The Moscow Times: "7 Reported Killed in Explosion at Ammunition Plant Near Moscow"

The Moscow Times/social media

Via the Moscow Times (and a Google Alert for "chemical plant explosion"): 

Seven people were killed in an explosion at a chemical plant in Russia’s Moscow region, the Telegram news channel Shot reported, as emergency crews responded to a fire at the facility.

The blast hit the Krasnozavodsk Chemical Plant, which produces ammunition and pyrotechnics, according to publicly available information. Authorities had not commented on the incident, and the reported death toll remained unconfirmed.

Shot reported that the seven people were inside workshop No. 4, which collapsed completely. Survivors said more workers had been inside, the channel reported, adding that rescue operations were continuing.

I imagine this was an accidental explosion, but these days, with Ukraine's abilities to penetrate Russia, you never really know...  

National Law Review: "the Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit Vacates EPA’s Methylene Chloride Risk Management Rule"

Via the National Law Review: 

Yesterday, in a much anticipated and long-awaited opinion, the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit vacated and remanded in its entirety the EPA’s risk management rule for methylene chloride and the underlying unreasonable risk determinations, under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA). The Court granted the petition filed by East Fork Enterprises, Epic Paint Company, and the American Chemistry Council and denied the petition filed by the Sierra Club. And by doing so, the Court provides, for the first time since the 2016 TSCA amendments, helpful judicial guardrails as to what is and is not unreasonable risk. 

...EPA will be forced to take this rule and the underlying risk evaluation back to the drafting table. This remarkable opinion will have a profound impact on the regulatory landscape as EPA navigates this new lack of discretion and rejection of core policy positions. Thus, companies should expect significant disruption and delays to EPA actions involving TSCA risk evaluations and risk management rules. 

I was expecting this to come from the EPA itself, but here we are! 

Iran War causes US fluoride shortage

Via a Google Alert I have for "shortage", this news from yesterday:

SHREVEPORT, La. (KSLA) - Shreveport’s water system has been without fluoride for about a week, Mayor Tom Arceneaux said.

City leaders say the shortage stems from a nationwide supply chain issue and is temporary.

I hadn't heard about this, but I found this article from NPR from April of this year: 

...U.S. water systems are facing a shortage of hydrofluorosilicic acid, a chemical used to fluoridate drinking water to prevent cavities and tooth decay.

The specialized chemical is mainly sourced from a small pool of international producers. And the conflict in the Middle East is disrupting the supply chain. Managers of U.S. water systems say the shortage in fluoridation chemicals is unprecedented.

Companies make the acid in large factories, primarily overseas. U.S. suppliers import and deliver the product. The acid arrives at water treatment plants across the U.S. in liquid form, transported in 5,000 gallon tanker trucks. "We don't manufacture it, we don't produce it. All of our chemicals are purchased, and they rely on the supply chain in order to get to our plants," Garbark says.

Israel is one of the world's leading producers of the chemical. "As we understand it, one of the main suppliers in Israel lost a number of employees temporarily, because they've been called up into service in the Israeli military," says Dan Hartnett, chief policy officer at the Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies. "That essentially shut down production at their facility in Israel. They haven't been producing acid. They haven't been able to ship it out."

We've seen supply chains fragment because of war (Ukraine) and disease (COVID.) We'll have to see what happens here and how new suppliers step in to fill the gap. 

"Unknown contaminant" (?) causes nitric acid tank release of NOX in Ohio

Via Ohio TV station WXIX, this chemical news: 

VINTON COUNTY, Ohio (WXIX) - Residents in Vinton County are back in their homes after they were evacuated due to a chemical release at a southeast Ohio explosives manufacturing facility.

Emergency crews issued an evacuation order within a three-mile radius of the Austin Powder Red Diamond Company in McArthur Wednesday morning after a 5,000-gallon tank with nitric acid released 3,000 gallons of nitric oxide into the atmosphere.

According to the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency, an “unknown contaminant entered the nitric acid tank,” causing the chemical reaction to occur.

Although the release was stopped, the lingering chemical plume prompted an evacuation of the small Village of Zaleski and several roads surrounding the Austin Powder Plant. Residents were able to go home at 4:40 p.m.

I too do not know what the contaminant was, but I'm guessing it was water or air. No fun for the local birds for sure. 

Now I've seen it all: NJ municipal workers steal pool chemicals for their own business

Via Patch:

SECAUCUS, NJ — On Tuesday, Secaucus Recreation Department employees John Schwartz, Frank Flanagan, Joseph Ferrara and Megan Wofsy-Flanagan were all arrested by Secaucus Police. All four are accused of stealing chemicals from the town pool and re-using them for their private pool maintenance business.

...Secaucus Police detectives used surveillance and undercover police officers to investigate. Police allege all four stole various pool chemicals purchased by the town and stored at the Secaucus town pool on Koelle Boulevard. Thefts sometimes occurred on a daily basis when these individuals were both on the clock and off the clock of the town’s payroll. They stole chemical amounts valued in the thousands, said police.

They would use the stolen chemicals to service pools for Crystal Clear Pool and Spa Management, said police, charging customers thousands of dollars. These private pools were located in Secaucus, but also in towns in Hudson, Bergen, Morris and Somerset counties. Also, some of these four town employees would work for their private company while getting paid on the clock by the town of Secaucus, allege police and the town.

Read the whole sorry article. I often joke with my management about the difficulty in fencing chemicals, but I guess I was wrong! 

CBS: FDA to review use of azodicarbonamide in bread preparation

Via CBS News, this update: 

The Food and Drug Administration is planning to revisit its approval of the food additive ADA, the agency's top foods official announced Thursday, after longstanding questions over the safety of the so-called "yoga mat" chemical that can be a bread ingredient in the U.S. but is banned in Europe. 

Also called azodicarbonamide, the FDA previously approved ADA's use to whiten cereal flour and improve baking bread dough. 

Advocacy groups have criticized the use of this chemical in food for years, over concerns about its potential health risks. The "yoga mat" nickname comes from ADA's other uses in the manufacturing of plastics and rubbers. 

In Europe, it is illegal to add the ingredient to bread, given the possibility it could result in a possible carcinogen called semicarbazide when it breaks down into other chemicals during bread making. 

I never predicted that Va/ni Har/i would be running the FDA, but here we are. 

Trump Administration gives final federal approval needed for Idaho gold and antimony mine

Via Bloomberg, this news: 

The Trump administration granted the final federal permit for a mine in Idaho that will produce gold and antimony, a critical mineral used in munitions and other applications.

The US Army Corps of Engineers issued the Clean Water Act permit needed for Perpetua Resources Corp.’s Stibnite project in Idaho. The move was facilitated by Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, the chair of the National Energy Dominance Council, according to a statement from his department.

“This mine marks a major step by this administration to secure critical mineral supply chains, reduce reliance on foreign countries, accelerate energy projects, unlock domestic resources, and drive American energy dominance on the global stage,” the department said.

Stibnite was one of 10 mine projects awarded fast-track status in April to speed the approvals process. Others included the Resolution Copper mine in Arizona, owned by Rio Tinto Group and BHP Group.

Perpetua is now focused on securing state permits and financing, the company said in a separate statement Monday. Stibnite can meet about 35% of US antimony demand during the first six years of production, the company estimates. The project is also expected to produce about 450,000 ounces of gold annually during its first four years of output.

 It will be interesting to see how long it takes before this mine actually begins producing antimony...

C&EN on the Iranian port explosion

Credit: Planet Labs PBC via AP

Via C&EN, this story (article by Bethany Halford)

An explosion on April 26 at Iran’s largest port, near the southern city of Bandar Abbas killed at least 70 people and injured more than 1,000, according to Iranian state media.

The Islamic Republic News Agency, a state-run outlet, quotes an official who says containers of chemicals set off the explosion, though they do not specify the chemicals’ identity. The New York Times reports that a person with ties to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, says the explosion was caused by sodium perchlorate—a strong oxidizer that is used as part of rocket fuel.

But that seems unlikely, according to Andrea Sella, a chemist at University College London. Sella says that although sodium perchlorate is a powerful oxidizer, it needs fuel to generate gaseous products that could cause an explosion like the one seen at the Iranian port. “Sodium perchlorate, on its own, to my knowledge, is not explosive and certainly doesn't detonate like that,” he says.

Sella initially thought the material might have been ammonium nitrate because of the intensity of the blast and the orange-brown plume of smoke—a hallmark of nitrogen dioxide from the burning of that bulk commodity chemical—that appears in videos of the incident. But he now suspects that it may have been ammonium perchlorate, a material that’s used as a solid-state propellant for missiles.

The combustion of ammonium perchlorate—a salt that combines the oxidant perchlorate and the reductant ammonium—is quite complex. It produces what Sella calls “a menagerie of gaseous products.” One of those is nitrogen dioxide, which could account for the orange-brown plume. Videos of the early stages of the fire also show black smoke, which Sella says indicates organic material also caught on fire. As the fire intensifies, the flame is a bright orange, which suggests that sodium is present.

A New York Times article says that the Iranian authorities are blaming incorrectly labeled goods. That certainly could be a problem, but I guess I don't understand why someone is shipping (or receiving) perchlorates seemingly without extra care? 

If you get a moment, go to the NYT article to watch the video of the explosion. (scroll down) The initial fire-resulting-in-explosion is both faster and slower than I expected. I'd love to know what actually happened.

NYT: Israeli academics determine gene for producing furanocoumarins in grapefruit

Via the New York Times: 

...High levels of furanocoumarins interfere with human liver enzymes, among other processes. In their presence, medications can build up to unhealthy levels in the body. And grapefruits and some related citrus fruits are full of them.

But there is no such warning for other kinds of citrus, such as mandarins and other oranges. Citrus researchers at the Volcani Center in Israel reported Wednesday in the journal The New Phytologist that, by crossing mandarins and grapefruit, they’ve uncovered genes that produce furanocoumarins in some citrus fruits. It’s a finding that opens the possibility of creating grapefruit that doesn’t require a warning label.

Scientists had worked out the compounds’ structures and pieced together a basic flowchart of how they are made years ago, said Yoram Eyal, a professor at the Volcani Center. But the precise identities of enzymes catalyzing the process — the proteins that snip off a branch here, or add a piece there — remained mysterious. He and his colleagues knew that one way to identify them was to breed citrus high in furanocoumarins with those without. If the offspring of such a cross had varying levels of the substances, it should be possible, by digging into their genetics, to pinpoint the genes for the proteins.

...When they examined the offspring of a mandarin and a grapefruit, the researchers saw something remarkable. Fifty percent of the young plants had high levels of furanocourmains, and 50 percent had none. That particular signature meant something very specific, in terms of how the ability to make these substances is inherited.

“We saw there was only one gene that could have controlled it,” said Livnat Goldenberg, a Volcani Center researcher who is the lead author of the new study.

...The researchers soon identified the gene controlling the production of furanocoumarins in leaves and fruit, which produces an enzyme called 2-oxoglutarate-dependent dioxygenase, or 2OGD for short. Mandarins, it turns out, have a mutated form of this gene that keeps the enzyme from functioning properly. This version cropped up in all the mandarin and orange varieties the researchers checked, explaining why they do not cause the same problems as grapefruit in people taking prescription medications. In these plants, furanocoumarin production is paused.

This is one of those things where 1) it's hilarious that it's taken up to 2025 to determine the gene for furanocoumarin production in grapefruit and 2) it will be really interesting to see if this innovation (pharma-safe grapefruit) is eventually commercialized. 

C&EN on the EPA ban of TCE and PCE:

In C&EN, this news (article by Britt Erickson): 

Most uses of the solvents trichloroethylene (TCE) and perchloroethylene (PCE) will be banned within 1–3 years under final rules released Dec. 9 by the US Environmental Protection Agency. But in response to pushback from some industries, the agency carved out longer phase-out times for certain applications.

The EPA’s crackdown on solvents under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) is part of the agency’s push to finalize proposed regulations before the administration of Donald J. Trump takes over Jan. 20.

TCE and PCE are 2 of the first 10 chemicals the EPA evaluated under the revisions to TSCA made in 2016. The agency proposed restrictions on both of them in 2023. Asbestos and methylene chloride are the only others for which final rules have been released.

TCE was once widely used as a solvent in cleaning products, degreasers, brake cleaners, lubricants, adhesives, coatings, and many other consumer and industrial products. The EPA considers the chemical “extremely toxic” and says it causes liver and kidney cancer, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, and a host of other health effects, even at low concentrations.

The obvious response to this is "I am terribly curious was EPA Administrator-Designate Lee Zeldin has to say about this", so I guess I will go with that. 

WTOL: "Perrysburg High School teacher placed on administrative leave following chemical mix-up in science experiment"

Via WTOL in Toledo, OH: 

PERRYSBURG, Ohio — A Perrysburg High School teacher has been placed on administrative leave following a chemical mix-up in a science class that led to several students experiencing symptoms requiring medical attention.

Perrysburg schools said during an activity Monday, the teacher "mistakenly provided ammonia instead of the intended vinegar for an experiment." The district said this resulted in multiple students "ingesting a small amount of the substance."

According to the district, some of the students experienced symptoms and were evaluated by a school nurse before being advised by Poison Control to seek further medical attention as a precaution.

The teacher has been placed on administrative leave, which I presume will end in their dismissal. I genuinely don't understand how this happened (i.e. why was anything in a chemistry lab ingested?) but I hope we will get some follow up with an answer as to what exactly happened. 

Hydrogen sulfide leak at PEMEX facility kills two last Thursday

Via CNN, this sad news from last week: 

A chemical leak at a PEMEX oil refinery in Deer Park, Texas, on Thursday killed two workers and injured several others, prompting temporary shelter-in-place orders for residents across the city, officials said.

The leak happened around 4:20 p.m., sending hydrogen sulfide – a colorless and potentially toxic gas – seeping into the air at the plant, according to Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez.

Two bodies have been found at the scene and at least 35 others were “triaged,” the sheriff said at a Thursday night news conference. It is unclear how many were treated on-site or brought to a medical facility.

PEMEX, a Mexico-based oil company, said in a statement in Spanish that operations were halted once the leak was detected and local authorities were notified.

Shelter-in-place orders were issued for the city of Deer Park, as well as some residents of neighboring Pasadena, as emergency officials told residents to stay indoors, close all windows and doors, and turn off their air-conditioners. The orders have since been lifted after air monitoring determined no hazardous chemicals had permeated the surrounding community, city officials said.

“We’ve not gotten any air monitoring reports to show that anything has gotten into the community that would be a concern to any constituents in Deer Park,” Deer Park Mayor Jerry Mouton said, noting air monitoring will be ongoing.

Hydrogen sulfide, commonly used in oil and gas refining, has a pungent “rotten egg” smell that may linger in the air, Mouton said.

I wasn't aware that hydrogen sulfide was used in oil and gas refining. CSB is deploying, so I imagine that we will come to understand more (I hope.) 

Janitor death, chemical spill, science building shutdown alarms New Mexico Highlands University

Via a Google News search on chemicals, this sad news from the Las Vegas Optic: 

Concerns about chemicals inside a New Mexico Highlands University science building have heightened following news of the death of a custodian who worked at the facility.

Kathy Jenkins, president of the NMHU Faculty Association and professor of exercise physiology at the university, said in an interview with The Optic on Sept. 21 that the custodian, Martin Lujan, worked at Ivan Hilton Science and Technology Building. 

Ivan Hilton was closed by the city of Las Vegas on Sept. 3 after campus police responded to an initial report of a chemical spill at the building. According to a press release provided by the university on Tuesday, Ivan Hilton was closed on Sept. 3 “as a result of issues with the storage and maintenance of chemicals … and it currently remains closed.”

Lujan passed away on Sept. 14.

Sounds like the chemicals initially involved may have included some biology fixatives (Carosafe, which is mostly propylene glycol and other organic compounds.)  

...Assistant Professor Michael Remke, who teaches courses in forestry and natural resources, said he became ill after working at Ivan Hilton.

“I was going home sick with headaches, with respiratory distress and irritation after smelling fumes while sitting and working in my office,” Remke said on Sept. 19. He said that on Aug. 12 he made a complaint with human resources, filed a formal worker’s compensation claim and filed a claim with the school’s Environmental Health and Safety Office about the symptoms he was having.

Remke said his complaints were not addressed directly; however, a cold room at Ivan Hilton was taped off. 

This cold room – a type of walk-in refrigerator on Ivan Hilton’s first floor – was being used to store chemicals, Remke said. He said it is not typical to store chemicals in a cold room and that such a space is more often used to store specimens and samples.

“I’m suspicious that … some of those chemicals were leaking, they were fuming, and the result was, as the cold room broke and heated up the fumes got really bad,” he said. “The fumes were seeping out of that environment (and) into the hallway on the first floor where they were impacting me in my office.”

Jenkins said she has received a list of chemicals that were found at Ivan Hilton. In an email to officials with AFT New Mexico, a union representing educators, as well as officials with National Education Association New Mexico, Jenkins said some of these chemicals include nitrobenzene, picric acid, radioactive thorium, cyanide and uncontained mercury.

I'm curious which chemicals were in the cold room. It sounds like Ivan Hilton had some chemical storage issues (which is probably true of 30% of American university science buildings.) My condolences to the family of Mr. Lujan. 

There's a glut of old cocoa beans out there

 Via the Financial Times, this important news: 

A frantic hunt by chocolate manufacturers for high-grade cocoa has left a backlog of old, poor-quality beans lying in London’s warehouses, leading to a rare divergence in prices between the UK and the US.

Last month cocoa futures traded in New York rose strongly, peaking above $10,000 last week, while London prices fell, dipping below $6,400 earlier this month. Despite a sell-off in recent days, US prices are down just 3 per cent since the start of last month, compared with a 16 per cent drop for the UK contract.

Cocoa prices on both markets rallied strongly earlier this year, as poor weather and disease decimated crops in Ghana and Ivory Coast, where two-thirds of the world’s cocoa beans are grown, and as hedge funds piled into the market.

But the global shortage has led to a race among cocoa bean processors to secure high-quality beans, while shunning older varieties. Stocks of harvested beans are emptying, with US inventories at 15-year low and warehouses in London the lowest since 2021.

What is left in London is a “poisoned pill”, said Martijn Bron, who was global head of cocoa and chocolate trading for agricultural commodities giant Cargill until 2022.

The UK capital has historically been the market for large-scale purchasers of cocoa. But at the end of August more than one-quarter of the 54,650 metric tonnes of cocoa beans held in the London ICE exchange warehouses was more than three years old, according to exchange data. Moreover, almost 80 per cent of this older stock is bulk-stored beans grown in Cameroon, which is widely viewed in the industry as lower quality for making chocolate.

Never fear, chocolate manufacturers have solutions!: 

...Bigger companies may add a small amount of cheaper Cameroonian cocoa — which, with a better colour than taste, is normally used to make powders rather than chocolate — into a blend, but they are constrained by their own protocols on quality, said Thornton. Smaller or private companies, on the other hand, “have more flexibility to cut costs”, she said.

“This will change the taste, but to be honest, with milk chocolate, by the time you add the sugar and milk, you can almost get away with anything,” said Thornton.

It would be really interesting to understand who buys the lowest quality cocoa beans for their chocolate.

You can buy hydrofluorocarbons on Facebook Marketplace?

Via Bloomberg: 

The Biden administration has launched a new initiative to crack down on smugglers at US borders and ports. The concern isn’t drugs or counterfeit goods, though; it’s a refrigerant that’s also a dangerous greenhouse gas.

The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and other agencies are arming themselves with new weapons — like AI tools that can pick out suspicious shipments — and rethinking ways of teaming up to combat the threat.

...The Biden administration made its first arrest under the law in March, charging a man in San Diego with smuggling HFCs allegedly bought in Mexico into the US. The indictment said Michael Hart concealed the refrigerants under a tarp and tools, then sold them on sites like Facebook Marketplace. The EPA has completed nine civil settlements linked to HFC importation in fiscal 2024, according to the agency.

Sounds like HFCs can fall off the back of a truck sometimes.

Bis(2,2,6,6-tetramethyl-4-piperidyl) sebacate showing up in fentanyl in the United States

Via the Los Angeles Times, this news: 

An industrial chemical used in plastic products has been cropping up in illegal drugs from California to Maine, a sudden and puzzling shift in the drug supply that has alarmed health researchers.

Its name is bis(2,2,6,6-tetramethyl-4-piperidyl) sebacate, commonly abbreviated as BTMPS. The chemical is used in plastic for protection against ultraviolet rays, as well as for other commercial uses.

In an analysis released Monday, researchers from UCLA, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and other academic institutions and harm reduction groups collected and tested more than 170 samples of drugs that had been sold as fentanyl in Los Angeles and Philadelphia this summer. They found roughly a quarter of the drugs contained BTMPS.

Researchers called it the most sudden change in the U.S. illegal drug supply in recent history, based on chemical prevalence. They found that BTMPS sometimes dramatically exceeded the amount of fentanyl in drug samples and, in some cases, had made up more than a third of the drug sample.

It was also a growing presence in fentanyl over the summer: In June, none of the L.A. fentanyl samples tested by the team contained BTMPS, the analysis found. By August, it was detected in 41% of them.

Here's the Medrxiv preprint. I don't think the material is particularly bad for you, but I suspect it's not particularly good for you either (especially if you smoke it.) 

I know this is remarking on criminals being criminals, but it is distressing to me how impure drugs of abuse are, and how the whole supply chain seems to rely on "any old white powder" and so now they're using a random UV stabilizer to extend their product. Sad! 

TIL "malaxer" | also, the problem of low-cost avocado oil adulteration

Bet you've never heard of a malaxer before
credit: Washington Post

Via the Washington Post, this fascinating article: 

Avocado oil is a rising star in the culinary world. It’s a heart-healthy cooking oil with a mild flavor that appeals to health-conscious consumers.

But scientists say that adulteration and mislabeling are rampant in the avocado oil industry, and that many people who believe they’re buying pure avocado oil are being misled by some of the nation’s largest retail chains.

Scientists at the University of California at Davis tested avocado oil samples, and have for the first time revealed the names of a dozen retailers who they say sold products labeled as avocado oil that contained cheap seed and vegetable oils, including Walmart, Sam’s Club, Kroger and Safeway. The companies didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Regrettably, I'm not very surprised to learn that avocado oil is adulterated with less expensive oils. I am, however, delighted to learn that Dr. Selina Wang of UC-Davis was an organic chemist before she moved into food science. Very cool! 

(genuinely, this is a great article, please do click and read) 

NYT on Eastman's "mass balance" calculations in recycled content

Via the New York Times, this article on recycling plastic and mass balance: 

...To grasp what mass balance accounting entails, you first have to know a bit about the two methods of plastic recycling.

The first, which has been around for decades, involves sorting, washing, shredding and melting down plastic waste and reshaping it into pellets. Much of the recycled plastic produced by this method, called mechanical recycling, is of lesser quality than the original. And only certain types of plastics can be recycled mechanically.

The second, newer method, chemical recycling, is an energy-intensive process that typically uses high temperatures, pressurization and chemical solvents or other chemical processes not to simply melt plastic but to break it down into its chemical building blocks. The recycled chemicals are then mixed with all sorts of other materials, including fossil-fuel-derived virgin plastic, to make new products.

This year, Eastman began operating one of the largest chemical plastic recycling plants in the world. Near the company’s headquarters in Tennessee, the plant uses methanol, heat and pressure to transform plastic waste. It takes plastics not accepted in most curbside recycling programs, like clamshell containers, colored plastics used in food and beverage packaging, and plastic fibers used in carpets and textiles.

Eastman wants to be able to market as recycled the products made with this material. But while it’s theoretically possible to physically track plastic pellets from recycled water bottles to a new life as plastic lawn furniture, it’s virtually impossible to trace basic chemicals dissolved from plastic waste and mixed with other materials to any particular batch of plastic products...

I think the criticisms of the mass balance calculations are reasonable (i.e. is there a good reason that Eastman should be trusted? Not really?) That said, if Eastman is truly hiding something and the material isn't being recycled, it will definitely start piling up or their landfill bills will start increasing. A thorough and public accounting of their warehouses (to be fair, the inputs and outputs of their plastic recycling system) would seem to me to be the only way that you could independently verify that mass balance is a reasonable way to calculate chemical recycling content. 

WSJ: "China Restricts Fentanyl Chemicals After Years of U.S. Pressure"

 Via the Wall Street Journal, this news from August 7: 

BEIJING—China is imposing new restrictions on chemicals used in the production of fentanyl, a move long sought by the U.S. that signals Beijing’s desire to keep open an important diplomatic channel with Washington ahead of November’s presidential election.

The status of the chemicals has proved a diplomatic sticking point for the past 2½ years, and the latest move marks a small step forward in the Biden administration’s strategy of seeking cooperation with China on counternarcotics even as the countries’ relationship is increasingly defined by competition.

China is one of the biggest sources of the chemicals used to produce fentanyl that are sold to cartels in Mexico that make the highly potent narcotic and traffic it into the U.S. Nearly 75,000 people in the U.S. are estimated to have died last year from synthetic opioids such as fentanyl, representing most overdose deaths in the country.

Beginning Sept. 1, Chinese authorities will impose stricter oversight over the production and sale of three such chemicals, including requiring exporters to obtain a license, according to a government notice posted online Monday. The chemicals—known as 4-AP, 1-boc-4-AP and norfentanyl—were blacklisted by the United Nations Commission on Narcotic Drugs in March 2022, requiring China to take corresponding steps domestically.

...“Drug-trafficking networks and Chinese chemists have shown a great deal of adaptability,” said Vanda Felbab-Brown, a counternarcotics expert at the Brookings Institution. Through its latest action, she said, China is going after relatively low-hanging fruit to try to signal to the U.S. that it wants to keep the door open to further cooperation...

It will be interesting to see what the new preferred fentanyl intermediates will be, and if the price ripples from the shift will be seen in the new favorited chemical... 

The Starliner issues are about nitrogen tetroxide flow

I haven't been paying attention to the details of NASA's Starliner saga (other than to note the unfortunate Boeing connection), but I did not know that the core issue is a chemistry problem: 

NASA's concern about Starliner's thrusters boils down to the failure of five of them during the vehicle's ascent to the space station. Starliner's flight computer shut off five thrusters, provided by Aerojet Rocketdyne, in flight. Four of the five thrusters were recovered after overheating.

Since then Boeing and NASA have conducted ground- and space-based tests of the small thrusters to try to replicate the failure and better understand, fundamentally, what is occurring. By getting to the root cause, the engineers will feel confident in their ability to address the problem for Starliner's flight back to Earth.

In ground tests, the engineers were able to demonstrate similar failures. Subsequent inspections showed bulging in a Teflon seal in an oxidizer valve known as a "poppet," which could restrict the flow of nitrogen tetroxide propellant. The thrusters consume the nitrogen tetroxide and mix it with hydrazine fuel for combustion. Despite the tests, however, engineers still don't understand precisely why the bulging is occurring and whether it will manifest on Starliner's flight back to Earth.

"People really want to understand the physics of what's going on relative to the physics of the Teflon, what's causing it to heat up and what's causing it to contract," said Steve Stich, who manages the Commercial Crew program for NASA. "That's really what the team is off trying to understand. I think the NASA community in general would like to understand a little bit more of the root cause."

I wonder what data they have on the material compatibility of nitrogen tetroxide with Teflon? It's probably pretty reasonably corrosion-resistant but I dunno, space is weird. Hmmm.