Question from Rebecca David
Hi Debra,
I recently painted my daughter’s room using “Old Fashioned Milk Paint. Later I heard that they add “radioactive Kaolin clay” to their paint as a filler. Do you think this is harmful?
Thank you.
Debra’s Answer
First of all, I’ve been recommending Old Fashions Milk Paint for so many years I can’t remember when I started. I have this paint on the walls of my house because it is completely natural and contains no VOCs or plastics, as most paints do. I love this paint.
I contacted the President, Anne Thibeau and asked her about this. She said, no, their paint is not radioactive.
“We use a blend of a few different clays that are proprietary,” said Anne, “And have actually had them tested for radioactivity (zero).”
“Our paint does not have, nor has it ever had, any radioactive or otherwise harmful materials in it. That goes against everything we stand for. Even our paint palette is limited because we have found many pigments are questionable as far as toxicity goes. But the colors we do make are easily blended to create hundreds of other beautiful colors, which many of our customers do on a regular basis. We are proud to have developed what we feel is one of the safest paints on the planet for the past 41 years.”
I did some additional research because the phrase “radioactive kaolin clay” just did not make sense to me. Here’s what I found.
Natural radioactive materials are present in all geological rocks in varying amounts, including clay. And also any other rocks. It is easily released into the environment.
A study was done on clay specifically to “measure the natural radioactivity due to the presence of radionuclides in clay and kaolin, used widely as raw materials in ceramics, bricks and cement industries, and to assess the possible radiological hazards associated with these raw materials.” The study concluded that while some natural radionuclides do exist in clays, “the calculated alpha index values for all samples are below the recommended upper level.”
Clays have been used since the beginning of humankind to make ceramic items of all kinds. Some clays may be more radioactive than others, or contain other naturally-ocurring metals or minerals.
But in general, clay is widely considered to be a safe ingredient. So much so that clay is recommended to be applied to the skin and taken internally as a means of removing radioactive materials from the body.
Radiation is present throughout the environment. You cannot escape it. Our bodies can accommodate the levels of radioactivity in the natural environment. The problem comes when we are exposed to levels beyond the natural ambient levels from human activities.
The bottom line is, clay is unlikely to contain more than natural levels of radionuclides, and Old Fashioned Milk Paint has had the clays they used tested for radioactivity, and none was found.
I don’t see a toxic danger here.
