EDF Health

Selected tag(s): Lautenberg Act

Families speak out on trichloroethylene exposure: It’s time for EPA to act

By Sam Lovell / Published: August 1, 2018

Samantha Lovell is a Project Specialist. Lindsay McCormick, is a Project Manager.

Today, families from across the country came to Washington, DC to tell lawmakers how the toxic chemical trichloroethylene (TCE) has impacted their lives.

TCE is a known human carcinogen that is toxic to the immune system and kidneys, and can cause fetal heart damage – among other harmful health effects.  The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) proposed bans on high-risk uses of TCE under the newly reformed Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) back in December 2016 and January 2017, but under this Administration, the agency has abandoned these bans.

TCE is also one of the first 10 chemicals slated for a broad risk review by EPA under TSCA.  Unfortunately, EPA plans to ignore the major exposures Americans face from TCE and other toxic chemicals released to our air, water and land – yet another sign that EPA is giving in to the chemical industry to the detriment of the public’s health.

In a moving press conference today led by Sen. Tom Udall, several families shared their stories in an effort to pressure EPA to finalize the bans and take other necessary steps to protect communities across the country from TCE. Read More »

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PART 1: EPA rams through its reckless review scheme for new chemicals under TSCA, your health be damned

By Richard Denison / Published: August 1, 2018

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

Part 1               Part 2               Part 3

Overruling the recommendations of its own longtime professional staff, political appointees at EPA have begun green-lighting new chemicals to enter commerce using an approach that shows contempt for the letter and intent of the 2016 reforms to the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA).

EDF blogged recently about the new approach and how it drastically deviates from what the law requires.[pullquote]Now any company will be free to produce, import and use the chemical in any manner it chooses and without any obligation to inform EPA of its activities.[/pullquote]

Today EPA posted the first decision made under the new scheme:  It issued a “not likely to present an unreasonable risk” determination for a chemical that, according to its manufacturer International Flavors and Fragrances Inc., is to be imported for use “to reduce malodors.  It will be sold to industrial and commercial customers for their incorporation into industrial, commercial, and household consumer products such as floor cleaners, cat litters, fabric refresher sprays, Etc.”

The “not likely” finding means that International Flavors and Fragrances Inc. can commence manufacture and sale of the chemical, and will not be subject to any conditions or limits.  Once manufacture starts, the chemical will be placed on the TSCA Inventory, and that company or any other will be free to produce, import and use the chemical in any manner it chooses and without any obligation to inform EPA of its activities.   Read More »

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Six Senators key to TSCA reform question EPA’s new chemical reviews in letter to Wheeler

By Richard Denison / Published: July 24, 2018

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

In a letter sent today to the Environmental Protection Agency’s Acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler, six Senators who were instrumental to achieving the 2016 Lautenberg Act’s reforms to the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) raised “serious concern” about further weakening changes EPA is poised to make in its review of new chemicals.

EDF had blogged about the changes last week.

The Senators’ letter includes a “request that your staff brief our offices about the planned changes prior to moving to implement them.”

The letter was signed by Senators Tom Udall, Tom Carper, Sheldon Whitehouse, Ed Markey, Cory Booker, and Jeff Merkley.

The Senators noted that “While in the months after passage EPA began to implement these provisions in a manner we believe was faithful to both the letter and spirit of the law, beginning in the middle of last year EPA signaled it would change course by narrowing the scope of its new chemical reviews and the requisite risk determinations in a manner that deviated from the statute.”

EDF has for many months raised concerns over the steady effort by Trump Administration political appointees at EPA to undermine the provisions of the Lautenberg Act intended to significantly enhance EPA reviews of new chemicals prior to allowing them onto the market.  The latest moves deviate even further from the requirements of the new law and threaten public and worker health.

EDF hopes that today’s letter will help convince EPA to return to a lawful, health-protective approach to conducting reviews of new chemicals under TSCA.

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EDF submits comments for peer reviewers on EPA’s exposure, use and hazard information on five PBT chemicals

By Lindsay McCormick / Published: July 24, 2018

Lindsay McCormick, is a Project Manager. Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist.

Yesterday, EDF filed comments on several draft EPA documents that are part of the basis for developing restrictions EPA is required to impose on five persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic (PBT) chemicals under the 2016 reforms made to the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA).  The draft documents are to undergo peer review, and EDF’s comments raise issues we believe peer reviewers need to pay particular attention to.

As required by TSCA section 6(h), EPA last year identified five PBT chemicals (DecaBDE, HCBD, PCTP, PIP (3:1), and 2,4,6 TTBP) that meet the statutory criteria for “expedited action”: By June 22, 2019, EPA must propose a rule to restrict these five chemicals.  Last month, EPA released draft documents for peer review and public comment that summarize available hazard information and assess exposure and use of each of the five PBTs.

Our main points for consideration for the peer review committee are summarized below: Read More »

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Trump’s EPA pivots yet again on reviews of new chemicals under TSCA, leaving public and worker health in the dust

By Richard Denison / Published: July 17, 2018

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

EDF has learned from multiple sources that political appointees at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) are on the verge of taking yet another huge lurch away from what the 2016 reforms to the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) require when EPA reviews the safety of new chemicals prior to their market entry.  A reporter at Bloomberg Environment has heard the same thing, and published an article this morning on some of the changes.

The Trump EPA apparently intends to abandon its November 2017 “New Chemicals Decision-Making Framework,” which already strayed far from the law’s requirements.  That approach would have allowed EPA staff to limit their review of a new chemical only to the intended uses identified by its manufacturer, despite the law’s clear mandate that EPA consider known or reasonably foreseen, as well as intended, uses when conducting its review.  Under the framework, where EPA had concerns about reasonably foreseen but not intended uses – rather than issue an order as required by the law – EPA would take two other steps:  make a “not likely to present an unreasonable risk” determination for the chemical, clearing it to enter commerce; and issue a Significant New Use Rule (SNUR), which could trigger a separate, future review on any subsequently intended use, wholly divorced from the initial review.

Initially, EPA staff indicated the “not likely” finding would be made only once a final SNUR had been promulgated.  That then slipped to have issuance of the finding coincide with the proposal of the SNUR.  That then slipped further to allow the finding to be issued based on EPA’s mere intent to develop a SNUR.

Now, however, the Trump EPA plans to decouple completely its ability to issue a “not likely” finding from any dependency at all on promulgation of a SNUR.  How then, you might well ask, would EPA consider reasonably foreseen uses of a new chemical?  The short answer is, it won’t.   Read More »

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Pruitt EPA Illegally and Dramatically Undermines Authority to Limit Dangerous Chemicals under Reformed Chemical Safety Law

By Richard Denison / Published: June 1, 2018

EPA today revealed its severely flawed approach to reviewing the risks to health and the environment posed by the first 10 chemicals being evaluated under the newly reformed chemical safety law, the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA).  These chemicals were selected in 2016 because of their potential dangers to the health of American families, but the Pruitt EPA has chosen to ignore many sources of exposure to the chemicals and, in doing so, will severely underestimate their actual risks.

“EPA is both ignoring the law and endangering public health.  The approach it is taking – designed by an appointee who came straight from the chemical industry’s lobbying arm – ignores millions of pounds of toxic pollution,” said Dr. Richard Denison, EDF lead senior scientist.  “Pruitt’s EPA won’t examine the real extent of exposures to these chemicals – and that will put at risk the lives and health of Americans.”

An analysis by Environmental Defense Fund reveals that EPA will ignore more than 68 million pounds of seven of these 10 chemicals released to the nation’s air, water, and land every year.  Among the chemicals are known killers such as asbestos and other toxic chemicals such as trichloroethylene (TCE) that cause cancer and are linked to developmental and neurological disorders.

Download or view the above table at this link.   Read More »

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