Environmental Testing (Long Beach, CA)

LONG BEACH ENVIRONMENTAL LABORATORY
A coal and water laboratory was purchased by Std Labs in 1981 from a Mr. Robert Speech. The lab performed coal sampling and analysis as well as water analysis for the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles and was certified by the state of California.

This became the 12th lab in the Std Labs system and was envisioned to be at an important domestic terminal for coal shipments from Utah and Colorado to Pacific Rim countries. In fact, these ports never became very large coal shipping terminals for a number of environmental issues.

The lab was supervised by Cheryl Hoyt under the direction of Ray Sim as a part of the Western Division.

Within one year it was discovered that Mr. Speech had covert arrangements with terminal operations personnel and coal brokers to supply results which Std Labs could not reasonably reproduce. As a consequence the company suspended work and immediately closed the lab rather than be responsible for generating inaccurate data.