The Polystyrene Page

• A 1986 EPA report on solid waste named the polystyrene manufacturing process as the 5th largest creator of hazardous waste.
• The international trade agreement -- Montreal Protocol -- decided to phase-out ozone depleting CFCs by the year 2000.
• CFCs and HCFCs are the same? -- EPA Office of Air and Radiation: "Chemicals such as HCFC-22 contain hydrogen....Thus, HCFC-22 is not technically a CFC."
  ***The industry succeeded in legally changing the name of CFC-22, as had they called it for a half-century, and renamed it (the 'environmentally friendly') "HCFC-22."

• Chemicals like styrene, used to make polystyrene plastic (Dow calls it styrofoam...shhh!) and therefore a contaminant in all polystyrene foam packages, are known to indiscriminately attack tissue and the nervous system.
• Styrene has been detected in factory air, as well as in ambient air, rivers, drinking water, and food that sits in polystyrene containers.
• Absorbed through the lungs, skin, and intestines; styrene biotransforms into a carcinogen and a mutagenic compound.

• Polystyrene promotes the throw away consumer ethic.
• More permanent, less polluting, reusable alternatives are available for almost all of its current applications, but industry chooses to ignore these options.
• Polystyrene gets the worst rating for its recyclability.

Eliminating the Use of Polystyrene

Last modified: 4 Mar 1996

http://www.ejnet.org/plastics/polystyrene/