Stone Industry Proposes Self-Policing as California Weighs Artificial Stone Ban

Facing a proposal in California to ban the use of a popular countertop material linked to a growing lung disease killing stonecutters, industry representatives said they are taking steps to self-police and tackle the crisis.

Artificial stone is linked to an aggressive form of silicosis among workers who have inhaled toxic silica dust generated when cutting and shaping slabs of the material, also known as engineered stone or quartz.

The International Surface Fabricators Association, with support from large artificial stone manufacturers, has resurfaced plans to establish a private certification program overseen by the industry to ensure only fabrication shops following required safety measures handle the controversial slabs.

The group aims to begin piloting business certification in Southern California, the nation’s silicosis epicenter, as early as this summer, according to testimony by ISFA’s CEO Laurie Weber to California regulators on Thursday in Sacramento. The audit and training program, which would be expanded statewide later in the year, aims to protect workers without banning artificial stone, she added.

“We believe that bans happen when systems fail, and we’re here to help fix the system,” Weber said. “We want an opportunity to sit at the table and talk about how to solve this together.”

Close to 500 stonecutters have contracted the incurable disease in California, including 54 who’ve undergone lung transplants and 27 who have died since 2019, according to tracking efforts by state health authorities. Nearly all those sick are Latino men, many of them immigrants.

Occupational safety experts say mounting scientific evidence shows that engineered stone dust is much more dangerous than that released by marble and other natural stones, though large U.S. manufacturers of the factory-made material, such as Cambria, dispute that assessment.

A medical association petitioned the California Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board last month to prohibit dust-producing tasks on engineered stone with more than 1% crystalline silica, including slicing and polishing. According to the Western Occupational Environmental Medicine Association, a ban would encourage the use of safer substitutes now sold in the U.S. and Australia by some manufacturers, such as Caesarstone and Cosentino. Australia prohibited the sale of engineered stone with more than 1% crystalline silica in 2024.

“The clock is ticking as we discuss, as we try this and that. Why are we protecting this cosmetic material for which there is a particularly appropriate and excellent substitute?” Dr. Robert Blink, an occupational medicine doctor in San Francisco and the association’s former president, said during the board meeting in response to ISFA’s licensing plan. “Why are we doing this while we’re waiting for people to die?”

The testimony came a day after Cambria and other beleaguered industry representatives testified before a U.S. House subcommittee in support of a bill that would immunize their companies from hundreds of lawsuits by sick stoneworkers. H.R. 5437, introduced by California Rep. Tom McClintock last September, would prohibit civil lawsuits against stone slab manufacturers or sellers for harm resulting from the alteration of their products and dismiss pending claims.

Rebecca Schult, Cambria’s chief legal officer, traveled from the Washington, D.C., hearing to the board meeting in Sacramento. The Minnesota-based company accounts for 40-50% of artificial stone produced in the U.S., though most of the material is imported from other countries, she said. Cambria, which also owns fabrication shops, has not yet developed alternatives to its high-silica artificial stone products.

“I’ll do my very best to be here going forward as well so that we can work on this together,” Schult told the regulators. “Quartz slab products can be cut safely.”

Weber said the industry pushed for a licensing system to be included in a state bill that went into effect this year, which reinforces workplace protections to prevent silicosis. She said it’s unclear why the bill’s final version did not include a certification initiative.

Two years ago, California approved the nation’s strictest rules to try to protect stonecutters. But the sophisticated measures, which prohibit the dry cutting of engineered stone to suppress dust and require employers to provide workers with respirators that can cost more than $1,000 each, are unfeasible for most fabrication businesses, according to employers and workplace regulators. About 95% of countertop fabrication shops that Cal/OSHA inspectors have visited were not following the required protections.

Advocates who have surveyed and informed stonecutters about silica hazards in the Los Angeles area said they doubted an industry certification initiative would help protect many from the disease.

“The challenge here is that the industry wants to essentially police itself under the proposal that they presented today,” Maegan Ortiz, who directs the Instituto de Educación Popular del Sur de California, said. “I think if history has shown us anything, big industries do not do very well at that.”

Silicosis has also been found among stoneworkers in Illinois, Colorado, Utah, Washington and other states where engineered stone is cut, though medical experts believe the illness is severely underreported.