INSIDE TSCA

EPA, Petitioners Outline Schedule For Resuming TSCA Asbestos Litigation

EPA and petitioners in consolidated litigation challenging the Biden-era TSCA rule phasing out six uses of chrysotile asbestos are proposing a schedule for resuming briefing in the case after the 5th Circuit last month accepted EPA’s withdrawal of its June request to further delay the case. In an Aug. 8 joint motion , the parties propose a Sept. 17 deadline for reply briefs from the petitioners, with 9,000 words of briefing to be divided among United Steelworkers, Asbestos Disease Awareness...

EPA Seeks Participants For TSCA Small Business Review Panels

EPA is seeking participants for a pair of small business advocacy review panels (SBARs) to provide recommendations on how the agency should craft TSCA risk management rules for formaldehyde and legacy uses and disposal of asbestos while still weighing whether SBAR panels are necessary for three other rules. The agency is seeking self-nominations directly from small entities that may be subject to the requirements of the formaldehyde and so-called asbestos part 2 rules, although other representatives, such as trade associations...

Observers See TSCA Reform Continuing Amid OCSPP Pick’s Moderate Views

Douglas Troutman, President Donald Trump’s pick to serve as EPA’s chemicals chief, brings a “middle-of-the-road” perspective and an interest in improving TSCA new-chemical reviews, observers say, though he is still widely expected to advance the Trump EPA’s deregulatory agenda amid staffing uncertainty and stakeholder clashes. Trump nominated Troutman , acting CEO and general counsel of the American Cleaning Institute (ACI) -- formerly the Soap and Detergent Association -- to head the Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention (OCSPP) on...

FDA Poised To Respond To Suit Seeking First-Time Limits On Phthalates

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is scheduled to file a response in the D.C. circuit next week to a lawsuit that represents the latest fight in a long-running push by environmentalists to revoke the allowance of phthalates in food-contact materials -- which many scientists say is the primary exposure pathway for most people. The issue of phthalates in food has been a point of contention in discussions over how EPA evaluates phthalates risk under the Toxic Substances Control Act...

Citing Ruling, PCRM Seeks To Toughen TSCA’s Limits On Animal Testing

Citing a landmark appellate court ruling, an animal rights group is developing a list of proposed legislative reforms that will strengthen TSCA’s current provisions on reducing animal testing and bolstering newer, non-animal testing methods should Congress make legislative changes to the statue alongside reauthorizing EPA’s TSCA fees. A source with Physicians Committee on Responsible Medicine (PCRM) tells Inside TSCA the group is looking mostly for changes to TSCA section 4, which discusses chemical testing authorities. The group is seeking...

Environmentalists, Industry Attack TSCA Cumulative Phthalates Assessment

Environmentalists and industry groups are criticizing EPA’s novel approach to analyzing the cumulative risk of phthalates, alleging that methodological deficiencies in documents currently undergoing peer review resulted in assessments that either understand or overstated risk. During an Aug. 4 meeting of the agency’s Science Advisory Committee on Chemicals (SACC), representatives from the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) and the Program for Reproductive Health and the Environment (PRHE) at the University of California San Francisco argued that EPA used too-low exposure data...

Industry Urges DTSC To Scale Back Plan To List Microplastics Under SCP

Industry groups are urging California’s Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC) to scale back an ambitious plan to add microplastics to the “candidate chemicals” list under its Safer Consumer Products (SCP) green chemistry program, arguing in part that the plan’s “overly broad definition” for the material could actually hurt consumers. [We] urge DTSC to consider the scientific nuances of microchemistries and implement exclusions to the definition for safety and sustainability-driven innovations,” writes Dan Selechnik, director of environmental health and safety...

EPA Sends Revised TSCA ‘Framework’ Rule For White House Review

The Trump EPA has submitted for White House review its draft proposed rule to replace the Biden-era “framework” rule laying out procedures for evaluating existing chemicals under TSCA just days after it told a federal court it was “very close” to releasing the plan. The White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) received the proposed rule Aug. 4, according to OMB’s website. OMB review generally is expected to take around 90 days, but can be slower, or in rare...

ACC Urges Court To Reverse Fluoride Ruling, Limit De Novo TSCA Review

Chemical manufacturers are calling on the 9th Circuit to reverse a district judge’s novel ruling ordering EPA to regulate drinking water fluoridation under TSCA, joining the Trump EPA in arguing that the judge should not have considered any evidence beyond that in the TSCA section 21 “citizen’s petition” that EPA first denied in 2016. “Section 21 actions were meant only as a backstop to ensure EPA responds promptly to petitions for rulemaking. The decision below, regrettably, made section 21 litigation...

Battery Makers Withdraw Second TSCA Petition Over TCE Phaseout Rule

Battery manufacturers have withdrawn their TSCA petition asking EPA to reduce the Biden-era workplace safety standards in the agency’s 2024 TSCA rule on the common solvent trichloroethylene (TCE), as well as further extending a 20-year phaseout period for one company’s use of TCE, just days before the agency was slated to respond. The trade group Alliance for a Strong U.S. Battery Sector and Microporous, LLC, submitted a July 25 letter to EPA withdrawing its joint Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA)...

Academics, Scientists Question Draft TSCA Phthalates Risk Evaluations

A group of scientists and academics are questioning the soundness of a set of draft TSCA documents evaluating the risk of several phthalates that an EPA advisory committee will peer review next week, arguing the agency rejected hundreds of studies from its analyses and used approaches that appear to underestimate the chemicals’ risks to human health. For all of the phthalates it reviewed, “EPA used an outdated and flawed systematic review methodology and excluded studies without scientific justification,” Rashmi Joglekar,...

EPA Draft Evaluations For DIBP, BPP Find Some Unreasonable Risks

EPA has released draft TSCA risk evaluations for phthalates known as DIBP and BPP that find the chemicals present some unreasonable risk of injury to human health based on exposure to workers as well as unreasonable risks to the environment from some conditions of use (COUs) -- TSCA’s trigger to develop risk management rules. The evaluations of di-isobutyl phthalate (DIBP) and butyl benzyl phthalate (BBP) are two in a package of six phthalate risk evaluations EPA is conducting under the...

Trump Nominates ACI Executive To Serve As EPA Chemicals Chief

President Donald Trump has nominated Douglas Troutman, the acting CEO and general counsel of the cleaning industry’s trade group, to serve as EPA’s next chemicals chief, picking a nominee with a commitment to consensus at a time when the TSCA program faces significant uncertainty and major clashes between industry and environmentalists. The White House July 30 transmitted Troutman’s nomination to be EPA’s “Assistant Administrator for Toxic Substances,” though the office he will lead if confirmed is the Office of Chemical...

Lawyers Warn Of Surge In Prop. 65 Enforcement Notices For BPS Exposure

Industry attorneys are warning clients about a surge in notices to sue under California’s Proposition 65 toxic warning label law for alleged exposure to bisphenol-S (BPS), a chemical used in plastics but also in thermal receipt paper, packing slips, stickers and shipping labels. “A review of the Prop. 65 60-Day Notice database maintained by the California Attorney General’s [AG] office reveals a dramatic spike in BPS-related notices in the first half of 2025. Over 325 notices for BPS have been...

EPA Seeks New Comments On TSCA PCE Rule To Aid Reconsideration

EPA has opened a new public comment period on the Biden-era TSCA risk management rule on the common solvent perchloroethylene (PCE or perc) to assist the agency as it “reconsiders” the rule and whether it should be revised. The agency “is seeking public comment to inform its reconsideration of the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) regulation for . . . PCE,” a July 30 Federal Register notice states. “This request for public comment follows the filing of several legal...

EPA, Industry Seek More Time For Talks Over TSCA Reporting Rule

EPA and industry petitioners are asking the D.C. Circuit to continue its pause of industry’s challenge to the Biden-era TSCA section 8(d) health and safety reporting rule to allow settlement talks to continue, after the Trump EPA last month pushed off the rule’s reporting deadlines by one year. “Petitioners American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers [AFPM], American Petroleum Institute, Acetaldehyde Consortium, and Aniline Consortium and Respondent . . . EPA hereby move this Court to extend the abeyance in this case...

EPA ‘Very Close’ To Releasing Draft Of Revised TSCA Framework Rule

EPA is telling the D.C. Circuit that it is “very close” to releasing its revised draft replacement to the Biden-era “framework” rule laying out procedures for evaluating existing chemicals under TSCA, after the court placed challenges to it in abeyance last spring on EPA’s promise of issuing such a draft in June. In a July 29 report to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, the agency says it “has advised the parties that it is...

EPA Asks 9th Circuit To Extend Pause In EDF, States’ 1,4-Dioxane Suit

EPA is asking the 9th Circuit to continue its extended abeyance in environmentalists’ and states’ 2021 challenge to the first Trump administration’s TSCA evaluation of 1,4-dioxane and associated findings of “no unreasonable risk” for certain uses of the solvent, to allow newer litigation over Biden-era changes to the evaluation and findings to play out. “Continuing the abeyance in this case thus remains appropriate pending a resolution in Union Carbide ” Corp. (UCC) v. EPA before the U.S. Court of...

Senate Seeks $16 Million FY26 Boost To TSCA Program, Teeing Up Debate

Senate appropriators are seeking to provide EPA with almost $113 million for TSCA risk and reduction activities in fiscal year 2026, a $16.6 million boost over FY25 levels, teeing up a potential debate with House appropriators and the Trump administration, which are both seeking to provide significantly less for the program. The Senate appropriations committee voted 26-2 July 24 to approve EPA’s FY2026 spending legislation and advance it to the Senate floor for a vote. Once approved by the full...

8th Circuit Extends Pause On TSCA CTC Rule Suit For EPA ‘Review’

The 8th Circuit has approved EPA’s request for an extended pause in consolidated challenges to the Biden-era TSCA rule on the solvent carbon tetrachloride (CTC or CCl4), a move that will give officials the time they say they need to complete their review of the rule while they have been reassessing other Biden-era TSCA regulations. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit’s July 25 order grants the Justice Department’s extended abeyance request for EPA, “until September 2, 2025,...

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