Union Carbide Institute Plant Dust Surveys of J-M Thermobestos Insulation Blocks (1962)

Internal papers of Union Carbide Chemicals Company's Institute plant near Charleston, West Virginia, from March to December 1962, later used as trial exhibits. After band saw operators complained of dust, industrial hygienist Robert E. Peele surveyed the plant's insulation shop and found that cutting J-M's "Thermobestos" blocks "produces a definite atmospheric hazard to health," while cutting Owens-Corning's "Kaylo" blocks did not. The plant medical director, Dr. R. J. Sexton, told the plant manager on March 21, 1962 that Thermobestos dust "presents a very definite hazard to health," that the shop had stopped using it, and that exposed men would get chest X-rays.

What it shows

Peele's report records that a J-M representative said the blocks contained 12 to 15% asbestos, the rest calcium silicate, and measured dust well above the 20 million particles per cubic foot limit he applied. In July 1962 he tested three "new and improved" Thermobestos blocks J-M had supplied and found them better but still releasing "asbestos dust particles" well above the limit. In November three J-M representatives visited, presented J-M laboratory data that did not agree with his, and offered to pay for Peele to visit J-M's Manville, New Jersey laboratory. Sexton wrote on December 4 that J-M was "extremely interested" in having Union Carbide use Thermobestos, and that he did not favor Peele accepting the invitation. The papers show a large customer's own hygienist finding a J-M insulation product hazardous to cut in 1962, and J-M disputing the finding rather than warning of the hazard (compare Dr. Smith's 1959 letter to Detroit Edison on Thermobestos).

In Johns-Manville's chronology

Johns-Manville's own chronology of what the company knew describes this document as follows:

1960-1962 Robert Peele/Union Carbide hygienist says J-M products are dustier than other manufacturer's products and are causing health problems in Union Carbide facilities.

Editor's note: J-M's description dates the matter 1960 to 1962 and says J-M's products were dustier than other manufacturers'. The papers run from November 1961 to December 1962, and they compare J-M's Thermobestos only with Kaylo. They are Union Carbide's own files, not J-M's.