EDF Health

Should we continue to take the chemical industry at its word when it insists it’s still for TSCA reform?

By / Published: July 28, 2010

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

I’m one of those throwbacks that loves to read a hard copy of a newspaper in the morning.  One thing the hard copies provide that reading online doesn’t is the ability to take in those full-page paid ads that Corporate America runs on a virtually daily basis.

Lately, not surprisingly, ads from “the people of America’s oil and natural gas industry” – aka the American Petroleum Institute (API) – are appearing frequently in the New York Times and Washington Post.  In one recent ad, API asserts:  “Above all else, the people of America’s oil and natural gas industry are committed to safe operations.”  That one is a little hard to swallow, coming as it does not only right on the heels of the largest environmental disaster in American history, but after years of staunch opposition to stronger safety regulation.  It seems API is now all for safety, after years of being against it.

This got me thinking about the chemical industry.  The industry’s main trade association, the American Chemistry Council (ACC), now says it’s all for “modernizing” TSCA, after years of opposing any such effort.  Why am I getting suspicious that there may be no there there?  Read More »

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More than weather heating up in DC: Rush-Waxman House bill puts TSCA reform back on front burner

By / Published: July 22, 2010

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

We’ve just moved another step closer to protecting Americans and our environment from dangerous chemicals.

The Toxic Chemicals Safety Act of 2010 (H.R. 5820) has been formally introduced by Congressmen Bobby Rush (D-IL) and Henry Waxman (D-CA).  The legislation would implement a top-to-bottom overhaul of the outmoded and ineffectual 1976 Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA).  Read More »

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A glimmer of good news flowing from the Gulf’s other recent disaster

By / Published: June 18, 2010

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

I’ve been blogging for some weeks now about how we may be compounding the problems of the BP oil disaster through our massive use of inadequately tested and ineffective dispersants.  There’s an eerie echo in these events to the compounding effects of decisions made in the wake of the Gulf region’s last major disaster, 2005’s Hurricane Katrina: specifically, the decision to house victims forced out of their homes in trailers made from imported plywood that exposed them to toxic levels of formaldehyde, a known human carcinogen.

In what I choose to regard as a silver lining arising from this earlier debacle, the U.S. Congress is finally – nearly five years later – inching toward passing legislation that seeks to prevent a repeat of that episode, by putting limits on how much formaldehyde can be emitted from imported and domestically manufactured pressed wood products.  Read More »

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Are you a guinea pig?

By / Published: June 15, 2010

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

The answer to that question — or at least what should be the answer — is the name of a new campaign launched today by Environmental Defense Fund, in cooperation with the Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families coalition and a number of its member organizations.

I Am Not a Guinea Pig is a new online campaign that provides tools and information Americans from all walks of life can use to press for fundamental reform of our nation’s toxic chemical law, the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA).

I Am Not a Guinea Pig is aimed at helping to ensure that the voices of millions of Americans who are concerned about and affected by exposures to untested and unsafe chemicals are heard as Congress begins the first serious effort to overhaul the 34-year-old TSCA.

The campaign will use a variety of social media, including a website, a Facebook page with daily updates, and a #NAGP Twitter hashtag.

Our thanks go out to our partners in Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families with whom we’ve worked in our initial effort: Autism Society, Health Care Without Harm, Learning Disabilities Association of America, Moms Rising, Reproductive Health Technologies Project and Teens Turning Green.

The campaign initially focuses on three groups at particular risk from toxic chemical exposures:  teens, children and health professionals.  We’ll be expanding the campaign over time to include others at risk, and we’ll continue until we’ve achieved the campaign’s fundamental aim:  a strong new chemicals policy in the United States that protects all Americans from toxic chemicals.

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Dispersants are a teachable moment for TSCA reform

By / Published: June 10, 2010

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

The Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families campaign just held a press call to draw direct links between the huge unknowns associated with the unprecedented use of chemical dispersants in the Gulf and the failures of TSCA.  The campaign called upon Congress to ensure that legislation to reform TSCA fully addresses dispersant safety so that, the next time a disaster of this sort unfolds, the country won’t be caught with its proverbial pants down.

While the reform bills would go a long way to improve the situation, the campaign also provided a detailed description of enhancements to the current reform bills needed to address:

  • the lack of public access to sufficient information about dispersants, their ingredients and their concentrations;
  • the lack of adequate safety testing for long- as well as short-term effects on both marine environments and people, including affected workers, volunteers and nearby residents;
  • the lack of a requirement that dispersants be shown to be safe as a condition for allowed use; and
  • the lack of adequate EPA authority to disallow unsafe dispersants and to halt or alter dispersant use based on on-the-ground developments.

As the legislation advances, we will be pressing Congress to include additional provisions to address these deficiencies.  There could be no better illustration of the limits to our current policies than that provided by government’s forced reliance on under-tested chemical dispersants the use of which is raising more questions than answers.

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Side-by-sides of TSCA, Senate bill and House discussion draft

By / Published: June 5, 2010

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

I have updated and made some minor corrections to the summary chart I posted earlier comparing current TSCA to the proposed TSCA reform legislation (Senate bill and House discussion draft) at the 10,000 foot level. It’s displayed below.

In addition, I have prepared a much more detailed side-by-side of the Senate bill and House discussion draft, which I’m posting here as a PDF.

Currently under TSCA Under the Senate and House proposals
DATA:  Few data call-ins are issued, even fewer chemicals are required to be tested and no minimum data set is required even for new chemicals. Up-front data call-ins for all chemicals would be required.  A minimum data set (MDS) on all new and existing chemicals sufficient to determine safety would be required to be developed and made public.
BURDEN OF PROOF:  EPA is required to prove harm before it can regulate a chemical. Industry would bear the legal burden of proving their chemicals are safe.
SAFETY ASSESSMENT:  No mandate exists to assess the safety of existing chemicals.  New chemicals undergo a severely time-limited and highly data-constrained review. All chemicals, new and existing, would be subject to safety determinations (in the case of certain new chemicals, at some point after entry into commerce).
SCOPE OF ASSESSMENT:  Where the rare chemical assessment is undertaken, there is no requirement to assess exposure to all sources of exposure to a chemical, or to assess risk to vulnerable populations. The safety standard would require the assessment of a chemical to account for aggregate and cumulative exposures to all uses and sources, and to ensure protection of vulnerable populations that may be especially susceptible to chemical effects (e.g., children, the developing fetus) or subject to disproportionately high exposure (e.g., low-income communities living near contaminated site or chemical production facilities).  “Hot spots” would be specifically identified and addressed.
REGULATORY ACTION:  Even chemicals of highest concern, such as asbestos, have not been able to be regulated under TSCA’s “unreasonable risk” cost-benefit standard.  Instead, assessments often drag on indefinitely without conclusion or decision. Chemicals would be assessed against a health-based standard, and deadlines for decisions would be specified.  Chemicals of highest concern would be subject to expedited safety determinations and/or actions to reduce use or exposure to them.
INFORMATION ACCESS:  Companies are free to claim, often without providing any justification, most information they submit to EPA to be confidential business information (CBI), denying access to the public and even to state and local government.  EPA is not required to review such claims, and the claims never expire. All CBI claims would have to be justified up front.  EPA would be required to review them, and only approved claims would stand.  Approved claims would expire after a period of time.  Other levels of government would have access to CBI.
RULEMAKING REQUIREMENTS: To require testing or take other actions, EPA must promulgate regulations that take many years and resources to develop. In addition to the MDS requirement, EPA would have authority to issue an order rather than a regulation to require reporting of existing data or additional testing.
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