2026年7月9日 / 美国东部时间下午5:54 / 哥伦比亚广播公司新闻 / 乔希·博斯威尔 撰稿
受雇检查洛杉矶一场大型仓库火灾后空气污染情况的公司，过往曾被指控在备受关注的环境灾难中淡化公共健康威胁。
6月17日，物流巨头林吉物流（Lineage）旗下一座占地50万平方英尺的冷藏仓库发生火灾。火势持续一周，随后当地进入紧急状态，居民纷纷担忧扩散至全城的烟雾羽流带来的健康风险。
2026年6月29日周一，工作人员在洛杉矶博伊尔高地社区的大规模仓库火灾后开展清理工作。埃里克·塞耶 / 洛杉矶时报 via 盖蒂图片社
为回应民众担忧，仓库运营商聘请了总部位于阿肯色州的Onterris公司开展空气质量检测。Onterris报告称空气质量“良好”，有害气体水平较低。
但如今，独立空气污染专家和当地活动人士告诉哥伦比亚广播公司新闻，他们认为这项仍在进行中的环境检测工作存在疏漏。
“这就像狐狸看守鸡舍，”非营利组织“政府问责项目”的环境调查人员莱斯利·帕西对哥伦比亚广播公司新闻表示。
Onterris的公众形象较为有限。该公司在今年4月更名前曾卷入多起争议案件。
但通过其曾用名“毒理学与环境健康中心”（简称CTEH）进行搜索，可以发现一段更为复杂的过往。
该公司已有29年历史，曾受雇于石油公司、铁路运营商和重工业企业。在多起重大灾难后，环保倡导者曾投诉该公司出具的调查报告淡化了公众接触受污染空气和水的健康风险。
2023年，诺福克南方铁路公司一列装载危险化学品的列车在俄亥俄州东巴勒斯坦脱轨后，该铁路公司聘请CTEH开展环境检测。
在环境保护署的监督下，CTEH的工作人员采集了样本，并告知当地居民他们的住宅是安全的。但随后居民出现偏头痛、恶心和癫痫发作等症状。
独立专家称，CTEH的检测未能覆盖脱轨事故可能释放的全部危险化合物，且空气采样时长过短，无法获得准确数据。
“如果由污染方负责检测和采样，他们天生就有不去发现问题的经济利益，”美国环境保护署前区域行政长官朱迪思·恩克在2023年对哥伦比亚广播公司新闻表示。“这完全存在利益冲突。”
当时，CTEH驳斥了这些指控，称其开展了全面检测，并“为准确呈现事实感到自豪”。
该公司代表污染方开展检测的其他争议事件可追溯至数十年前。
2005年，墨菲石油公司聘请该公司，对其位于路易斯安那州查尔梅特的炼油厂在卡特里娜飓风后发生的石油泄漏污染情况进行检测。
《纽约时报》报道称，CTEH未遵循美国环境保护署的土壤采样计划，出具了无毒性的检测报告，并利用这些数据劝阻当地居民提起诉讼。
CTEH当时表示，其检测处于环境保护署的监督之下，并遵循了“最佳实践”方法。
2010年墨西哥湾“深水地平线”石油泄漏事故发生后，石油巨头英国石油公司聘请了CTEH，两名国会议员致信英国石油公司首席执行官提出警告。
“CTEH有着受指控制损害公众健康的公司雇佣的历史，其出具的调查结果总是为雇佣它的企业利益辩护，”当时来自加利福尼亚州的众议员洛伊丝·卡普斯和来自佛蒙特州的众议员彼得·韦尔奇在致英国石油公司的信中写道。
Onterris的官员驳斥了过往的批评，他们告诉哥伦比亚广播公司新闻，该公司实际上“发现了多个[深水地平线]泄漏事件对空气质量造成负面影响的情况”，其数据“被用于保障人类健康”。
2006年，中国石膏板制造商天津可耐福石膏板公司聘请CTEH，调查其产品中存在硫化氢的相关投诉。CTEH检测后称未释放硫化氢，也未发现其他有毒气体。
随后，美国消费品安全委员会将两款可耐福产品列为其评选的十大硫化氢污染“问题石膏板”中的第1位和第4位。
2011年，针对可耐福石膏板释放有害气体的集体诉讼最终达成和解，约5000名美国房主获得11亿美元赔偿。该公司未承认存在不当行为或责任。
Onterris告诉哥伦比亚广播公司新闻，当时其检测结果显示有毒气体水平“不足以对人类健康造成影响”，且只有石膏板内部才存在有害含量，这一结论“与其他机构开展的研究并不矛盾”。
2008年，田纳西河谷管理局控制的煤渣坝发生决堤，向罗恩县倾泻了超过10亿加仑的污泥，这是美国历史上规模最大的工业泄漏事故之一。
CTEH对空气进行了检测并宣称空气质量安全。但居民并不认同这一结论。
“人们纷纷病倒，”反山顶开采非营利组织“联合山地防御”的工作人员马特·兰登在2010年接受《纽约时报》采访时表示。“眼睛肿胀、出现皮疹、耳朵疼痛，婚戒都被腐蚀失去光泽。他们说需要时间才能部署高容量监测设备。”
美国环境保护署的审计发现，CTEH在田纳西州的检测“未达到质量保障程序要求”。
Onterris告诉哥伦比亚广播公司新闻，其仅承接了该灾难的应急响应阶段工作，其收集的空气数据“被证实是准确无误的”。
CTEH于今年4月更名为“Onterris”。
“尽管名称发生了变化，但团队、专业技术和服务保持不变，”该公司当月在一份声明中表示。
如今，洛杉矶居民正对Onterris近期发布的报告提出质疑，该报告称这场毁灭性仓库火灾后空气中未检测到有害化学物质。
当地环保组织“东庭院社区环境正义”正与独立空气质量专家合作，自行开展采样检测。
“我们一直在户外采集样本，尽我们所能做好工作，”开展此次检测的加州大学欧文分校暴露科学与环境流行病学家吉尔·约翰斯顿博士表示。
“尤其是因为仓库使用的保温泡沫在燃烧时，可能会释放大量挥发性有机化合物和有毒气体，伴随烟雾扩散，”她说。“但这些数据尚未得到系统性收集。”
约翰斯顿表示，她认为包括林吉物流承包商在内的所有机构，在火灾发生的最初几天都未检测挥发性有机化合物和重金属，而这些污染物在当时最有可能达到有害水平。
Onterris告诉哥伦比亚广播公司新闻，该公司是按照联邦官员的指示开展检测的，且直到6月20日才接到该仓库屋顶太阳能板运营商Altus Power的委托，此时火灾已发生三天。该公司表示，其于6月21日抵达现场。
该公司发布的报告称，其于6月23日开始“社区流动监测”，并对空气中的重金属进行检测。
根据洛杉矶县公共卫生部的数据，从6月17日火灾发生首日至6月25日，仓库周边10英里范围内居民的急诊就诊人数飙升至正常水平的三倍。
根据州机构南海岸空气质量管理区的数据，6月19日，仓库附近的伊斯曼大道小学的一处联邦监测站在一个多小时内检测到每立方米755微克的细颗粒物，属于高度危险水平。
2025年1月摧毁洛杉矶大片区域的毁灭性山火期间，帕萨迪纳的加州理工学院空气监测仪记录到每立方米约650微克的细颗粒物。
Company hired to check air quality after L.A. warehouse fire accused of downplaying health risks in past
July 9, 2026 / 5:54 PM EDT / CBS News / By Josh Boswell
The company hired to check air pollution after a giant warehouse fire in Los Angeles has been accused in the past of downplaying the public threat during high-profile environmental disasters.
The June 17 fire broke out at a 500,000-square-foot cold storage facility owned by logistics behemoth Lineage. It burned for a week and sparked a state of emergency, with residents raising concerns about the risks posed by plumes of smoke that spread across the city.
A crew cleans up after a massive warehouse fire in the Boyle Heights neighborhood on Monday, June 29, 2026 in Los Angeles, California. Eric Thayer / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
To answer those concerns, the warehouse company hired Arkansas-based Onterris to test air quality. Onterris reported “good” air quality and low levels of hazardous gases.
But now, independent air pollution experts and local activists are telling CBS News that they believe the environmental testing, which is still ongoing, has been inadequate.
“It’s like the fox guarding the henhouse,” Lesley Pacey, an environmental investigator for nonprofit Government Accountability Project, told CBS News.
The public profile of Onterris is limited. The company was tied to some controversial cases before it underwent a rebrand in April.
But a search of its former name, Center for Toxicology and Environmental Health, or CTEH, reveals a more complicated story.
The company has existed for 29 years, and has been hired by oil companies, rail carriers and heavy industry. On several occasions, environmental advocates have complained that the firm produced findings that downplayed the health risks to the public from polluted water and air after major disasters.
When a Norfolk Southern train carrying hazardous chemicals derailed in East Palestine, Ohio, in 2023, the railroad brought CTEH in for environmental testing.
CTEH officials, monitored by the Environmental Protection Agency, took samples and told families their homes were safe. Residents later suffered migraines, nausea and seizures.
Independent experts claimed CTEH’s tests failed to look for the full range of dangerous compounds potentially released by the crash and sampled the air for too short a period to get accurate readings.
“If you have the polluter doing the testing and sampling, they have a built-in financial interest in not finding problems,” Judith Enck, a former regional EPA administrator told CBS News in 2023. “There’s absolutely a conflict of interest.”
At the time, CTEH disputed those claims, saying it conducted extensive testing and “pride ourselves on accurately representing the facts.”
Other controversies around the company’s testing on behalf of polluters date back decades.
Murphy Oil Corp. used the firm in 2005 to test for oil spill contamination after Hurricane Katrina at its Chalmette, Louisiana, refinery.
The New York Times reported that CTEH did not follow the EPA plan for soil sampling, produced clean toxicology reports and used the data to dissuade locals from filing lawsuits.
CTEH said at the time its tests were under EPA supervision, and that it followed “best practice” methods.
When oil giant BP hired CTEH after its 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, two members of Congress wrote to warn its CEO.
“CTEH has a history of being hired by companies accused of harming public health and releasing findings defending the corporate interests that employ them,” then-Reps. Lois Capps, of California, and Peter Welch, of Vermont, wrote in a letter to BP.
Onterris officials disputed that past critique, telling CBS News the company in fact “identified numerous situations where air quality was negatively impacted by the [Deepwater Horizon] spill” and its data “was used to ensure the protection of human health.”
Chinese drywall manufacturer Knauf Plasterboard Tianjin hired CTEH in 2006 to investigate claims of hydrogen sulfide in its products. CTEH found none were emitted, nor other noxious gases.
The Consumer Product Safety Commission subsequently ranked two Knauf products as No. 1 and No. 4 in its top 10 list of hydrogen sulfide-contaminated “problem drywall.”
A class action lawsuit against Knauf over the drywall gas led to a $1.1 billion settlement for around 5,000 U.S. homeowners in 2011. The company admitted no wrongdoing or liability.
Onterris told CBS News its tests in that instance found noxious gas levels “not high enough to cause health effects in humans” and the only harmful amounts were inside the drywall, a finding “not contradictory to studies conducted by other agencies.”
In 2008, a coal ash dam controlled by the Tennessee Valley Authority broke, releasing more than 1 billion gallons of sludge onto Roane County in one of the largest industrial spills in U.S. history.
CTEH tested the air and declared it safe. Residents disagreed.
“People were getting sick,” Matt Landon, a staffer at anti-mountaintop mining nonprofit United Mountain Defense, told The New York Times in 2010. “Eyes swelling up, rashes, ear aches, wedding bands tarnishing. They said it was taking them time to get high-volume monitors out there.”
An EPA audit found CTEH’s Tennessee tests “failed to meet quality assurance procedures.”
Onterris told CBS News it was only contracted for the emergency response phase of the disaster, and the air data it collected was “confirmed as accurate and correct.”
CTEH rebranded as “Onterris” in April this year.
“While the name has changed, the team, expertise, and services remain the same,” the firm said in a statement that month.
Now, Los Angeles residents are questioning recent Onterris reports showing a lack of harmful chemicals in the air following the devastating warehouse blaze.
East Yard Communities for Environmental Justice, a local environmentalist group, is working with independent air quality experts to take its own measurements.
“We’ve been out there collecting samples doing the best we can,” said Dr. Jill Johnston, a UC Irvine exposure scientist and environmental epidemiologist conducting the tests.
“Particularly because of the foam that’s used to insulate the warehouses, when it burns there’s potential for a lot of volatile organic compounds, toxic gases, to come out with that smoke,” she said. “And that data hasn’t been collected systematically.”
Johnston said she believes that no agencies, including Lineage contractors, were checking for volatile organic compounds and heavy metals during the first few days of the fire, when they were most likely to be present at harmful levels.
Onterris told CBS News that the company conducted testing at the direction of federal officials, and was only called by the warehouse’s rooftop solar panel owner Altus Power on June 20, three days after the fire began. Onterris was on site from June 21, the company said.
The firm’s published reports say it began “roaming community monitoring” and checking the air for heavy metals on June 23.
Emergency room visits from patients living within 10 miles of the warehouse spiked to three times the normal rate from the first day of the fire on June 17 through June 25, according to the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health.
One federal monitoring station at Eastman Avenue Elementary School near the warehouse measured 755 micrograms per cubic meter of fine particles for more than an hour on June 19, a highly hazardous level, according to the state agency South Coast Air Quality Management District.
During the devastating fires that destroyed swathes of the city in January 2025, a Caltech air monitor in Pasadena recorded about 650 micrograms per cubic meter.