Today, the EPA released a list of the first ten chemicals it will evaluate for potential risks to human health and the environment under TSCA reform.
The first ten chemicals to be evaluated are:
- 1,4-Dioxane
- 1-Bromopropane
- Asbestos
- Carbon Tetrachloride
- Cyclic Aliphatic Bromide Cluster
- Methylene Chloride
- N-methylpyrrolidone
- Pigment Violet 29
- Tetrachloroethylene, also known as perchloroethylene
- Trichloroethylene
Earlier this year, the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act was signed into law, amending the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) of 1976 – the Nation’s primary management law of chemicals in commerce – and effectively changing the way hazardous chemicals are reviewed and classified. The Lautenberg Act required the EPA to publish this initial list by December 19, 2016, with chemicals drawn from the agency’s 2014 TSCA Work Plan, a list of 90 chemicals selected based on their potential for high hazard and exposure as well as other considerations. The EPA will now complete risk evaluations for these chemicals within three years to determine whether they present an unreasonable risk to humans and the environment. If it is determined that a chemical presents an unreasonable risk, it must then mitigate that risk within two years.
Under the newly amended law, the EPA must release a scoping document within six months for each chemical listed above that includes information on the hazard(s), exposure(s), conditions of use, and the potentially exposed or susceptible subpopulation(s) the agency plans to consider for the evaluation. For each risk evaluation that the agency completes, TSCA requires that it begin reviewing another so that by the end of 2019, there must be at least 20 chemical risk valuations ongoing at any given time. In October, the EPA
For more information on the chemicals listed can be found here.
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