Field investigation to determine the environmental source of PCBs in a pig farm

Authors :: Mélanie Picherot
A. Vénisseau
Aline Brosseaud
Vincent Vaccher
Philippe Marchand
Gaud Dervilly-Pinel
Bruno Le Bizec
Elodie Lesquin
Laboratoire d'étude des Résidus et Contaminants dans les Aliments (LABERCA)
Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRA)-Ecole Nationale Vétérinaire, Agroalimentaire et de l'alimentation Nantes-Atlantique (ONIRIS)
Direction Générale de l'Alimentation (DGAL)
LUNAM Université [Nantes Angers Le Mans]
Source :: Food Chemistry, Food Chemistry, Elsevier, 2018, 245, pp.394-401. ⟨10.1016/j.foodchem.2017.10.105⟩
Publication Year :: 2018
Publisher :: Elsevier BV, 2018.
Abstract: International audience; During a national monitoring plan, a pork fat sample was declared non-compliant for the sum of dioxins and PCB-DL (EU regulation). The National Reference Laboratory together with competent authorities conducted extended investigations to determine rapidly the contamination source at the farm level. A range of samples (n=129), representative of potential contamination sources, was selected for further characterization (fat, feed, materials, dust, soil) and was analyzed for PCDD/Fs and DL-PCBs by GC-HRMS. A hot spot was localized in the farm, which corresponded to a pre-feed storage tank, the paints of which presented huge DL-PCB concentrations (> 1x10(6) pg g(-1)), responsible for the contamination. The present case report describes a new source of PCB contamination, previously undescribed.