Department of Agriculture allows the sale of unadulterated vinegar at these concentrations as an
inert ingredient. However, once mixed into a defoliant, pesticide licensing regulations affect availability and distribution, and increase costs.
"While the Sentinel, on the advice of legal counsel who had reviewed state and federal trade secrets laws, did temporarily remove the ingredient list from our Web site after five days, we subsequently, and quickly, published the name of the
inert ingredient in follow-up stories and editorials, and then republished the entire list again, based on the judge's ruling in Los Angeles," Miller said, referring Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge David Yaffe's rejection of Suterra's request for a temporary restraining order blocking publication of the ingredients.
The three numbers on the bag are the percentages of nitrogen, phosphorous, and potassium with the total of the three being the total active ingredient; the remaining percentage is the
inert ingredient, which is carrier or filler.
Experts are unsure whether chlorpyrifos - the active ingredient in Dursban - or an
inert ingredient, or a combination of ingredients may be causing health problems, LaFave said.
The medication may contain a different
inert ingredient, however, and it's possible that someone might have a minor side effect from that, but it happens only rarely.
"But we've shown that there are changes taking place in this
inert ingredient."
In work published in the 19 January 2009 issue of Chemical Research in Toxicology, Nora Benachour and Gilles-Eric Seralini found that an
inert ingredient used as a surfactant, polyethoxylated tallowamine, was more damaging than the active ingredient glyphosate to human umbilical cord, placental, and embryonic cells.
EPA recognizes that the statutory nomenclature for pesticides under FIFRA engenders public misunderstanding, stating that "many consumers have a misleading impression of the term '
inert ingredient,' believing it to mean water or other harmless ingredients" (U.S.
Joe Haid, editor of several magazines about the ratite industry, says emu oil is an "
inert ingredient" in sunscreens, shampoos, perfumes, and lotions.
Ketone based solvents are indexed as
inert ingredients, approved to be used in non-food use pesticide products under the FIFRA act.
Insecticide aerosols are sprays that contain active pesticides and other
inert ingredients to kill insects.