Pollutants and Reproductive Health

Pollutants that Disrupt Reproduction, Hormones, and Intergenerational Health

The Imperial Oil Refinery releases many pollutants that are known to affect reproductive health. Reproductive health includes many varied concerns, such the well being of sperm, fertility, cancers of the ovaries or prostate, and effects to the fetus. When the land gets polluted, our reproductive health is disrupted. Reproductive health is not just a concern of the person, but of the entire community and generations yet to come.

Some pollutants also affect the body's hormone systems, including hormones like estrogen and androgen, involved in reproduction and the development of bodies. Hormones send messages through the body, and coordinate many bodily process, including how genes are expressed. Therefore, chemicals that disrupt hormones can have many kinds of health effects to all parts of the body beyond reproduction, and there are windows of development in the life-cycle when disrupting hormones can have profound effects. Pollutants can disrupt hormone systems by both mimicking or blocking the work of hormones. The body only needs small amounts of hormones for its inner processes. Therefore, it can only take a small amount of pollution to disrupt hormone systems.

Chemicals can also have effects on reproductive health effects that extend between generations, such as when a chemical passes through the placenta into a fetus. When a chemical impacts a fetus, it may also have effects to the eggs growing inside that fetus. Therefore, the health harms of chemical exposures can even stretch to the grandchildren of the person exposed.

Below are two lists of Pollutants released by the Imperial Oil Complex in Sarnia:

1. Pollutants Linked with Reproductive Health Harms

2. Pollutants Linked with Hormone Disruptions.

The charts for these chemicals testify to the extraordinary volume of pollutants potentially affecting reproductive well-being. The total amount of pollutants since 1994 with the potential to cause harms to reproductive health is in the 100,000s of tons.

Learn more about these Chemicals with the Pollution Reporter App

List of Pollutants with known Reproductive Health Effects

Below are charts showing the cumulative release of some of the pollutants that the combined Imperial Oil Refinery and complex in Sarnia has reported to the federal government through the National Pollution Release Inventory. The reproductive health effects of each of these chemicals is well established by researchers.

List of Pollutants with Known Hormone Disrupting Effects

Below are charts showing the cumulative release of some of the pollutants that the combined Imperial Oil Refinery and complex in Sarnia has reported to the federal government through the National Pollution Release Inventory. The hormone disrupting effects of each of these chemicals is well established by researchers.