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

Yesterday, three legal scholars from the Center for Progressive Reform (CPR) sent a letter to Cass Sunstein, Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) in the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB).  That letter rebutted on legal grounds the call made by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in its own letter to Mr. Sunstein for OMB to force EPA to withdraw its proposal to use its authority under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) to list chemicals of concern.

EPA’s proposal, which entails use of its clear authority under Section 5(b)(4) of TSCA, has been stalled at OIRA for 405 days as of today, with OIRA refusing even to allow the proposal out for public comment.  I wrote an extensive blog post earlier about all of the reasons why EPA’s proposal is legally sound and makes good market sense.  That post – titled “Why is OMB blocking EPA from using even its limited authority under TSCA?” – went up way back in December, and there’s been no movement on the proposal since then.

CPR’s letter rebuts the Chamber’s claims, noting that it plain and simply “Gets the Law Wrong.”  EDF, too, has developed a legal analysis of EPA’s authority under TSCA to identify and list chemicals of concern, which is fully consistent with CPR’s analysis but goes further to address a few other legal aspects of the issue.  That’s why I’ve decided to post it here.

I’ll leave you to read our memo for the details, but provide its conclusion here as a teaser:

“EPA has clear authority under Section 5(b)(4) to list chemicals of concern and is not required to establish criteria in advance of the issuance of a proposed rule listing specific chemicals.  EPA’s authority also extends to the listing of categories of chemicals.  The legal threshold for action under Section 5(b)(4) should be interpreted as identical to that in Section 4(a), which requires only a “more than theoretical” basis for concluding that a chemical “may present” an unreasonable risk.  Even if Section 5(b)(4) is interpreted to mean something different from that in Section 4(a), it should be interpreted to be far less restrictive than the standard in Section 6.  In addition, Section 5(b)(4) does not require consideration of economic impact in the decision to list a chemical.  Finally, the statute is clear that listing of a chemical in a proposed rule under Section 5(b)(4) triggers export notification under Section 12, and may require the issuance of a SNUR [Significant New Use Rule] with respect to significant new uses of the chemical.”

It’s a sad state of affairs when even this modest step proposed by EPA to use its clear authority under TSCA is not even being allowed by OMB to see the light of day and benefit from public review and comment.

Samuel Beckett’s play, which I borrowed for the title of this post, is described as an absurdist play.  That pretty much sums up the endless review by OMB of EPA’s modest proposal.