u/lucius-tarquinius

I have a new, grainy dust that formed uniformly over my apartment during demo work on the exterior of my apartment building. The demo work involved pulverizing stucco. The grainy dust does not appear in my walk-in closet, which I frequently use.

I've been told that a certified industrial hygienist could help with unknown particle identification. What type of testing should I be asking for?

My understanding is I would want to take samples from affected and unaffected rooms to get a relative comparison

• Stereomicroscopy for sorting out particle type
• SEM-EDX for elemental composition
• XRD for mineral component identification
• (micro-)FTIR because paint is suspected
• Some type of petrographic analysis in addition to the chemical analysis

Am I missing something or on the wrong track?

My landlord had work done in the back of our fourplex the unit next to mine to repair dry rot. There was a lot of dust generated by the work, because they were pulverizing stucco (contained lead paint) from the exterior to address the dry rot. There was no containment plastic around my windows or door until the end of the demo work.

I now have this grainy dust all over my apartment from front to back. The dust feels like the pulverized stucco from the outside.

The landlord's assessor says this couldn't have come from the outside. Regardless, it is all over my stuff, and we have lead paint under the current paint layer in our apartment anyways, so I do not feel good about the dust being everywhere either way. The assessor says that they are only going to clean select areas that are no more than 3 feet from windows or doors.

Does anyone know who to call to:

1. Assess dust to determine if it is likely from stucco or somewhere else?
2. Perform lead safe cleaning of household items?
3. Determine if items should be thrown away/replaced?

Additionally, does anyone know if in Oakland the landlord would be responsible for all of this?