SO WHAT'S THE PROBLEM?
Most sofa's are filled with foam. 20% of that foam consists of flame retardant chemicals. Most top fabrics are also treated with flame retardant chemicals, and 40% of the fabric can be flame retardant chemicals.
This is a high chemical loading when you think of a small home with a sofa, 2 armchairs a footstool and 4 mattresses. Mostly these chemical flame retardants are not chemically bonded to the fabric or foam so they leach out into the house dust. From here they permeate skin, are ingested as dust, enter our bodies where they are stored in fats, pass to our children through breast milk (the UK has the highest levels of flame retardants in breast milk), cross the placenta, cross the blood brain barrier and then build up in the fat cells of our children.
These chemicals are so long lasting that UK Professors of toxicology, fire science, environmental science, veterinary science, social science, environmental chemistry and community health JOINED TOGETHER to ask for fire safety by design rather than by chemicals.
DEFRA are aware of the problem. They want these chemicals broken down and have directed that all waste domestic seating containing POPs (the worst of these chemicals) be incinerated alongside hazardous hospital waste. The cost to councils is massive. The waste is unconscionable. And the environmental harm is worldwide.
If DEFRA can't burn away the chemicals they will leach from our sofas in landfill into our waterways enter the food chain and harm wildlife.
The Environmental Audit Committee ran a substantial study leading to a report asking for the UK to align with Europe. We ask for the UK legislation to align with Europe. Europe insists on "safety in normal use" in the home - and that includes safety from chemical exposure and safety from accidental fires. In Europe (like in the US and the rest of the world) this safety is achieved without the chemicals.
Fire scientists tell us from looking at World Health Organisation data that fire deaths across Europe are no worse than here. The chemical companies say that the flame retardant chemicals create a delay to ignition (they claim in the range of 16 minutes), but this report was funded by the North American Fire Retardant Association and can not be relied upon. European research suggests the delay to ignition might be in the order of 2- 4 minutes. The Fire Brigade Union in the UK call the delay to ignition "negligible".
FIREFIGHTERS ARE 323% MORE SUSCEPTIBLE TO CANCER THAN THE GENERAL POPULATION BECAUSE OF THEIR EXPOSURE TO TOXIC CHEMICAL EFFLUENTS.
THE DANGER TO OUR HEALTH
The CFRs in our furniture release into the air in our homes, settle in dust, are ingested, and permeate the skin before accumulating in the fat cells of our bodies. CFRs are linked to a host of health problems, including:
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Neurological problems, including learning disorders, reduced IQ and behavioural problems in young children
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Endocrine disruption e.g. Thyroid disease
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Reproductive problems and infertility
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DNA damage
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Cancer
WHEN FURNITURE COMBUSTS,THE CFR'S IT CONTAINS EXACERBATE THE RELEASE OF HYDROGEN CYANIDE AND CARBON MONOXIDE, MAKING A FIRE SITUATION MORE TOXIC FOR FIRE FIGHTERS AND VICTIMS ALIKE.
Children are considered to be disproportionately affected.
CFRs can cross the placenta in the womb, they are ingested in breast milk by a baby and are ingested by a small child’s crawling and hand to mouth behaviour.
Some CFRs have been banned as “persistent organic pollutants” (POPs) under the Stockholm Convention, because they are too harmful to human health or the environment to be tolerated.
There remains a danger from both legacy CFRs still in circulation as well as emerging CFRs that have replaced the banned chemicals.
AN ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTER
CFRs are highly mobile and have been found all over the world in air, dust, soil, sediment, water, food, and wildlife. They migrate easily out of landfill sites and spread over large distances and more than a hundred species of wildlife found across every continent, from Antartica to the Arctic are reported to be contaminated with highly toxic CFRs.
Because the government recognises the dangers CFRs pose to the environment, since 2022 it has required all upholstered furniture to be incinerated as hazardous waste at the end of its life. The cost of incineration of a sofa at 800 degrees to 1200 degrees varies from £12/sofa to £500/sofa.
The amount of waste soft furniture in the UK is thought to be 280,000 tonnes, this approximately equates to 4-8 million two-seater sofas per year.
Foam treated with CFRs is unrecyclable.
WE CALL UPON THE UK GOVERNMENT TO:
STOP
The requirement for the 'open flame' test which is almost impossible to pass without Chemical Flame Retardants
SWITCH
To harmonise our furniture fire safety regulations with the European General Product Safety Regulations
where a 'smouldering cigarette' test is used
We'll keep you informed on developments of fire safety