Is Xtol Significantly Safer Than D-76?

Jaf-Photo · Feb 26, 2014

Photo Engineer said:
Wood ash lye is very friendly to make, but is still lye and as such is very toxic to humans, fish, plants and well, just everything in general! It even makes the water and ground more alkaline.

Just because something is made in a friendly fashion does not make it itself safe. Consider Lye Soap. Made by cooking fat with lye. Great cleanser! Very good for the environment as it uses up lye and fat both. Ruins skin when you bathe with it. Your wife would look like an old crone by the age of 30 if she used it.

So, we use soaps with all kinds of chemical addenda such as TEA which is the alkali in HC110 BTW. Go figure!

PE

Of course, chemists and every other profession will defend the work they do. (I'm a lawyer so you don't have to teach me to suck eggs.)

I still feel that it is very sensible to try to reduce, limit and avoid potentially hazardous chemicals in your home and general living environment.

On another anectdotal note, I have actually splashed mysef with C-41 chemicals. And I can tell you that the warnings about skin sensitation are no joke. Ow and ouch!

Therefore, I do heed chemical cautions and warnings and I treat all my photochems with the utmost care.

(And Scandinavian are holding up nicely, despite the wood ash lye. Thanks for asking, though

Roger Cole · Feb 26, 2014

Sheesh. I gave up after a few pages.

In a word: no.

They're both innocuous (to you, not speaking of the environment, but don't dump either in a trout stream!) given just a modicum of care.

Maris · Feb 26, 2014

A person who works a lot in my darkroom is a major figure in AESSRA Inc. In full the name reads Allergy and Environmental Sensitivity Support and Research Association Inc. This group helps many Australians whose lives are devastated by multiple allergies and chemical sensitivities.

The person I refer to has a HEPA filtered "safe room", an oxygen cylinder nearby, and a formal emergency procedure organised in the case of anaphylaxis. This same person has used Xtol and Dektol for years with no health consequences whatsoever. The only change needed in the darkroom is the replacement of ordinary stop bath and fixer by their odourless equivalents.

Sal Santamaura · Feb 26, 2014

RattyMouse said:
...Inside the house I have two very large and very expensive HEPA air filters going round the clock. At least at home I have decent air...

I applaud your efforts to keep the children safe. Let's hope they get a chance to go out of your house once in a while.

It seems that China has latched onto PM2.5 as the be-all and end-all of air quality metrics, probably since Shanghai's "air" is so laden with it that other pollutants pale in comparison. Nonetheless, I'd also be concerned about gaseous pollutants that aren't susceptible to HEPA remediation.

Speaking of your HEPA filters, by definition they're good down to 0.3 microns. Unfortunately, depending on the type of coal being burned, a substantial percentage of the "air" they're filtering can get through. See this

http://www.psicorp.com/pdf/library/sr-1001.pdf

for further details. Many PM2.5 particles are apparently between 0.07 and 0.15 microns. These are especially dangerous to health; those smaller than 0.1 micron can pass though lung tissue into the bloodstream, then circulate throughout the body.

Jaf-Photo · Feb 26, 2014

Well, life will eventually kill you. There's not much to be done about that.

In the meantime, limiting the things that could cause impending death, illness or discomfort will go a long way.

cliveh · Feb 26, 2014

Today people are health and safety mad and we live in the nanny state of risk assessment and wrapping everything in cotton wool. When I was a kid I remember playing with globules of mercury on the carpet, when I wasn’t helping my dad saw up sheets of asbestos and I have been sticking my fingers in dev, stop and fix for many years with no adverse effects. Life without risk is not much of a life. Having said that I do realise some photographic chemicals are particularly nasty and carcinogenic and with those I take extreme care. But there is nothing wrong with good old D76.

Roger Cole · Feb 26, 2014

cliveh said:
Today people are health and safety mad and we live in the nanny state of risk assessment and wrapping everything in cotton wool. When I was a kid I remember playing with globules of mercury on the carpet, when I wasnt helping my dad saw up sheets of asbestos and I have been sticking my fingers in dev, stop and fix for many years with no adverse effects. Life without risk is not much of a life. Having said that I do realise some photographic chemicals are particularly nasty and carcinogenic and with those I take extreme care. But there is nothing wrong with good old D76.

This, with a few caveats. Just as I think we are to the point of silliness today in trying to eliminate even tiny risks, we were too cavalier years ago about many things. I remember when almost no one wore a seatbelt and those who did were laughed at, or at least looked at like they had a screw loose. Truth is you can do more to improve your chance of living to a ripe old age by wearing your seatbelt, getting some exercise and eating right than any amount of mitigation of household risks that are tiny in the first place.

Sirius Glass · Feb 26, 2014

cliveh said:
Today people are health and safety mad and we live in the nanny state of risk assessment and wrapping everything in cotton wool.

Since cotton comes from plants and wool comes from sheep, based on your own statement, I cannot trust anything you say. That includes the non-existent nany state that appears in virtually every one of your posts.

Photo Engineer · Feb 26, 2014

One thing that has been ignored here is the Oxygen demand of a chemical. BOD or COD comes from the need to oxidize a substance and degrade it in open air. Both XTOL and D76 are reducing materials with about the same amount of Oxygen demand and alkalinity. Therefore, both will use up Oxygen and produce byproducts such as CO2.

And, BTW, HEPA filters remove particles, not toxic gases and so H2S, SO2, CO2, CO and etc, get through and into the area you are trying to protect.

Last but not least, EDTA, our good old standby in Bleaches and Blixes is classified by some as a toxic substance, but it is used intravenously for heavy metal poisoning, and California has banned even minute quantities of Thiourea, a common photographic chemical, but it is found in abundance in wild flowers growing along the road.

PE

Tom1956 · Feb 26, 2014

:

Photo Engineer said:
One thing that has been ignored here is the Oxygen demand of a chemical. BOD or COD comes from the need to oxidize a substance and degrade it in open air. Both XTOL and D76 are reducing materials with about the same amount of Oxygen demand and alkalinity. Therefore, both will use up Oxygen and produce byproducts such as CO2.

And, BTW, HEPA filters remove particles, not toxic gases and so H2S, SO2, CO2, CO and etc, get through and into the area you are trying to protect.

Last but not least, EDTA, our good old standby in Bleaches and Blixes is classified by some as a toxic substance, but it is used intravenously for heavy metal poisoning, and California has banned even minute quantities of Thiourea, a common photographic chemical, but it is found in abundance in wild flowers growing along the road.

PE

Well that's California for ya. As a printer, do you have the slightest idea how many times I've been forced to scrap perfectly good negatives and plates because the State of California put out a new decree? I can recite it in my sleep: "The State of California has determined that this product contains ingredients that cause cancer and reproductive harm".
And I'm over here 3000 miles away printing labels for things that will never get past the Mississippi river. I'm glad I don't live in California. I'd probably get arrested and thrown in the klink for something I didn't even know was against the law.

RattyMouse · Feb 26, 2014

Sal Santamaura said:
I applaud your efforts to keep the children safe. Let's hope they get a chance to go out of your house once in a while.

It seems that China has latched onto PM2.5 as the be-all and end-all of air quality metrics, probably since Shanghai's "air" is so laden with it that other pollutants pale in comparison. Nonetheless, I'd also be concerned about gaseous pollutants that aren't susceptible to HEPA remediation.

Speaking of your HEPA filters, by definition they're good down to 0.3 microns. Unfortunately, depending on the type of coal being burned, a substantial percentage of the "air" they're filtering can get through. See this

http://www.psicorp.com/pdf/library/sr-1001.pdf

for further details. Many PM2.5 particles are apparently between 0.07 and 0.15 microns. These are especially dangerous to health; those smaller than 0.1 micron can pass though lung tissue into the bloodstream, then circulate throughout the body.

I think the general consensus is that the most damaging particles are the 2.5 micron in size. The reason is that they are able to pass through all the body's filtration defenses in the nose and lodge deep into lung tissue where they remain for a very long period of time (forever)? Particles that pass through lung tissue and enter the blood stream are capable of being filtered out by kidney and liver functions and so are not damaging in the long term. We are talking microgram quantities and less here. Very few toxins are damaging at such a low amount. You can ingest micrograms of sodium cyanide without noticing it.

removed account4 · Feb 26, 2014

hi rattymouse
if you are extremely worried about
toxicity and film developer
you might consider caffenol c
coffee vit c and washing soda ..
mix it fresh before each dev session
no worries avout toxic spill ..
ingredients can be stored
in your kitchen or laundry area or darkroom
you might get baking sosa and purge water out
before use or go to the caffenol blog to see how much ,ore you might need
if you are worried about sodium carbonate being more dangerous than baking soda ..
the main wory with caffenol is some people say it smells bad
and negatives tend to come out very nice ..

have fun
john

dorff · Feb 27, 2014

RattyMouse said:
I think the general consensus is that the most damaging particles are the 2.5 micron in size. The reason is that they are able to pass through all the body's filtration defenses in the nose and lodge deep into lung tissue where they remain for a very long period of time (forever)? Particles that pass through lung tissue and enter the blood stream are capable of being filtered out by kidney and liver functions and so are not damaging in the long term. We are talking microgram quantities and less here. Very few toxins are damaging at such a low amount. You can ingest micrograms of sodium cyanide without noticing it.

You are talking about stable, insoluble particles here, such as carbon (soot), metal oxides such as titanium oxide and alumina, silica etc. None of those materials, bar possibly some pigments, are photographically important, and certainly none of the developers, fixers etc. qualify as such, as they are all soluble. The mechanism whereby sub-micron particles cause health effects is oedema of the lungs, not chemotoxicity. The chemical composition is in fact quite irrelevant, with PTFE and titanium oxide particles giving the same symptoms at the same concentrations.

Is Xtol Significantly Safer Than D-76?

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