In this study we measured some parameters that are associated with ethanol damage to the liver. The method allowed us to determine the injury that chronic and acute ethanol treatments produce at the cellular level without interference from homeostatic or compensatory mechanisms. The system used is a hepatic fetal human cell line, WRL-68, which retains, in culture, many of the liver-specific functions. WRL-68 cells do not metabolise ethanol, and consequently we could evaluate the effect of ethanol alone. We explored two different conditions: 30 days with 0.1 M ethanol (chronic treatment) and 24 h in the presence of 0.5 M ethanol (acute treatment). 1. The transmission electron microscopy studies revealed, in both treatments, the presence of granules not usually present in the cytoplasm of control cells and morphological mitochondrial alterations in chronically treated cells. 2. Lipid peroxidation, measured as the rate of malondialdehyde production, increased three and a half times in acutely treated cells and about twofold in chronically treated cells. 3. The percentage of total activity (activity in the medium/(activity in the medium + activity of the cells). 100) and the enzymatic activity in the culture medium of gamma glutamyl transpeptidase (GGT), alanine amino transferase (ALAT), aspartate amino transferase (ASAT) and alkaline phosphatase (AI-P), increased. 4. We measured some parameters related to the transport of sodium across the membrane. Cells chronically treated with ethanol had higher rate constants and effluxes than control cells. There was no difference between the total and passive efflux. Ethanol treated cells apparently lacked the ouabain sensitive pathway. In acutely treated cells, the total sodium efflux and the rate constant were enhanced. Sodium pools in the acutely treated cells were diminished and active sodium pumping was seven times higher than in control cells. 5. We determined the number of high affinity ouabain binding sites per cell. Ethanol did not alter the number of pumps, rather it seems to induce a functional alteration. Our results indicate that ethanol per se induces lipid peroxidation, alters enzymatic activities, sodium transport systems, sodium pools and cellular morphology, and that all these changes may be partly responsible for ethanol-induced hepatotoxicity. The data compare favourably with those reported in the literature for many different systems. Therefore our model for studying the mechanism of alcohol effects appears to be valid, with the advantage of being able to compare experiments that can be done in the same system and under the same conditions.