Source of Toxic Chinese Drywall Difficult to Pinpoint April 20, 2009

Wall Street Journal

The sulfur gases being emitted from toxic drywall have been found to cause corrosion of metals in close proximity.  Oxidation occurs mainly in copper wiring, copper plumbing, air-conditioning machinery/ducting.  Personal items such as jewelry, electronic devices, and appliances have also been reportedly damaged by the sulfur-emitting drywall.

The drywall in question was manufactured with a high content of gypsum, a naturally occurring mineral.  According to a spokeswoman for the drywall manufacturer Knauf Plasterboard Tianjin Co., a subsidiary of Knauf International GmbH, the company has traced some of their toxic drywall to a mine in the Shandong province of China.

Knauf Tianjin continues to cooperate with United States officials on resolving the matter.  However, they feel that they are being singled-out for acknowledging the problem while other manufacturers have not.

It is estimated that the United States imported around 309 million square ft. of drywall from China during a housing boom from 2004- 2007.   This is only enough material to build around 35,000 homes many more are expected to contain the toxic drywall.  Many homes were built using material from several suppliers, thus the exact number of homes containing toxic drywall is difficult to predict.  One major difficulty in finding the bad drywall is that it is often unclearly labeled, making it harder to identify the manufacturer.