Silicone contaminants could drift north: researchers

Silicone-based chemicals used in some hair and body products are raising alarm among scientists who say such pollutants could enter the Arctic environment and end up in the northern food chain.

Traces of the silicone-based chemicals are already showing up in the Great Lakes and in urban areas down south, said Derek Muir, a research scientist with Environment Canada. Should those chemicals drift northward, they could build up in the food chain and affect human health, he added.

"Silicone-based chemicals that are used in personal care products and so on … we haven't actually detected them in the Canadian Arctic, but in Scandinavia, there is evidence that they're showing up at least in remote areas," Muir said last week during the annual northern contaminants workshop in Lake Louise, Alta.

"We're gearing up in the future to look for these particular class of chemicals because there are some concerns about their properties."

Pollutants that make their way to the Arctic are resistant to breaking down in the atmosphere and in the water. Muir said his research team recently reviewed thousands of chemicals used in Canada, finding that several had properties enabling them to travel around the world and accumulate in the Arctic food chain.

Chemical pollutants have already been detected in the North, including those used in stain repellents and flame-retardant materials, as they travel northward from industrialized regions.

Robert Letcher, another Environment Canada researcher who studies contaminants in polar bears, said those chemicals could affect human health or behaviour.

"These are used as surfactants and stain-resistant materials in carpets, and then we have a broad sweep of chemicals known as brominated flame retardants," said Letcher, who is also a adjunct professor at Carleton University in Ottawa.

Muir said as scientists develop a better understanding of which chemicals are a hazard to the northern environment and northerners' food, companies will be ableto ensure such chemicals don't end up on the market in the first place.

The Northern Contaminants Program workshop, which ran Oct. 2-4 in Lake Louise, brought together more than 130 northern leaders, scientists and representatives from various federal departments and organizations to discuss toxic contaminants research in the North.