Daily Score Blog

It's old news, but still worth paying attention to.  Last Friday, the Washington state House of Representatives passed legislation to ban toxic flame retardants known as PBDEs -- which are something of an obsession around these parts. 

This is a pretty big deal, since the bill covers deca-PBDEs -- the only form of the compound that's still widely used, as far as I know.  Washington's bill doesn't ban deca outright. There are still exemptions, and the ban is phased in over several years. Still, it  treats deca much more aggressively than, say, a recently announced Canadian PBDE ban that environmental advocates have called "toothless," because it leaves deca largely unscathed.  Deca appears to be less toxic than the other forms of PBDEs, and also less likely to accumulate in human bodies.  But there's growing evidence that, over time, deca can break down into other, more dangerous forms of PBDEs -- meaning that if we continue to use deca, we could be setting our grandkids up for some tough times down the road.

The key to the bill's passage (besides the aerospace exemption, which kept Boeing from nixing it) is that the ban on deca is phased in:  it only takes affect after an independent fire safety commision reviews of the safety and effectiveness of alternative flame retardants.   That seems prudent -- PBDEs may be bad, but fire is bad too, and other fire retardants may be no safer.  Phasing out deca makes sense, provided that there are good alternatives.

Which brings me to my second piece of news: here's a press release that recently landed in my inbox, about a new fire inhibitor -- something even better than a flame retardant.  I mention this mostly  because I was once a young boy, and thus a pyromaniac, and there's a really cool video of a room treated with flame retardants that totally goes up in flames.  Rockin!

(The video's kind of hard to find:  follow this link, click on "AF21" and then "demo". )

Yesterday was the first anniversary of giving up (OK, totaling) our family car.

To mark the occasion: a tally of our accomplishments, followed by an announcement of our plans.

Driving: We reduced our driving by two-thirds compared to our average in recent years. We drove 90 percent less than the average US family of our size and income. We drove about 2,500 miles—about 7 miles a day on average—in Flexcars (mostly), carpools that went out of their way to pick us up (often), and borrowed cars (occasionally).