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A group of chemicals known as polybrominated diphenyl ethers that are widely used as flame retardants are so harmful Environment Canada has added them to the country's list of toxic chemicals and wants manufacturers banned from making them.

Environment Canada is proposing a ban on two formulations no longer made in North America, but it is allowing continued use of the most common type.

Despite these indications of potential harm, the most widely made type of the flame retardants, called decaPBDE, will continue to be used in Canada if it is imported in consumer products and by industry.

Although PBDEs are used in Canada, they aren't made in the country, and environmentalists say any ban on domestic manufacturing would be meaningless if the government provides a huge loophole for continued public exposure through imports.

The government's proposal “is pretty toothless,” says Elaine MacDonald, a scientist at the Sierra Legal Defence Fund. “The fact that you've just labelled it as toxic but then you're not taking the next step, which is to ban it, is not effective.”

Environmentalists are accusing the government of proposing regulations that will allow a dangerous chemical to remain in use.

“By not comprehensively banning all PBDEs, notably the decaPBDEs, the Harper government is regulating the status quo, essentially avoiding the most serious aspects of this problem and giving the Canadian public a mistaken impression of action,” said Kathleen Cooper, a senior researcher with the Canadian Environmental Law Association.

Almost everyone in Canada likely has some exposure to PBDEs, which have been used since the 1970s in products such as home electronics, computers, cars, carpets, clothes and furniture.

When PBDEs were first used, there was little indication they might be dangerous, and it was thought they would save lives by reducing the number of fires.

But scientists have now been expressing increasing alarm about them because the chemical has begun seeping out of consumer products and is accumulating in the tissues of people and wildlife. It is not clear how the chemical is released from products but it's commonly found in household and office dust, believed to be the largest route by which people are being exposed.

The human health effects of PBDEs are not fully known, but they have been found to interfere with thyroid hormones in animal tests using low levels of exposure, and some scientists suspect they are playing a role in the emergence of new health problems, such as attention deficit and hyperactivity disorders in children, among other problems.

This week, the Sierra Legal Defence Fund asked Environment Canada to set up a board of review to investigate whether Canada should have a full ban on all types of the chemical.

If Canada were to institute such a ban, it would be the first country in the world to do so.

Environment Canada defended its proposal yesterday.

The regulations “represent a first step in the management of PBDEs in Canada,” said France Jacovella, director in Environment Canada's pollution prevention department, who added that further restrictions, including measures on products containing the chemical, are under consideration.

Under Environment Canada's proposal, two mixtures of the chemical will be banned from use for health and environment reasons, although this move will have almost no consequences. The major manufacturer of the mixtures, Great Lakes Chemical Corp., voluntarily agreed to phase them out in 2004 under an agreement with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.