Does green styrofoam contain lead or other hazardous chemicals?

Question

I do a lot floral arranging, for which I use a lot of green styrofoam from Michael's. After all those lead warnings, I wonder if green styrofoam contains lead, or other hazardous chemicals. The green styrofoam I use tends to powder a lot. My hands always end up coating with those green powder rubbed off from the green styrofoam when I play with it. Do you know where I can get styrofoam of better quality? Many thanks.

Answer 1

The lead in the plastics which you have heard about so recently comes from lead salts which have been added to stabilize the plastic, so that it remains soft after being formed in a hot mold.  Without the stabilizers, those soft vinyl lunch bags wouldn't be very soft.  Vinyl is pretty much the only plastic to which lead is added.

Styrofoam is produced from pellets which are a combination of polystyrene and a blowing agent, probably pentane or CO2.  There is no need to add a stabilizer to the mix, and the resulting Styrofoam product is inert, and any harmful gases have been left at the factory.

So don't worry and keep arranging your flowers.  But be wary of those fake vinyl daffodils from China.