How Does (CTS) Affect Our Environment?

Research has shown that coal tar sealed parking lots are shedding tiny bits of the material, which is washed by rain into nearby waterways – killing, sickening and maiming aquatic creatures such as salamanders, minnows and, importantly, bugs at the base of the food chain. The chemicals kill tadpoles, cause tumors on fish, stunt growth of aquatic creatures and reduce the number of species able to live in a waterway.
As a result of being washed into waterways by storm water, these chemicals’ concentrations have been rising over the last two decades, and chemicals are getting into the house dust, researchers think, when small bits are eroded off pavement and tracked into nearby homes.

 Children are at Risk from (CTS)

Scientists have demonstrated that toxic elements of coal tar were showing up in the dust of homes next to parking lots and driveways, raising questions about health effects on children in those homes, especially toddlers who frequently put their hands in their mouths. Coal tar is known to cause cancer in humans, as well as genetic mutations in lab animals.
One of the new studies helps quantify that risk. Kids who are average in terms of how often they put their hands into their mouths are getting 2 ½ times as many PAHs from house dust as from food, while those in the 95th percentile of hand-to-mouth behavior – they do it more than 94 percent of other kids – get 9 ½ times as much from the dust.
Researchers still would like to know how much of a toxic dose those same kids are getting when they play outside in yards next to coal tar-sealed asphalt, or on the asphalt itself. The level of cancer-causing chemicals in the dust on the asphalt itself has been measured at about 37 times the levels found in house dust.