum degradation (90%) was obtained with PL1 after 30 days in the presence of 0.1% surfactant. "

Degradation of polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins and polychlorinated dibenzofurans by the white rot fungus Phanerochaete sordida YK-624.
Be sure to skim the related article titles on the right.

In short, the advocates of mycoremediation acknowledge that fungi have the ability/tendency to chemically alter the molecule, something that may not happen with 'hot' composting (thanks for the phrase, John Elliott)

Nice work Rusty,

I had know that receipts were more plastic than paper and avoided them in my compost. I didn't know the plastic coating used the plasticizer BPA. I was also thinking along the same lines that good fungal remediation should degrade the plasticizers. Good reference finds too.

Brett Andrzejewski wrote:...Good reference finds too.

To quote a friend from another forum:

"Without documentation, you're just another person with an opinion."

This is the model I subscribe to fervently. Agri/ecology are sciences, and rely on specific metrics, so I'm always looking for those in new ideas and established practices. Makes the conversation easier, leaves less to question

Rusty Shackleford wrote:A few weeks ago I was reading Slow Death by Rubber Duck by Rick Smith, Bruce Lourie
One troubling point they bring up is the prevalence of BPA in non-plastics. Given the popularity of cardboard mulching, and the essential nature of 'brown material' in vemicomposting, I thought I would share:

that is a very eye opening book! However, I'd be more worried about avoiding the receipt paper itself. I'm just remembering being a sandwich shop cashier in high school here, and all of that paper I handled.

Who even knows if plants uptake BPA? Or if it's bio-magnified up the food chain?

The single biggest thing you can do to avoid it is avoid caned food and drink, as it lines almost every aluminum/tin can out there.

drake schutt wrote:...
Who even knows if plants uptake BPA? Or if it's bio-magnified up the food chain?

one source from last year: Uptake and accumulation of four PPCP/EDCs in two leafy vegetables.
Dodgen LK1, Li J, Parker D, Gan JJ.

Abstract
Many pharmaceutical and personal care products (PPCPs) and endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) are present in reclaimed water, leading to concerns of human health risks from the consumption of food crops irrigated with reclaimed water. This study evaluated the potential for plant uptake and accumulation of four commonly occurring PPCP/EDCs, i.e., bisphenol A (BPA), diclofenac sodium (DCL), naproxen (NPX), and 4-nonylphenol (NP), by lettuce (Lactuca sativa) and collards (Brassica oleracea) in hydroponic culture, using (14)C-labeled compounds. In both plant species, plant accumulation followed the order of BPA > NP > DCL > NPX and accumulation in roots was much greater than in leaves and stems. Concentrations of (14)C-PPCP/EDCs in plant tissues ranged from 0.22 ± 0.03 to 927 ± 213 ng/g, but nearly all (14)C-residue was non-extractable. PPCP/EDCs, particularly BPA and NP, were also extensively transformed in the nutrient solution. Dietary uptake of these PPCP/EDCs by humans was predicted to be negligible.

source: Environ Pollut. 2013 Nov;182:150-6. doi: 10.1016/j.envpol.2013.06.038. Epub 2013 Jul 31

This question posed by William Van Cotthem is an extended dicussion about a post from his own blog. A followup post can be found here.

A key point, IMO:

John Chater · University of California, Riverside ...
BPA is a relatively large (and nonpolar) molecule compared to the ions that plants typically take up (K+, N03-, Mg++, ect.), so I do not think that the plant will take up the BPA (which has two phenol groups in the structure), so there is theoretically no way for the soil's BPA to get into the crop. Which crops are you interested in?

Remember, all materials need to pass through the Casparian strip in order to make through the root's endodermis and into the vasculature. [emphasis mine]

I was reading an article about a week or so ago about BPA. It turns out, all the BPA free containers replaced BPA with BPS, which is apparently not any healthier than BPA. Must have been a marketing ploy to get us all to buy new containers. . .

Anyway, I was thinking this morning that if BPA leaches out of plastic containers, then surely there is a point at which the BPA is leached out, or at least is only left in insignificant amounts. If that is indeed so, then all of my old plastic containers should be safer than any of the new ones. . .

By the way, I too, started reading Slow death by Rubber Duck some time ago. I had to put it down as our exposure to bad things seemed so pervasive that there was nothing we could do to eliminate it, which was depressing.