Tag Archives: consumer products

A pivotal moment for TSCA reform

By | Bio | Published: July 24, 2012

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Senior Scientist.

We have reached a pivotal moment in the quest for meaningful reform of the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA):  On Wednesday the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee will mark up a new and improved version of the Safe Chemicals Act.  To my knowledge, this will be the first time a vote has been taken in the U.S. Congress to amend the basic provisions of TSCA since its passage in 1976.

The markup will come after today’s oversight hearing in the same committee spurred by a set of events that couldn’t provide a better poster child for why this law needs so badly to be overhauled:  An exposé published in the Chicago Tribune on the massive use in everyday household items of a set of flame retardant chemicals that were grandfathered in under TSCA 36 years ago along with more than 60,000 others.  Their safety was never required to be determined, let alone established – yet we now know these toxic chemicals not only do not serve their claimed purpose, but are so persistent in the environment and build up in people such that every American – including newborn babies – carries them in our bodies.

While we still have quite a ways to go to achieve real and lasting TSCA reform, the new language represents real progress toward the “sweet spot” – striking the right balance between the dual needs of ensuring vital public health protections, sustaining the economic health of the chemical industry and spurring it to innovate toward safer chemicals.  Any objective reader of the new language will see, for example, that it better tailors and paces information requirements, ensures speed to market for new chemicals, and enhances protection of companies’ proprietary interests in chemicals they develop.

The changes reflect the sustained efforts of a group of diverse stakeholders who dedicated themselves over the last many months to seek out common ground and to provide substantive input on the legislation, often in the face of considerable opposition.  Relative to the introduced version of the Safe Chemicals Act of 2011, major sections have been completely rewritten to address key concerns heard from all stakeholders, including those not willing to come to the table.

While further progress is needed, the changes being made to the legislation are direct and tangible evidence of the fact that when stakeholders positively engage in the legislative process, the result is an improved bill.

EDF and the Safer Chemicals Healthy Families coalition stand committed to continuing to work after Wednesday’s markup with all parties willing to engage with us in good faith toward finding more common ground.  This week in particular, it is vital that those who have sought out such common ground stand behind the progress made to date and make clear they are committed to taking this forward.

 

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More evidence that protecting Americans from toxic chemicals is not a partisan issue

By | Bio | Published: July 9, 2012

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Senior Scientist.

Another encouraging sign emerged today that efforts to ensure the chemicals we all encounter every day are safe need not fall into the partisan food fight that seems to consume so much of Washington, DC these days:  A bipartisan group of 26 Senators — more than a quarter of the U.S. Senate — has sent a letter to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lisa Jackson in support of actions EPA is taking to limit Americans' exposure to a class of very toxic chemicals widely used for decades as flame retardants in furniture, electronics and even childrens' products.

The chemicals in question have gained even greater notoriety in recent months after an in-depth investigation published in the Chicago Tribune exposed a coordinated campaign of deception by the chemical and tobacco industries to hide the truth about these toxic chemicals.

The Senators' letter urges EPA to pursue a variety of actions on these chemicals, including to finalize proposed notification and testing rules — now undergoing public comment — as quickly as possible.  But the Senators also call attention to the severe limits on EPA's authority under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), and they urge prompt action to reform TSCA:

"While we commend the EPA for taking steps to address PBDEs, it is concerning that the agency must undertake lengthy rulemaking processes merely to secure additional health and safety data on a chemical of concern and to receive notifications regarding expansions of its uses.  Further, EPA is not evaluating steps to actually restrict existing unsafe production and uses of these toxic flame retardants.  This reinforces why there is broad agreement that TSCA must be reformed to protect American families from dangerous chemicals in a cost-effective way and we urge you to continue to work with Congress to enact consensus reforms."

The letter's signatories are as follows:

Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), Olympia Snowe (R-ME), Dick Durbin (D-IL), Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Chuck Schumer (D-NY), Susan Collins (R-ME), Ron Wyden (D-OR), Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Al Franken (D-MN), Joe Lieberman (I-CT), Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Tom Harkin (D-IA), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Jon Tester (D-MT), Jack Reed (D-RI), Tom Udall (D-NM), John Kerry (D-MA), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Maria Cantwell (D-WA), Sherrod Brown (D-OH), Daniel Akaka (D-HI), and Michael Bennet (D-CO).

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The beat goes on with 13 new additions to the Candidate List under REACH

By | Published: June 18, 2012

Allison Tracy is a Chemicals Policy Fellow. Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Senior Scientist.

The number of chemicals identified as “substances of very high concern” (SVHCs) in the European Union continues to grow.  With today’s addition of 13 new chemicals, there are now 84 entries (representing 92 Chemical Abstract Service (CAS) registration numbers) on REACH’s Candidate List for Substances of Very High Concern for Authorisation.

The European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) added the 13 chemicals based on each chemical’s classification as Carcinogenic, Mutagenic, or Toxic for Reproduction (CMR).  [UPDATE:  Of the new batch, two are among the 83 TSCA workplan chemicals recently identified by EPA as priorities for risk assessment, and five were reported as being in U.S. commerce in 2006.  With the new addition, a total of 48 of the 92 CAS numbers on the Candidate List were reported as in commerce in the U.S. in 2006.  Additionally, 20 of the 92 CAS numbers on the Candidate List are included among the TSCA workplan chemicals.] Read More »

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Lessons for us all in the passing of a giant: Nobelist Sherwood Rowland

By | Bio | Published: March 13, 2012

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Senior Scientist.

Today's New York Times logs a passing this past weekend that should be noted by any of us who consider ourselves to be a friend of science and the environment:  Dr. Sherwood Rowland, a modest but persistent chemist who, together with his colleague, Mario Molina, discovered that a class of synthetic chemicals — chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) — widely used at the time as propellants in aerosol cans and as refrigerants were tearing a hole in the ozone layer.

That discovery, reported in a seminal paper published in Nature in 1974, ultimately earned him the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1995.  In addition to the import of the discovery itself, however, there are several other aspects of this story that for me have considerable resonance in the current debate over chemicals policy.

Rowland found that even minute releases from consumer products of chemicals widely asserted to be wholly "inert" could persist and accumulate so as to cause potentially catastrophic effects at a global scale.  It is a case study of the ability of humans, through literally millions of individual decisions and events, to transform the health of the global environment – a huge wake-up call.

Yet this science was treated as virtual heresy at the time.  Major efforts were mounted by the chemical and affected consumer products industries to discredit his work; today's New York Times obituary reports:  "One article, in the trade publication Aerosol Age, accused him and Dr. Molina of being K.G.B. agents out to destroy capitalism."  And he was largely shunned by other academic chemists, reportedly receiving not a single invitation to lecture in a university chemistry department for a decade after the Nature paper was published.

Dr. Rowland also believed that the implications of his scientific discovery were so profound as to warrant his advocating for changes in policy.  A 1988 article about him in the Los Angeles Times reported that:

Rowland's wife, Joan, recalls one night in the fall of 1973 when her husband got home late from work. "How'd it go?" she had asked drowsily.  "It's going very well," he said. "It just means, I think, the end of the world."

It may well have, had not Rowland and many others taken that science and pressed for national and global action, an effort that led ulitmately to global adoption in 1987 of the Montreal Protocol, which bans virtually all uses of CFCs.

A good and timely reminder that, collectively, human activity even on a small individual scale, can both create health and environmental problems at a global scale, and — with sufficient political will backed by a conviction that science will ultimately prevail —  find and implement global solutions.

 

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Twin dangers from TCE: Widespread exposure, and now a strong link to Parkinson disease

By | Bio | Published: November 22, 2011

Jennifer McPartland, Ph.D., is a Health Scientist.

A study published online in the Annals of Neurology last week, “Solvent Exposures and Parkinson Disease Risk in Twins,” adds to scientific evidence linking exposure to the solvent trichloroethylene, or TCE, and other common solvents with onset of Parkinson disease.  Parkinson disease is a debilitating condition well known for symptoms of trembling but can also include slowed motion, impaired posture and balance, and loss of automatic movements (e.g. blinking, arm swaying when walking).  Most unfortunately, it has no cure. 

According to the authors, this new twin study is the first confirmation in a population-based study of a significant association between exposure to TCE and incidence of Parkinson disease.    Read More »

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ACC’s chemical prioritization tool: Helpful, but flawed and off the mark for EPA to use without TSCA reform

By | Bio | Published: September 20, 2011

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Senior Scientist.

As I noted in my last post, the American Chemistry Council (ACC) issued its own “prioritization tool” in anticipation of the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) public meetings  to get input on the approach it will use to identify additional chemicals of concern under its Enhanced Chemicals Management Program.

In the context of TSCA reform, various actors in the industry have long called for prioritization, often saying they support EPA’s ability to get off to a quick start on identifying chemicals for further work – only to propose schemes that are more likely to do the opposite.

ACC itself has over time come off as a bit schizophrenic on prioritization, apparently being for it before they were against it.  ACC’s release of its tool puts it squarely back in the pro-prioritization camp, but just what is it proposing?  My sense is it’s after something quite different from what EPA proposes, and frankly, different from what EPA is currently capable of deploying, given its limited authority and resources under TSCA.  In this sense, ACC’s proposal is more relevant in the context of TSCA reform, where we presumably would have an EPA with a mandate to review all chemicals in commerce, the authority to readily get the data it needs, and the resources required to execute the kind of comprehensive prioritization scheme ACC proposes.

But setting that disconnect aside for the moment, let’s delve a bit deeper into the ACC proposal on its own merits.  Read More »

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Gasping for breath: Asthma-inducing diisocyanates enter our homes and schools

By | Bio | Published: July 21, 2011

Johanna Katz is a Cornell Iscoll intern at EDF.  Jennifer McPartland, Ph.D., is a Health Scientist.

Toxic chemicals called diisocyanates are long-established as occupational hazards known to cause severe respiratory problems to workers who use or are otherwise exposed to them (see here).  In fact, diisocyanates are the number one cause of workplace-induced asthma (see here and here).  Recently, potential exposure of the general public to diisocyanates has grown, as these chemicals are increasingly used in consumer products.  This is certainly a troubling trend considering that the primary health effect of these chemicals, asthma, is a massive and growing public health problem, especially among children.  And some of the newest uses of diisocyanates are in products to which children are quite likely to be exposed.

Asthma is at an all-time high, affecting more than 24 million Americans, and creating astronomical health and productivity costs upwards of $20 BILLION each year.  And while diisocyanates are but one of many contributors to the increasing rate of asthma in the general population, we surely don’t need to be bringing more products containing such chemicals into our homes, schools, and workplaces. That will only make matters worse.

So what exactly are diisocyanate chemicals, where are they found, and what’s the federal government trying to do about them?  Read on to find out.  Read More »

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Funny name, serious concern: EPA proposes Significant New Use Rule for 14 glymes

By | Bio | Published: July 11, 2011

Allison Tracy is a Chemicals Policy Fellow. Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Senior Scientist.

EPA today proposed a Significant New Use Rule (SNUR) that, once finalized, would mandate that companies notify EPA prior to engaging in any “significant new use” of any of the 14 chemicals EPA has identified collectively as glymes.  Among other concerns, EPA has identified their use in various consumer products and their potential to cause reproductive and developmental toxicity.  For most of the glymes, the significant new use would be any use in a consumer product beyond those that are already ongoing.  For two of these chemicals, the significant new use would be any use.

This proposed SNUR, which was mired at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for more than six months, is now out for a 60-day public comment period.  A SNUR is essentially the only means available to EPA under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) by which it can try to limit the use of an existing chemical of concern.  It is far from a perfect means of doing so.

Nonetheless, within its limited authority under TSCA, today’s step by EPA brings at least some degree of scrutiny over a quite nasty group of chemicals.  Read More »

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Sludging through the nano lifecycle: Caution ahead

By | Bio | Published: September 23, 2010

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Senior Scientist.

Researchers at Virginia Tech have identified and characterized silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) in the sewage sludge produced by an operating municipal wastewater treatment plant.  The study is notable in several respects:  It is the first time AgNPs have been detected in a field-scale study, one of a real-world operation representative of a real-world exposure scenario to boot.  It shows that silver can exist in wastewater treatment products as nanoparticles.  It indicates such particles may be most likely to partition to sludge under common treatment technologies.  And it suggests that silver may be chemically transformed in the course of wastewater treatment.

The study did not demonstrate that the AgNPs detected in the sludge originated from products containing such nanoparticles, as some news stories have suggested, although the authors indicate such a source "is likely."  But the findings have important implications for nano safety nonetheless.  Read More »

Posted in Nanotechnology | Also tagged , | Comments closed

A minimum data set: Who needs it?

By | Bio | Published: April 18, 2010

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Senior Scientist.

Sound chemicals management and control demands sound information.  The Safer Chemicals Healthy Families coalition believes information sufficient to determine a chemical’s safety needs to be provided for all chemicals, as a condition for them to enter (for new chemicals) or remain (for existing chemicals) on the market.

Needed chemical information is not limited to test data, and even for types of data that can be derived from testing, alternative sources and approaches may be appropriately used.  Given the large number of chemicals for which information is needed, the availability of various sources of information, and the desirability of minimizing cost and use of laboratory animals, all reasonable efforts should be made to use existing information and data derived from the use of validated alternative methods – as long as the information they provide is current and scientifically reliable.

But who needs such information? Read More »

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