HUD considers stronger rules on air safety in trailers

WASHINGTON — The Department of Housing and Urban Development is weighing stiffer regulation of formaldehyde emissions in mobile homes after government tests showed units housing people displaced by Hurricane Katrina had elevated levels of the toxic gas.

But indoor air-quality advocates say tightening the regulations on mobile homes won't make them safe.

And manufacturers who built the mobile homes that are under scrutiny on the Gulf Coast will play a part in HUD's process in creating the new regulations.

As the agency that regulates the mobile home industry, HUD requires manufacturers to limit the amount of formaldehyde emitted by plywood and particleboard used in construction.

A colorless gas with a pungent odor, formaldehyde has been linked to a series of health problems, including sore throats, nosebleeds and breathing troubles. It is also a suspected carcinogen.

"HUD will continue to assess its formaldehyde standards in light of testing and recommendations by (the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) and ... will propose stricter rules as necessary," said HUD spokesman Lemar Wooley.

Jeff Inks, a government regulations specialist with the Manufactured Housing Institute, said he did not know if the institute would back new rules, because they have not been finalized.

He said millions of mobile homes that house Americans are "absolutely" safe and "there's still a lot of disagreement on what the effects of formaldehyde are."

But Becky Gillette, a Sierra Club official, disagrees. At the behest of Katrina victims who said their homes were making them ill, the Sierra Club tested about 80 trailers and mobile homes and found elevated levels of formaldehyde in most of them.

Gillette said HUD's standards for formaldehyde levels in mobile homes are inadequate because they don't regulate emissions in carpeting, glue and furniture, which are often made of formaldehyde-emitting particleboard.

Current HUD regulations limit the amount of formaldehyde that can be emitted by plywood in a mobile home to no more than 0.2 parts per million. Particleboard emissions are capped at 0.3 parts per million.

Wooley said the new rules would seek to reduce emissions for particleboard used in flooring and adopt a new requirement for fiberboard commonly used in cabinets. He also said the new regulations will be developed with the help of the Manufactured Housing Consensus Committee, a 22-member panel composed of manufacturers, mobile home occupants and state agencies.

At least one of the mobile home companies on the panel, Fleetwood Enterprises of California, has been named in a lawsuit filed by Katrina and Rita victims who say their emergency housing made them sick.

William Farish, director of engineering at Fleetwood Enterprises, said tightening regulations on formaldehyde will require a consensus.

"Everybody will have to first decide if there is a problem in manufactured housing," he said.

The same panel has tried to reverse a HUD rule requiring warnings in mobile homes that say materials used to build it may emit the chemical linked to many health problems, especially in children and the elderly.

"But we don't think there is a problem," said panel member Jerome McHale of the Federation of Manufactured Home Owners of Florida.

Pressed by lawmakers who reacted to the concerns of Gulf Coast hurricane victims, FEMA asked the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to test the air quality in a sampling of mobile homes and trailers in Mississippi and Louisiana.

The CDC found levels of formaldehyde "higher than expected in indoor air." It recommended residents spend "as much time outdoors in fresh air as possible," and FEMA said it would redouble efforts to relocate trailer and mobile home residents.

FEMA bought about 120,000 travel trailers and 20,000 mobile homes at a cost of more than $2 billion to house people displaced by hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

No federal agency regulates formaldehyde emissions in travel trailers.

FEMA said it won't use trailers in future disasters. On Friday the agency announced it would use nontraditional disaster housing, including pre-fabricated "Katrina cottages" and other modular homes that would be strictly regulated for indoor air quality.