Community Health
Community Health
Community health is our first priority.
Nearby residents report health complaints including but not limited to headaches, respiratory and gastrointestinal symptoms from exposure to chemicals at the Chiquita Canyon Landfill. Health impacts from odors and air pollution can vary, depending on a person’s sensitivity and extent of exposure. Sensitive individuals include children, seniors or those with chronic health conditions.
Frequent air monitoring is ongoing to identify chemicals that may be causing health effects. Results are being analyzed and compared to health guidance values meant to protect the public from health effects. Dangerous levels of chemicals posing an immediate health threat have not been identified in public areas using the available monitoring data. However, there is uncertainty regarding how persistent exposures to odor chemicals may affect health over time, and monitoring is continuing to determine if there are low level ongoing exposures to these and other landfill chemicals that may pose risks.
Environmental Odors and Your Health
Environmental odors can sometimes trigger physical health symptoms that are generally expected to go away when the odor is gone. Persistent exposure to environmental odors could cause persistent and continuing symptoms, even when chemicals are present below state and federal guidance levels.
Common symptoms from environmental odors include:
- Headache
- Dizziness
- Nausea and other gastrointestinal symptoms
- Eye, nose and throat irritation
- Cough or wheeze (especially if you have allergies, asthma, or other lung problems)
- Sleep problems
In addition, people may experience mental stress from persistent exposure to environmental odors, including anxiety, helplessness, sadness or depression. These symptoms may be triggered when odors are below irritation levels, especially if:
- The odor has an unpleasant smell.
- You’ve had a previous bad experience with the odor.
- You believe the odor is harmful.
- You feel stressed by the odor.
Other factors, such as seasonal allergies or a difficult life event, may also contribute to these physical and mental symptoms. Also, exposure to odors and air pollutants may worsen or intensify symptoms. As always, you should visit your healthcare provider if you have questions about your health.
For more information, visit the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry’s Are Environmental Odors Toxic? (cdc.gov).
Health Guidance Values
At this time, air monitoring websites provide real-time or hourly air concentration data. These concentrations can be compared to short-term (acute) health guidance values. This includes acute Reference Exposure Level (REL) values for air concentrations developed by the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) of the California Environmental Protection Agency (CalEPA).
At and below Acute RELs, we do not expect health risks from acute exposure. Thus, one-hour average concentrations from air sampling results are compared to the one-hour acute RELs to evaluate whether there is a harmful peak in exposure.
Acute RELs include conservative adjustments or built-in “safety cushions” to account for unknown information about a chemical and variations in people’s sensitivity to exposures, so exposures above the acute REL do not necessarily cause health problems.
To evaluate persistent exposures over time, chronic REL’s are used. Recent data have not indicated exposures above chronic RELs, however there is some uncertainty, generally because not all monitored chemicals have a chronic REL.
Reducing Your Exposure
Steps to maintain healthy indoor air:
- Portable air cleaners with an activated carbon filter can help to remove gases and odors, while a high efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filter remove particles such as dust and pollen. Some portable air cleaners can filter both particles and gases.
- Air filters with large amounts of activated carbon help remove benzene and other volatile organic compounds as well as odors.
- Additional odor-reducing filters, such as those with potassium permanganate, are recommended to further remove odorous gases.
- Additional odor-reducing filters, such as those with potassium permanganate, are recommended to further remove odorous gases.
- All filters need regular replacement. Check filters and air cleaners at least once a month for odors, dust accumulation, and damage.
- Air cleaning devices should be certified by the California Air Resources Board for electrical safety and to minimize ozone generation indoors.
- Air cleaning devices should be properly sized for the space where they are used, based on the clean air delivery rate (CADR) or other metric that describes the area or volume the device is rated for.
Air Monitoring
Air quality monitoring is happening to gain insight into potential community impacts over the short- and long-term and inform advisories and actions to protect public health. Since 2022, SCS Engineers (one of the landfill's contractors) has been operating a network of 12 air-monitoring stations (MS), five around the Chiquita Canyon Landfill perimeter (MS-01 through MS-05) and seven throughout the community surrounding the landfill (MS-06 through MS-12) (see figure above for details).
This network has been designed to cover the area most impacted by landfill emissions. At each station, air pollution measurements are gathered using equipment to monitor hydrogen sulfide, methane and wind information hourly (every hour) and in near real time (data is posted on a dedicated website shortly after collection).
In May 2024, specialized monitors were also installed at the MS-10 (Hasley Canyon Park) and MS-12 (Val Verde Community) stations to measure hourly concentrations of benzene and other volatile organic compounds (VOCs). More of these VOC monitors are expected to be deployed at other community sites later this year.
For more information and up-to-date hydrogen sulfide and methane data at all community sites, please visit Community Air Monitoring Program.
For more information and up-to-date VOC data (including benzene) at the MS-10 and MS-12 sites, please visit Chiquita Canyon Landfill Community Air Monitoring Program.
It is important to note that people react to chemicals differently, and even without exceedances, physical symptoms can be triggered.
Water Monitoring
Public water systems are required to monitor raw and finished water as required by their permit and by California’s Safe Drinking Water Act. At this time, there is no indication that drinking water supplies have been affected by the ongoing situation at the Chiquita Canyon Landfill.
The Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board required the landfill to install additional monitoring wells and has increased the frequency of testing around the landfill. If testing shows that contamination is migrating offsite, the regional board will coordinate with the appropriate state and local agencies to increase monitoring frequencies for any vulnerable drinking water sources.
If you own a private domestic well not regulated by the State Water Resources Control Board’s Division of Drinking Water, you can refer to “A Guide for Private Domestic Well Owners” (ca.gov). If you wish to test your well, the following link provides access to a geographic information system (GIS) application that enables users to locate the State Water Resources Control Board’s Environmental Laboratory Accreditation Program (ELAP) accredited laboratories: California ELAP Certified Laboratories (arcgis.com).
Learn more:
- Water quality results from groundwater monitoring wells is available at Groundwater Ambient Monitoring and Assessment (GAMA) Groundwater (ca.gov).
- The System Area Boundary Layer (SABL) Look-up Tool (ca.gov) enables people to locate their location on a map and identify the service area boundary that provides their water.
