Food Safety

San Francisco's Free "Organic Biosolids Compost" is Toxic Sludge, and Not Good For You!

by John Stauber — August 17, 2010 - 3:01pm
  • Topics: Food Safety, Activism, Sludge, Environment, Health, Science

    • Independent testing commissioned by the Food Rights Network found toxic contaminants in San Francisco's sewage sludge "compost." In the sludge product given away free to gardeners from 2007 to March 4, 2010, are contaminants with endocrine-disruptive properties including PBDE flame retardants, nonylphenol detergent breakdown products, and the antibacterial agent triclosan. The independent tests were conducted for the Food Rights Network by Dr. Robert C. Hale of the Virginia Institute of Marine Sciences.

    Watch a CBS 5 KPIX August 10, 2010 report providing a startling story of how San Francisco is violating its own precautionary principle law by dumping toxic sludge on city gardens.

    Gavin Newsom Hopes to Leave His Sludge in San Francisco

    by John Stauber — July 27, 2010 - 10:39am
  • Topics: Food Safety, Agriculture, Journalism, Sludge, Environment, Ethics, Science

    • Last month, I wrote Chez Sludge, the first inside report on the sewage sludge scandal unfolding in San Francisco, based on internal documents obtained by the Food Rights Network and now online in the Toxic Sludge wiki on SourceWatch.

    San Francisco, under its "green mayor" Gavin Newsom, has since 2007 perpetrated a greenwashing scam upon city gardeners. The city, known for its environmentally sound practices and commitment to a precautionary principle approach to dealing with environmental hazards, has deceptively and fraudulently been giving away free "organic Biosolids compost," that is actually nothing but toxic sewage sludge from San Francisco and eight other counties, "composted" by the giant waste handler Synagro.

    "Giving Up Faith": The EPA, Dispersants, and the Commons in Chains

    by Steve Horn — July 20, 2010 - 10:02pm
  • Topics: Food Safety, Corporations, Environment, Health

    • The great environmental activist Derrick Jensen, in an article titled "Beyond Hope," published in the May/June 2006 issue of Orion Magazine, lamented,

    Gulf Seafood Chemically Tested for Oil, But Not Dispersant

    by Steve Horn — July 15, 2010 - 4:10pm

    Reporter Miriam Wang of the ProPublica blog points out that although seafood from the Gulf has been tested for oil content, testers at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) neglected to test whether the chemical dispersant applied to the oil in the Gulf could be found in the seafood.

    Main Source: 
    Propublica, July 14, 2016

    Can You Be on the Pork Industry's Payroll and Stay Unbiased?

    by Jill Richardson — June 9, 2010 - 12:18pm
  • Topics: Food Safety, Agriculture, Animal Rights

    • Apparently not. Shauna Ahern of the famous Gluten-Free Girl blog is paid to write a blog for the National Pork Board. She just wrote a piece about a factory hog farm she visited and how wonderful it was. Here's an excerpt:

    The entire place felt warm. Even though there were something like 2,500 pigs there, taken from birth to the market (farrow to finish, in pork production terms), the whole place felt calm and well-kept. It felt like a home.

    I've been to a factory hog farm, too, and it was also a "family farm." But that didn't change the fact that there were 4,000 pigs crammed into one building eating unhealthy diets and unable to engage in natural hog behaviors, like rooting. If it felt like a home, it was a home sitting on top of half a year's worth of hog manure.

    Adulteration of Packaged Milk Rampant in Pakistan

    by Anne Landman — May 17, 2010 - 4:42pm

    Frame from video promoting Pakistan's dairy industry Pakistani television ads portray packaged milk as healthful, even sexy, and encourage parents to feed milk to their children, but
    the National Assembly Standing Committee on Human Rights in

    Main Source: 
    Islamabad Frontier Star, May 10, 2010

    Waiter, There Is Toxic Sludge in my Organic Soup!

    by John Stauber — March 16, 2010 - 12:03pm
  • Topics: Food Safety, Agriculture, Sludge, Children

    • (NOTE: Visit the SourceWatch Portal on Toxic Sludge)


    Fifteen years ago, the Center for Media and Democracy in my book Toxic Sludge Is Good for You first exposed the deceptive PR campaign by the municipal sewage industry that has renamed toxic sewage sludge as "biosolids" to be spread on farms and gardens. Unfortunately, the scam continues to fool more people than ever, even in San Francisco which is often dubbed the country's greenest city.

    I suspect that Bay area celebrity chef Alice Waters would never dump sewage sludge onto her own organic garden, nor serve food grown in sludge in her world famous natural foods restaurant Chez Panisse. The mission of her Chez Panisse Foundation is to create "edible schoolyards" where kids grow, prepare, and eat food from their own organic gardens. But Francesca Vietor, the new executive director of the Chez Panisse Foundation, is at the same time actively promoting dumping toxic sludge on gardens in her role as Vice President of the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission.

    San Francisco's Toxic Sludge - It's Good for You!

    by John Stauber — February 8, 2010 - 5:26pm

    Fifteen years ago, CMD's book Toxic Sludge Is Good for You! first exposed the hidden government and industry PR campaign greenwashing toxic sewage sludge as "biosolids," an invented PR euphemism use

    Main Source: 
    Organic Consumers Association, February 8, 2010
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