Know what is in your environment

October 29, 2009

What are our typical findings from an in-home inspection?

Filed under: About the business, News — Tags: , , , , — Seth Goldberg @ 8:26 am

If you are concerned about your personal environment, you may wonder what potentially harmful items are in my home?  What harmful toxic elements are present?  Making our personal environment safe is the ultimate goal of ESSCO – Safety Check. 

Over the past two-years Environmental Services & Solutions Corporation (ESSCO) has preformed thousands of tests on consumer products for families and businesses using X-Ray Fluorescence (XRF) Analyzers, specifically looking for heavy metals such as lead, cadmium, arsenic and mercury.   While providing these testing services to moms and dads, toy stores, manufacturers, importers and industries, we collected data.  

Our data includes what type of product it is, if the product is new or used, what surface coating or substrate is present, and how the product is utilized.  Now we want to share this data to help inform the public of what is in their personal environment.

We know that consumer products contain a wide variety of heavy metals.  Here is data from 8000 tests of consumer products:

1. Total lead content over 300 parts per million (PPM) which is the current federal regulation for children’s products, in 6.81% of all tests.
2. Cadmium content over 40 PPM (a level that was part of the Washington State Children’s Safe Products Act) was found in 3.64% of all tests.
3. In general, used products versus new products were found to contain higher quantities of lead (10.15% v. 4.42%) and children’s products were found to have below average levels of total lead content (4.05% over 300 PPM).
4. However 16.27% of mouthable products (products that children put in their mouths) were found to contain lead in excess of 300 PPM.
5. Of all defined substrates: Ceramics were found to contain lead and cadmium most often. 31.02% of tests on ceramics were found with lead in excess of 300 PPM and 12.03% with cadmium above 40 PPM.

It appears that the products we cook with, eat off of, drink out of and wear have more metals than the average toy.  Although toys have a more direct relationship to children, children can still be exposed to potentially harmful metals in everyday consumer products found around the home, especially in the kitchen. 

Knowledge is the key, know what is in your environment and mitigate potential harm.

October 28, 2009

What is a typical in-home inspection like

Filed under: About the business — Tags: , , , , — Seth Goldberg @ 9:46 am

You may be wondering, how do we do our inspections?  What is a typical inspection?  What do we normally test?  Well, being a mobile testing company that specializes in consumer product, we come to your home or business and do the testing right on the spot.  All inspections are personalized to the specifications and concerns of the customer. 

A typical in home inspection is where we come to your home and test any items you would like tested, with our XRF analyzers and inform you of their elemental makeup.  We like to test the items that have a direct relationship to you and your family, specifically things you use on a regular basis.  Items in your home that you don’t come in contact with on a regular basis, such as a picture frame on your wall, offer limited toxic exposure potential and we typically don’t test them unless they are painted and the paint is cracking.  However, the toys your children play with, the plates you eat off of, the jewelry you wear all have a direct relationship with you and thus a correlation to your personal environment. 

In a normal inspection, we will let you identify the items you want tested, but will of course give you some thoughts and suggestions as to what items we have noticed potentially certain harmful elements, from prior experience.  While testing, we will answer any questions you may have about what we are doing, the results, what they mean, how the XRF analyzer works, the regulations, etc.  We will not tell you what to do with any item, but will give you suggestions as to what we may do with that item if it was ours. 

Testing is fairly straightforward, items are identified, with the analyzer pressed against the item in the specific area that you want tested it is as simple as point and click.  We use and combine information from a digital camera, a laptop and a software platform we developed to collect data, analyze the spectrum and do report generation capabilities. 

While the XRF Analyzer is testing, we take a digital photography of the item and write some identifying information about the item in our computer program.   All of this testing and data collection takes approximately one minute per test.  

After all testing is complete; we simply merge all the information with our software program and create an inspection file.  We provide you with a link to download our software online and will email your this inspection file and instructions on how our software works.  With our software you have access to the spectrograph and all merged data, the ability to print PDFs about every item tested or export data to an excel file.

Our typical in-home inspections are between 2 and 3 hours long, but some inspections have been as short as 30 minutes or several days long.  It is up to you and the amount of information you would like to know about your environment.

Why We Started The Business

Filed under: About the business — Tags: , , , , — Seth Goldberg @ 8:07 am

Have you ever wondered if what your children are playing with is safe?  Have you ever considered what consumer products are made of?  I can honestly say that I never really gave much thought to those simple questions until the September of 2007.  My brother asked me a question, would I be interested in helping people know what is in their environment, educating them on their surroundings and providing information. 
 
When my brother first was introduced to the use of XRF analyzer technology, he was so impressed with the technology that he asked the demonstrator to come to his home to test his children’s toys and consumer products for potential toxins.  Unfortunately, at the time, this individual representing an advocacy groups said he could not test his home, and when he was asked if there was a local company who could come to his home and provide this essential, non-destructive testing, this gentleman didn’t know of any such company. 
 
I received a phone call from my brother a few hours later asking if I wanted to change my life and help people know what was in their environment. 

We formed Environmental Services & Solutions Corporation within a few weeks and began to help people and businesses, know what is in their environment.  This would be my first effort at a socially rewarding business.  Within a month or two of this life changing decision and direction, there were all those toy recalls for lead (Mattel, Fisher Price, etc).  And more immediately within my own family, my little nephew, who was not even one year old yet, tested positive for a small amount of lead in his blood. 
 
By using the XRF analyzer, my brother was capable of identifying one specific item which his body came in direct contact with.  The likely culprit to giving my nephew a little lead, was a Bumbo seat (a polyurethane seat a baby can sit in on the floor and wiggle around in but not get out of), specifically a yellow Bumbo seat.  This one item contained approximately 2000 parts per million (PPM) of lead and my nephew would sit in it in a diaper and chew on the sides of the seat.
 
We simply started this company to help other families and businesses reduce their potential toxic exposure with the simple use of technology.  Our belief, if we help reduce toxic exposure we are thus creating a healthier environment.  If you live in a healthier environment, and one specifically with reduced lead exposure there are tremendous health and intellectual benefits (among others such as reduced criminal activity).  If we have a society that is healthier and more intellectual, public dollars could be diverted from healthcare to other social issues.  Thus, a snowball rolling downhill helping to create a positive wave and a better society, improving lives and creating jobs. 

October 27, 2009

Who we are – Environmental Epidemiolgists

Filed under: About the business — Tags: , , , — Seth Goldberg @ 9:34 am

When people think of testing, they most likely envision a laboratory, white lab coats and a sterile environment.  We are not such a company.  Environmental Services & Solutions Corporation (Essco – Safety Check) is a leader in mobile X-Ray Fluorescence (XRF) testing services, we specialize in helping people and businesses know what is in their environment.   We use technology to identify potentially harmful elements within consumer products and other materials and we can identify such elements as lead, cadmium, arsenic, mercury, many other, as well as identify Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC).

We started this company (in 2007) to help share information with parents, concerned individuals and businesses by helping them identify potentially harmful consumer products with the use of laboratory-grade, handheld, X-ray Fluorescence (XRF) analyzers.  Our goal is to provide quality elemental information, fast and efficiently all while being cost effective and scientifically accurate.  With this knowledge, people and businesses can make educated decisions as to what they are exposed to or the products they are selling.

What we do is work directly with the consumer in one-on-one in-home inspections or in larger group settings such as toy testing parties and community events; we can test toys, ceramics, jewelry, virtually any consumer product (non-destructively).   We can work with retailers and businesses to test products; and, we can work in industrial settings, manufactures, ports of call and on the proactive side to maintain machines to ensure when parts need replacing prior to them failing.

Our testing is not done in the laboratory, each location becomes our laboratory. Essco -Safety Check uses XRF Analyzers, along with sophisticated proprietary software, photography and meta-data collection to provide elemental information and report generation capabilities of virtually anything.  Essentially, we simply select our item to be tested and point and click with our analyzer.  We let the analyzer do its job and then we provide this information in an easy to use format, digitally to the end user. 

We are a family who simply wishes to help people and businesses understand their environment and help to reduce potential toxic exposure with the use of technology and information.  If you are an informed consumer, you can make the educated decisions in your life as to what your child plays with, what you and your family eat off of, what you wear as jewelry or interact with on a daily basis.  We hope to work more with manufactures rather than the end consumer, helping to reduce the amount of toxic items that reach the shelves.

We have become environmental epidemiologists and forensic elemental specialists!

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