ISSUE: Inside TSCA

EPA Asks 9th Circuit To Remand DecaBDE Rule For New Proposal In 2023

EPA has asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit to pause environmentalists’ suit over a Trump-era rule barring uses of a persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic (PBT) flame retardant chemical and remand it to the agency for reconsideration, vowing to move quickly on a new proposal it says will be published in the spring of 2023. “Petitioners would not suffer undue prejudice if the Court grants EPA’s motion,” reads EPA’s March 15 motion for remand in the joint...

EPA Hints At Settlement Talks In Challenge To PFAS TRI Listings

EPA says it is “discussing” a possible “resolution” to environmentalists’ suit over its Trump-era framework for listing per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI), which the groups claim allowed industry to take advantage of several improper “loopholes” despite Congress’ intent for a strict reporting mandate. In an unopposed March 3 motion to the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, EPA asked -- and quickly received -- an extension of its deadline to respond to...

SACC Doubts TSCA Fenceline Method Despite EPA Push For Lenient Review

Members of EPA’s Science Advisory Committee on Chemicals (SACC) are questioning whether the agency’s draft TSCA screening method for identifying risks to fenceline communities can achieve that goal without significant changes, even after chemicals chief Michal Freedhoff warned that a lengthy screening process could unduly delay “urgent” rules. In early remarks during their March 15-17 peer review meeting for the screening method, many SACC panelists voiced concerns the approach ignores too many exposure pathways and has other flaws that may...

EPA Targets Fluorinated Plastics Over PFAS Pesticide Contamination

EPA is warning industry that it could take TSCA enforcement action over per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) when it is found as a contaminant in certain fluorinated plastics, in its latest response to the 2020 discovery of the chemicals in a common pesticide, and a reminder of the ongoing push to limit new PFAS uses. “The agency is notifying companies of their obligation to comply with existing requirements under the Toxics Substances Control Act (TSCA) to ensure unintentional PFAS contamination...

Freedhoff Aims To Balance TSCA Fenceline Screenings With Rules’ ‘Urgency’

Chemicals chief Michal Freedhoff told EPA science advisors on March 15 that the agency see its screenings of Trump-era TSCA evaluations for fenceline community exposures as a difficult balancing act, where insufficient action could leave out vulnerable communities while formally supplementing the documents will delay regulations by a year or more. In her opening address to the Science Advisory Committee on Chemicals’ (SACC) three-day peer review meeting of the fenceline screening approach, Freedhoff said that while she believes there were...

Unions Urge EPA To Better Understand OSHA Rules In TSCA Evaluations

Major labor unions are warning EPA that while they support its efforts to strengthen consideration of workplace protective gear in chemical risk evaluations, officials “misunderstand” OSHA’s requirements and have failed to fully address harsh interagency criticisms on the subject that were issued in response to a draft Trump-era chemical review. In comments on draft revisions to EPA’s Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) final evaluation of the flame retardant cluster HBCD, auto and other unions charge that although they support the...

White House Questions EPA’s Data Choices In Draft PFHxA Assessment

Key agencies are questioning EPA’s decision to rely on data from animal testing instead of human epidemiology in its draft risk assessment of a per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) known as perfluorohexanoic acid (PFHxA), with key White House offices saying that its use of the studies was “overly conservative.” The warning, from the White House offices of Management and Budget (OMB) and Science & Technology Policy (OSTP) and several other agencies, were spelled out in interagency comments on a draft...

EPA Outlines Research Plan To ‘Modernize’ TSCA New Chemicals Reviews

EPA’s toxics and research offices have released a draft agenda for their recently announced joint effort to “modernize” the TSCA program’s approach to reviewing new chemicals, outlining “a multi-year collaborative research program” that also involves the National Toxicology Program (NTP) and is already partly underway. On March 10, the Office of Pollution Prevention and Toxics (OPPT) and Office of Research and Development (ORD) posted “ a high-level overview ” of their action plan for Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) new-chemical...

EPA Floats Consolidated TSCA Section 8 ICRs

EPA has announced that it plans to renew and consolidate several information collection requests (ICRs) that implement various data-gathering programs authorized by TSCA section 8, framing the move as needed to comply with the Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA). “EPA is consolidating several ICRs covering reporting and recordkeeping activities under TSCA Section 8 to streamline the presentation of the paperwork burden estimates for these various activities and eliminate any duplication, which will in turn is expected to reduce the administrative burden...

Suit Over Transparency Of EPA’s New Chemicals Program Heads To Court

EPA and environmental groups are poised to begin active litigation as soon as this month in the groups’ long-pending suit seeking greater transparency and public engagement on TSCA reviews of new chemicals, following more than a year of negotiations that both sides now say will conclude this month. In a joint case management statement dated March 2, both sides in Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), et al., v. EPA say they plan to file “by the end of March” stipulations...

Groups Say TSCA Systematic Review Draft Repeats Some Trump-Era Flaws

Academics and environmental groups are charging that even though EPA has vowed to drop a Trump-era approach to systematic review for TSCA evaluations the agency’s draft replacement maintains several key elements that peer-reviewers found to be deeply flawed, warning that ongoing reviews may already be “compromised” by the new framework. In comments on EPA’s draft Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) systematic review approach, experts in the discipline associated with the University of California San Francisco’s Program on Reproductive Health and...

COVID-19 Disinfectant Maker Agrees To $253,032 EPA Penalty

EPA has settled an enforcement case against a Texas firm that previously won emergency approval for a “durable” COVID-19 surface disinfectant, only to lose that emergency authorization in 2021 over allegations that it sold the product outside the narrow terms the agency set at the time. On March 10, EPA announced a settlement with Allied Bioscience , manufacturer of the disinfectant SurfaceWise2, that includes a $253,032 penalty for violations of the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA). “EPA investigations...

California, Environmentalists Urge EPA To Bolster TSCA ‘Fenceline’ Method

California regulators and environmentalists are urging EPA to expand the screening approach it will use to identify risks to fenceline communities in TSCA chemical evaluations, arguing the agency should set up its consideration of cumulative or aggregate exposures through various exposure pathways to more holistically consider communities’ risks. In comments filed with EPA ahead of science advisors’ scheduled March 15-17 peer review of the draft screening method, both California’s Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC) and Earthjustice praised the agency’s...

GOP’s Kennedy Raises Integrity Warning For IRIS Formaldehyde Peer Review

Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) is asking the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) to replace a staffer slated to oversee peer review of EPA’s draft Integrated Risk Information System (IRIS) assessment of formaldehyde, arguing that the officer’s past role as a senior IRIS scientist “risks undermining” the body’s impartiality. In a March 2 letter to Clifford Duke, director of the science academy’s Board on Environmental Studies and Toxicology, Kennedy argues that NASEM’s current staff officer’s “direct and personal...

EPA Agrees To ‘Tentative’ Deal In Suit Over Long-Delayed TRI Listing Of DINP

EPA could soon agree to a deadline to take final action on its 21-year-old proposal to list diisononyl phthalate (DINP) on the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI), after reaching a “tentative” settlement with environmental and public-health groups that have argued data from the inventory will aid a pending TSCA evaluation of the chemical. District Judge Haywood S. Gilliam on March 7 approved a joint stipulation in Breast Cancer Prevention Partners (BCPP), et al., v. EPA where attorneys for the two...

OSTP Eyes Early Steps To Define ‘Sustainable Chemistry’ Under 2021 Law

The White House’s Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) is readying a request for information (RFI) that an official says will seek public input on the definition of “sustainable chemistry” -- a key subject for OSTP as it seeks to implement a 2021 law requiring it to advance the discipline. During a March 8 panel discussion at the online Green Chemistry and Commerce (GC3) Roundtable conference, OSTP Assistant Director Of Environmental Health Melanie Buser said “we’re hoping to post”...

Environmentalists Say TSCA Requires ‘Whole Chemical’ Risk Approach

Environmental groups are attacking EPA’s plan to decide on a case-by-case basis whether to apply its novel “whole chemical” approach to identifying risk in TSCA evaluations or instead apply the Trump-era model of separate determinations for individual uses, arguing the law requires a single risk finding for each substance as a whole. In a comment letter dated Feb. 14 but posted to an online docket March 8 on EPA’s proposal to add a whole-chemical risk finding to its Toxic Substances...

DOD Continues Push To Develop PFAS-Free Foam As Deadline Looms

Defense Department (DOD) officials are continuing their efforts to develop firefighting foam that does not contain per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) ahead of a looming Oct. 1, 2023, statutory deadline to publish a military specification for a fluorine-free fire-fighting agent and a 2024 deadline to bar use of PFAS-based foams. Robin Nissan, a program manager with DOD’s Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program (SERDP), said during a March 7 webinar on sustainable chemistry sponsored by the Green Chemistry and Commerce...

EPA Acknowledges Call For Probabilistic Risk Analysis In D4 Evaluation

EPA is acknowledging that is should consider academic scientists’ calls to adopt probabilistic dose-response analysis methods in its TSCA evaluation of a siloxane, an approach that supporters say would shore up the scientific basis of any evaluation, though the agency is sidestepping how it plans to assess the issue. “The suggestion for employing probabilistic methods for dose-response analysis of cancer and non-cancer endpoints is a valid point for Agency consideration during dose-response analysis, after the ongoing hazard data evaluation is...

EPA Aims To Toughen, Expand List Of Products Subject To Green Purchasing

EPA is seeking to expand the number of product categories subject to its sustainable federal purchasing program while eliminating a preference for products that lack independent certification after its recent release of new criteria aimed at limiting procurement of products containing per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). During a March 2 webinar , agency officials announced a series of steps to fulfill its obligations to assist the federal government’s move toward Environmentally Preferable Purchasing (EPP), in compliance with a recent executive...

Pages

Not a subscriber? Request 30 days free access to exclusive environmental policy reporting.