No holds barred

What do hot coffee and granite kitchen worktops have in common? The answer is easy for Americans: Both are so dangerous that the unsuspecting consumer must be urgently warned about them. Coffee can only burn your fingers, but a granite worktop is all the more treacherous as the danger is invisible and only detectable with highly sensitive instruments. After an article in the New York Times, all home owners now know this and the name of the enemy: radon, a naturally occurring radioactive inert gas that is supposed to escape in hazardous concentrations from granite slabs and is regarded as the main cause of lung cancer after smoking.

“What’s lurking in your kitchen worktop?” was the New York Times headline on 24 July 2008, which described the case of an anxious home owner whose granite kitchen was shown to contain ten times more radon than the rest of her rooms. Even though the article did not describe all granite as hazardous, it caused nationwide uncertainty among home owners and among stone traders and processors, who are already fighting the consequences of the property crisis as it is. The natural stone industry in the USA already sees itself confronted with calls from shrewd lawyers to report cases of high radon concentration in the kitchen in order to sue those responsible for damages.


Damage limitation

The American federation, the Marble Institute of America (MIA), reacted quickly and provided studies and test results as evidence that although granite actually emits radon into its surroundings, this is at safe concentrations and without risk to the health of occupants. This proves that granite is safe and not damaging to the health.

It has long been general knowledge that radon exists in the natural worldwide environment, but granite kitchens are the object of regular attacks in the USA. Hardly surprising in view of American consumers’ high ranking of granite over other building materials – those who can afford to treat themselves to a granite kitchen. The manufacturers of engineered stone are more or less explicitly named as the initiators or at least the profiteers of the campaigns.

Whoever the initiator is, the consequences for the American market have sounded the alarm bells among the producers. MIA is making great efforts to limit the damage and help has meanwhile arrived from Italy. A group of Tuscan stone producers recently provided 200,000 US dollars for a marketing campaign to promote the image of granite in the USA. The companies involved include Internazionale Marmi e Macchine Carrara, Red Graniti, Henraux, M+Q, Fontanili, Sten, Gruppo Antolini, Stoneval, G.M.C., Metro, Santucci, Savema, Magti, Adolfo Forti and Bruno Lucchetti.