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POLYURETHANE FOAM ASSOCIATION SUPPORTS RESEARCH AND EDUCATIONAL WORK
TO ADDRESS HOME FURNISHINGS FLAMMABILITY ISSUES

WAYNE, NJ (May 21, 2001) - Members of the Polyurethane Foam Association (PFA) at its General Business Meeting held in Arlington, VA strongly supported the group's proactive efforts to help reduce the incidence of household fires involving home furnishings.

PFA members approved a position statement (copy attached) on residential furniture and mattress flammability. The majority of fires involving home furnishings are caused by smoldering ignition. And the home furnishings industries' efforts have been effective in realizing a significant reduction in the number of fires caused by smoldering heat sources. It is now time to address small open flame ignition and develop ways to achieve a reduction in the number of those fires.

To achieve that goal, PFA is working with industry and regulatory groups providing technical counsel and product samples as these groups conduct research in an attempt to identify flammability test procedures that correlate to real world fire performance of composite home furnishings products. PFA also pledged to support any resulting small open flame test procedure that is:

• Based on the composite performance of the finished piece including all items of assembly.
  Mattress testing should include bed clothing*
• Appropriate to the risk of small open flame ignition,
• Without bias toward any component,
• And, reproducible and technically feasible.

*Bed clothing (bedclothes) is defined as mattress covers, sheets, blankets, comforters, pillowcases and similar articles.

"PFA realizes that there is a significant technical challenge ahead. It is extremely difficult to predict actual fire behavior. We hope that by dealing with composite products, including outer coverings, that as many realistic fuel sources as possible will be considered in the research work. We know that the home furnishings industry and its many suppliers have a formidable task ahead to achieve a workable small open flame test procedure. By working together and sharing knowledge of our products' fire performance capabilities, I'm confident the industry will be successful," said PFA president Greg Davis of Wm. T. Burnett.

Lou Peters, PFA executive director, added, "There's much more to the fire safety issue than product testing and exploring various product construction options. We can't ignore the most common cause of household fires. Home fires are not started by a sofa or mattress. In most cases, fires are caused by errors in human behavior or oversight. PFA will continue its broad reaching fire safety and fire prevention educational activities. Also, we will be working to improve public knowledge and to raise the priority given fire prevention activities, and to encourage the installation and use of fire detection (smoke, heat and CO detectors) and suppression (extinguishers and residential sprinklers) systems."

PFA is a trade association comprised of United States flexible polyurethane foam (FPF) manufacturers and their suppliers. PFA manufacturing members account for about 70% of all domestic FPF production. FPF is used as a key comfort component in most upholstered furniture and mattress products and it plays an important fire safety role by helping to reduce smoldering ignition.

Since its founding in 1980, PFA has been heavily involved in consumer fire safety education. PFA also provides information to users of FPF regarding safe handling and storage procedures.

Position Statement on Residential Furniture and Mattress Flammability

May 21, 2001

Since its formation in 1980, the Polyurethane Foam Association (PFA), through its various fire safety efforts and its members' technologies, has been instrumental in helping to educate the users of flexible polyurethane foam (FPF) about the safe use and storage of the product and thereby contribute to reducing loss of life, injuries and property damage due to fires.

As the key comfort component in household furnishings products, FPF has been vital to United States mattress manufacturers by helping them comply with the Federal Flammability Standard for Mattresses (FF4-72) and by helping the residential upholstered furniture industry build products that comply with the voluntary UFAC performance standard. The efforts of the mattress and upholstered furniture industries, along with a reduction in the number of smokers, have been effective in helping to significantly reduce the incidence of household fire fatalities resulting from smoldering ignition by cigarettes. While smoldering ignition remains the most common cause of fires that originate in household furnishings products, it is important to achieve a further reduction in the number of fires that originate in household furnishings ignited by small open flame sources such as matches, disposable lighters and candles.

In addressing small open flame ignition fires with home furnishings, all of the flammable components present in the composite item play an important role. In the case of a smoldering heat source, which burns through the outer layers of a composite, FPF helps reduce the chance of ignition. But, with a small open flame ignition source, those same outer layers can become significant fuel sources contributing to involvement of the composite product. Thus, to properly address ignition by small open flame, the burning characteristics of the composite product must be considered.

PFA position on residential mattress flammability by small flame ignition source

PFA supports the efforts of the Sleep Products Safety Council and the Consumer Product Safety Commission, which are engaged in research with a goal of developing a composite, end product performance-based small open flame ignition standard. PFA members are providing technical counsel and sample materials as part of the research process.

PFA position on residential upholstered furniture flammability

PFA is a member of the Intra-Industry Coalition and is participating in the Coalition's Small Open Flame Technical Committee (SOFTC) in its work to identify a small-scale, composite product bench test that correlates with the real world fire performance of residential upholstered furniture. A possible product of that research could be the creation of a component performance standard that suppliers could certify their products against.

PFA position on small open flame testing

With both residential mattress and residential upholstered furniture flammability testing, PFA will support any resulting small open flame ignition test protocol that is:

• Based on the composite performance of the finished piece including all items of assembly.
  Mattress testing should include bed clothing*
• Appropriate to the risk of small open flame ignition,
• Without bias toward any component,
• And, reproducible and technically feasible.

*Bed clothing (bedclothes) is defined as mattress covers, sheets, blankets, comforters, pillowcases and similar articles

Products that comply with any resulting test protocol should be:

• Commercially viable and saleable,
• And, effective in resisting ignition by small open flame without compromising smoldering ignition performance.

PFA position on fire prevention and fire safety education

PFA believes that broad educational efforts conducted on an ongoing basis can be effective in preventing household fires. In addition to educational efforts, the installation and use of fire detection (smoke, heat and CO detectors) and suppression systems (extinguishers and sprinklers) are also important elements of a successful fire safety program.