NY lawmakers pass ban on coal tar as driveway sealant

oleantimesherald.com ^ | 6/3/21 | Rick Karlin

[AbolishCSEU]

ALBANY (TNS) — Homeowners in a few years could be seeking alternatives when they want to patch or seal their driveways.

Lawmakers this week passed a bill that, if signed by Gov. Andrew Cuomo, would ban the use of coal tar, the dense, acrid-smelling goo that is used in domestic and commercial pavement sealing.

A ban has been discussed for a decade and some municipalities already prohibit its use. Additionally, most highway or road builders have switched to other petroleum-derived products to put down pavement.

But coal tar is still used in driveways and parking lots. Environmentalists say the suspected carcinogen can easily wash off into watersheds, harming aquatic life. It is also harmful to humans who have long-term exposure.

[Red Badger]

What about in Neutrogena T/Gel Extra Strength Therapeutic Shampoo ?...................

[joe fonebone]

Coal tar is also used to treat psoriasis and other skin disorders.
What about them?

[headstamp 2]

Their goes my Ichthamol drawing salve

[oh8eleven]

Coal tar is also used to treat psoriasis and other skin disorders.

Now that you mention it ... maybe 30-35 years ago my dermatologist had me use a coal tar shampoo to rid my scalp of psoriasis.
It worked, but sure did smell like krap.

[PIF]

“Environmentalists say ...” lots of stuff mostly false misleading wrong but politically correct.

[Free in Texas]

They can always use DAP, I guess.

[woodbutcher1963]

I better stock up.
Actually I buy the CVS version.

[woodbutcher1963]

Concrete does not work to well for driveways in New York.
The frost and the rock salt tear it apart.
The freeze, expand frost/thaw cycle breaks it up.

[Albion Wilde]

I remember the acrid smell of the tar-melting kettle trailers that the self-employed roofers wheeled around the old rowhouse neighborhoods in Philly. They would hoist buckets of hot tar up two-to-four stories to the flat tarpaper roofs and use a mop to spread it around to seal leaks.

I think this one might have been wood-fired:

[JohnBovenmyer]

>real world practical exposure

'Coal tar' is commonly used in OTC daily shampoos. Used to be very widely used to treat numerous skin rashes. Still is widely available as a cheap, sometimes effective psoriasis treatment. With well over a century of Dermatologic usage the cancer risk from the somewhat 'purified' coal tar products normally used today is generally summarized as zilch. Older, more concentrated, less 'purified' coal tar topicals were held to be more effective 'back in the day,' but have mostly been replaced with topical steroids and other newer, more expensive alternatives. There are thousands, if not tens of thousands, of chemicals present in any 'coal tar' product so they can't be precisely characterized.

Not that Dermatologists deny that some hydrocarbons present in some coal tar products, as well as many other incompletely burnt items (soot, barbecued meat, etc.) can sometime cause cancer. We should remember and honor Percival Pott for his discovery of scrotal cancers in London's chimney sweeps, the first identified environmental cancer cause.

[woodbutcher1963]

True dat. NY is really turning into the northeast version of California. Next thing they will probably ban will be 2 cycle engines.

[immadashell]

Next thing they will probably ban will be 2 cycle engines.

I think they already have with jet skis.

[Cold Heart]

I have access to some low priced bulk molasses.

[Chode]

popping tar bubbles with yer toes...

[KC Burke]

Many on the thread are confusing coal tar and coal tar pitch with asphalt (and asphalt bitumen). Most road and lot paving that is not Portman cement concrete is asphaltic concrete, a flexible pavement more suited to rolling loads. Asphaltic concrete pavement is asphaltic bitumen, sand and fine aggregate gravel mixed, heated and laid with a paving machine in layers.

In road repair sometimes a material called coal tar pitch is heated and poured into cracks where it’s adhesive, self-leveling and moisture sealing properties repair cracks either for minor repairs or sometimes in preparation for overlays.

Likewise asphalt or coal tar pitch are two different types of materials used in built up roofing. Coal tar pitch roofs are somewhat pricey but self-healing premium systems compared to four-ply asphaltic-felt roofing — the normal built-up roofing.

Coal tar pitch heated in a pitch pot stinks.

[joe fonebone]

My psoriasis was terrible... My back looked like a piece of raw meat.... the coal tar helped a great deal...
But, I did ruin tons of t shirts and bed sheets....

[suthener]

“Traveling gypsys most affected.”

Where do you live where you know about the driveway gypsies? We have a bunch of them that spend the winters in Mobile, Al. then go north for the summer.

[Right Brigade]

the gravel will stay put longer with a good tar base beneath it.

"Once there were parking lots

Now it's a peaceful oasis

you got it, you got it"

[bgill]

Japan is turning food scraps into concrete building materials.

[Wuli]

“We should remember and honor Percival Pott for his discovery of scrotal cancers in London’s chimney sweeps, the first identified environmental cancer cause.”

i.e. degree and type of exposure plus general personal hygiene when ANYTHING foreign is encountered

The question IS NOT “can” some substances be carcinogenic to biological life the TRUE question is what frequency at what level of exposure does something become for sure carcinogenic, and the scientific answer is rarely ANY exposure at all even just once!!!!!