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A leading kitchen and bathroom benchtop company will stop using high-silica engineered stone, because of the material’s link with incurable lung disease.
AGB Stone is New Zealand’s biggest fabricator of engineered stone benchtops, with more than 130 people working across six factories.
Owners Cam and Christine Paranthoiene have announced the company will phase out the use of engineered stone with a content of more than 40 per cent silica.
“It is the single most effective and easiest thing that any fabricator can do to step change the risk of silicosis. We now have a viable alternative, so it’s time everyone in the industry made the change,” Cam Paranthoiene said.
Prolonged exposure to dust created when engineered stone is dry-cut can cause silicosis, a sometimes fatal disease that scars the lungs and makes it difficult to take in oxygen. Absorbed dust can cause other diseases, including lung cancer.
Tradies overseas have died horrible deaths and survivors are often disabled by severe shortness of breath. Other common silicosis symptoms, which don’t appear until after disease develops, include a persistent cough, fatigue and weight loss.
Silica is found in stone, rock, sand, clay and many building materials, but dust from engineered stone is more dagerous, because the man-made products have contained up to 95 per cent silica, compared to 2 to 50 per cent in natural stones.
Sick stonemasons going public – some of whom later died – prompted Australian authorities to move towards banning high-silica engineered stone, and New Zealand could follow suit.
Workers should be protected by strict safety measures, including cutting the stone only when it is wet, to stop dust being created, and powerful ventilation systems.
AGB Stone owners Cam and Christine Paranthoiene have committed to lower-silica engineered stone products.
WorkSafe inspectors have visited the 147 businesses known to fabricate engineered stone (also called artificial stone) and issued notices to 129 of them.
Breaches at 26 businesses were so serious as to warrant a prohibition notice, which shuts down operations until an inspector is satisfied proper changes are made.
Only 140 people have lodged claims for assessment of accelerated silicosis, as of February this year, with 16 accepted. One leading occupational physician estimates there are about 1000 current and former stonemasons at risk.
Engineered stone is not manufactured in New Zealand. Varieties that have a lower silica content – in most cases less than 40 per cent – have been developed recently, as the dangers of silicosis become more widely known and as regulators consider bans on higher-silica products.
Kiwi importers including NZ Panels Group and Laminex NZ have also committed to transitionto the lower-silica products over the next 12 months.
Health experts warn the riskom the lower-silica products aren’t yet well understood, so safety measures and a stronger regulatory response remain vital.
AGB Stone’s low-silica product will be called Better Benchtops, and be progressively phased in from later this year.
Paranthoiene said the shift in silica content, alongside robust safety processes, “will offer peace of mind for our staff and customers”.
The company had already invested in state-of-the-art machinery, he said, and was an early adopter of wet-cutting and air monitoring.
“None of our staff has had issues with silicosis, and we not only monitor the air quality of our factories, but staff have annual on-site lung tests, too.
“We take extra steps to ensure their safety, including overalls going straight from the factory to be laundered so they are never taken home.”
The company had been subject to some improvement notices from WorkSafe, he said.
“They are generally minor and not always associated with silica. We close them out immediately and have no outstanding improvement notices.”
A Weekend Herald investigation published in May revealed gaps in oversight of the industry, with confidential ministerial briefings warning that “significant unmanaged risks to worker health” had been found at some worksites.
WorkSafe will report to the Government on regulatory options by the end of November. That advice will cover the merit of a ban, and some in the industry expect such a step could permit only lower-silica products.
If you can help us shed light on this issue, contact investigative reporter Nicholas Jones by email: nicholas.jones@nzme.co.nz
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Nicholas Jones is an investigative reporter at the New Zealand Herald.He won the best individual investigation and best social issues reporter categories at the 2023 Voyager Media Awards.
