Hazard assessment of chemicals, vol. 8

Hazard assessment of chemicals, vol. 8

628 thermore, several other chapters in Vol. 5 were more a p p r o p r i a t e l y called c o n t a m i n a t i o n control. Certain readers will be ...

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thermore, several other chapters in Vol. 5 were more a p p r o p r i a t e l y called c o n t a m i n a t i o n control. Certain readers will be disappointed in finding r e l i a n c e upon nonmetric units throughout the two volumes and overreliance on U.S. laws making various chapters less than useful to an international audience of environmental scientists and engineers. The authors are overwhelmingly well known in their respective fields and speak with the voice of experience. These volumes are recommended as a library reference for U.S. libraries.

Environmental Health Engineering in the Tropics, An Introductory Text. Sandy Caairncross and Richard Feachem. John Wiley & Sons, New York, NY: 1993. 306 pp. (ISBN 000 471 93885 8) $37.95 softcover. This is the second edition of the book published in 1981 and contains several revisions. The book describes control measures against diseases common to a number of tropical and developing countries. It identifies drinking water supply and disposal of human excretion as major environmental media requiring attention. It provides engineering measures for treatment of these media suitable for tropical and developing countries. The book is intended for both engineers and public health officials including the medical profession. This book is recommended as a desk copy and as a library reference.

Global Accord, Environmental Challenges and lnternational Responses. Nazli Choucri, ed. The MIT Press, Cambridge, MA; 1993. 562 pp. (ISBN 0-262-032007) $50.00 hardcover. This volume addresses environmental protection as a geopolitical issue. A scientifically trained reader will find the writing too extensive for its content. Much of the writing is in the style of a personal view rather than a dispassionate description of the subject common to scientific writing. Despite this shortcoming, the book contains highly relevant subjects and provides a perspective to scientists that is not mormally provided to the environmental scientific community.

Groundwater Contamination and Analysis at Hazardous Waste Sites. Suzanne Lesage and Richard E. Jackson, eds. Marcel Dekker, Inc., New York, NY; 1992. 545 pp. (ISBN 0-8247-8720-X) $175.00 hardcover. This reference book describes the process of groundwater contamination and the analytical methods for its

Books

evaluation. The information included in this book is largely from the U.S., although Canadian, Australian, and German conditions are also considered. The book relies upon methods mandated or recommended by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and elaborates on their application. The 17 chapters are logically divided into four major sections consisting of analytical methodologies, monitoring strategies, site investigations, and geochemical investigations. This book is recommended as a library reference.

Handbook of Industrial Waste Treatment, Vol. 1. Lawrence K. Wang and Mu Hao Sung Wang, eds. Marcel Dekker, Inc., New York, NY; 1992. 392 pp. (ISBN 0-8247-8716-1) $150.00 hardcover. As the title implies, this is the first volume of an anticipated multi-volume compendium. The current volume contains chapters on waste minimization and storm water treatment. It also contains chapters on treatment of waste resulting from metal plating and finishing, photographic processing, soap and detergent industry wastes, acid pickling of metals, and textile and phosphate wastes. The literature appears to have been covered up to the early 1980s, although some later information is also included.

Harmful Chemical Substances, Vol. 1, Elements in Groups I-IV of the Periodic Table and their Inorganic Compounds. V.A. Filov, A.L. Bandman, and B.A. Ivin, eds. Ellis Horwood/Prentice Hall, West Nyack, NY; 1993. 722 pp. (ISBN 0-13-383373-9) hardcover. This most interesting book is the English translation of the first volume of a multi-volume series of books published by a Russian publisher in St. Petersburg. The Russian version has been revised and updated in the English translation. The book discusses adverse health effects associated with intake of the chemical elements identified in the title along with their compounds. Although the western reader will find that some of their favorite references are not considered in this book, there is a wealth of information heretofore unavailable in the West. Those involved in evaluating risks of exposure to various chemicals will find a great deal of new information in this volume. This book is highly recommended as a library reference.

Hazard Assessment of Chemicals, Vol. 8. Jitendra Saxena, ed. Taylor & Francis, Bristol, PA; 1993. 332 pp. (ISBN 1-56032-271-3) $99.00 hardcover.

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This volume contains six reviews on risk assessment in environmental remediation, data needs for chemical mixtures, risk assessment of essential elements, hazard ranking systems used by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) to prioritize remediation activities, contamination sediments, and monoclonal antibodies and their application in measuring environmenal contamination. The reader will find little relationship amongst these reviews except that they all deal with environment and not necessarily with hazard assessment. Although the articles appear to be well-written, there is no evidence of a peer review. A more appropriate place for these articles would have been in the relevant peer-reviewed journals.

Hazardous Waste Cost Control. Richard A. Self, ed. Marcel Dekker, Inc., New York, Ny; 1993. 276 pp. (ISBN 0-8247-8891-5) $110.00 hardcover. As stated by the editor, this book is written primarily for project managers and cost engineers, although others may also benefit from it. The book is an economics book written with the U.S. regulations in mind. Given the complexity of U.S. regulations, it is not surprising that the reader is occasionally unsure if the authors are talking about hazardous waste as defined by the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act or hazardous materials as described in the Comprehensive Environmental Response and Liability Act. The confusion is confounded by the discrepancy between the title of the book and its contents which deals largely with environmental remediation rather than hazardous waste. The book contains relevant information on engineering economics as related to hazardous waste and environmental remediation. The authors are all known in their respective fields.

Indoor Air Quality & Control. Anthony L. Hines, Tushar K. Ghosh, Sudarshan K. Loyalka, and Richard C. Warder, Jr. Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ; 1993. 340 pp. (ISBN 0-13-463977-4) hardcover. This book presents one of the first attempts to cover indoor air much like any other environmental issue. The various chapters of the book contain information covering essentially every aspect of indoor air. The authors have successfully tried to avoid advocacy and have provided a science-based approach to indoor air quality and its control. The uninitiated reader will be confused with the proliferation of units. For example, the section on radon included Working Level, PCi, and Bq. The problem is, of course,

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endemic in the U.S. The authors could have done a service by using SI units as their primary unit everywhere including when they use ppm and ppb, and, in addition, the common equivalents. The book is highly recommended for practioners of indoor air control.

Landscape Ecology and GIS. Roy Haines-Young, David R. Green, and Stephen H. Cousins, eds. Taylor & Francis, Bristol, PA; 1993.288 pp. (ISBN 0-74840002-8) $79.00 hardcover. According to the editors, the landscape "is the sphere in which a range of processes are active. Landscape ecology aims to focus on the way in which these processes interact, and provide a framework in which human impact on the environment can be understood. From understanding, actions and suitable management strategies can be developed." Until recently, analytical tools were unavailable to answer questions on landscape ecology. The development of geographical information systems (GIS) provides landscape ecologists with a tool to overcome their problems. A workshop held at the University of Nottingham in January 1984 provides the core of this book. However, additional authors were invited to contribute. The five sections of the book contain 19 papers.

Large Marine Ecosystems, Stress, Mitigation, and Sustainability. Kenneth Sherman, Lewis M. Alexander, and Barry D. Gold, eds. AAAS Press, Washington, DC; 1993. 376 pp. (ISBN 0-87168-506-X) $46.95 softcover. This volume contains the proceedings of a symposium which was held in 1990 in Monaco. The presented papers cover a variety of areas of marine ecosystems. The authors range from highly respected scientists to those with political backgrounds. Like most other proceedings, the scientific quality of various papers must be judged on a case by case basis and ranges from exceptionally high to purely administrative/political in nature.

Perspectives on Biodiversity. Case Studies of Genetic Resource Conservation and Development. Christopher S. Potter, Joel I. Cohen, Dianne Janczewski, eds. AAAS Press, Washington, DC; 1993. 248 pp. (ISBN 0-87168-512-4) $34.95 softcover. This volume is the result of efforts of several fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science who were assigned to a variety of