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Posted by David Sherman on Monday, May 05, 2008 at 19:08:32 :
In Reply to: Hexavalent Chromium mentioned in chrome plating. posted by chriscase@san diego on Monday, May 05, 2008 at 18:43:43 :
Exactly. If chrome is the issue, which we still don't know it is, then the stainless steel would eventually get dull or pitted after days of use as a derusting anode, as the chrome went into the solution. Hexavelent chrome salts really are poisonous and carcinogenic. This has been known for a long time. I believe the lethal dose for acute exposure is around an ounce or so, and people who worked in plating operations in the bad old days before OSHA and the EPA did develop sores and cancer from it even if it didn't flat-out kill them immediately. But they were dealing with strong hot solutions and fumes of hexavalent chrome salts and chromic acid, not a piece of stainless steel that might shed a few parts per million of atoms into the water.
I'm still not sure the mystery poison is chromium though, because of the claim that it's now been removed from all stainless steels. You can't have stainless steel without chromium, unless you count monel (a nickel/copper alloy) as a kind of stainless. Again, if there was anything in stainless that was so deadly, why are we still cooking in stainless steel pots and eating food processed in stainless steel food factory equipment?