PBB: AN ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTER

Corbett details a little-known environmental disaster in this nonfiction work.

The author looks back at the contamination of land, animals, and humans by toxic polybrominated biphenyls in 1970s Michigan. The text takes readers through the history of Michigan—from its geologic development through its human settlement—to establish context, then focuses on some pivotal incidents: The Michigan Chemical Company contaminated the surrounding environment, and PBBs were inadvertently mixed into animal feed, spreading the toxins to chickens and cows and their milk, eggs, and meat, which were consumed throughout the region and led to a host of medical problems. The initial contamination was compounded by a refusal by people in authority at various government agencies to take the problem seriously, allowing the PBBs to spread throughout the state for several years. In the final chapters, the book takes a broader look at environmental toxins and their effects on the body, placing the PBB contamination into the larger context of harmful chemicals people have been exposed to. The author, who was one of the scientists raising the alarm about PBBs and investigating the Michigan contamination, describes his own involvement in the third person, which reads a bit awkwardly but allows the book to maintain a journalistic perspective. The narrative is a compelling blend of neutrally presented background information combined with a factual but impassioned detailing of the PBB case that goes into detail about the lives of everyone involved and has little patience for the official incompetence, disengagement, and denial that prevented the problem from being managed safely (“Had the incident been investigated by competent, intellectually honest people initially, the contaminant and its source would have been identified and eliminated in the fall of 1973”). Corbett combines an advocate’s perspective with a measured authorial voice, resulting in an engaging look at a largely unknown environmental catastrophe.

A well-written and informative slice of scientific history.