From the office of the Federal Register:

The US EPA has published 19 premanufacture notices (PMNs) and ten notices of commencement (NOCs) for new chemicals. Section 5 of the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) requires any person who intends to manufacture (defined by statute to include import) a new chemical (i.e., a chemical not on the TSCA Chemical Substances Inventory (TSCA Inventory)) to notify EPA and comply with the statutory provisions pertaining to the manufacture of new chemicals. Under TSCA sections 5(d)(2) and 5(d)(3), EPA is required to publish in the Federal Register a notice of receipt of a premanufacture notice (PMN) or an application for a test marketing exemption (TME), and to publish in the Federal Register periodic status reports on the new chemicals under review and the receipt of notices of commencement (NOC) to manufacture those chemicals. This document, which covers the period from February 20, 2012 to February 29, 2012, and provides the required notice and status report, consists of the PMNs pending or expired, and the NOC to manufacture a new chemical that the Agency has received under TSCA section 5 during this time period.

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From Heartland.org:

Efforts to reform the Toxic Substances Control Act could end up harming human health by stifling innovation and keeping perfectly safe and beneficial products from reaching consumers, concludes a just-released study by the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

Changes Would Stifle Innovation

“Changes to TSCA are highly unlikely to have any measurable positive effect on public health, given the scant evidence that the trace-level substances that TSCA regulates have any significant health impacts,” said Angela Logomasini, director of risk studies at CEI, in a press release accompanying the study.“Rather, a stronger TSCA law may harm human well-being by leading to bans on many valuable products, undermining innovation, and diverting resources from valuable enterprises to meet burdensome regulatory mandates.”

TCSA Balances Costs, Benefits

Enacted in 1976, TSCA is designed to regulate chemicals not covered by other environmental statutes. TSCA also differs from other environmental laws in setting a risk-based standard for allowing the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to regulate chemicals.

TSCA “also demands that the agency consider both cost-benefit considerations and potentially adverse outcomes of its regulatory actions,” noted Logomasini. “Under TSCA, EPA is allowed to regulate when the agency finds that a chemical poses ‘an unreasonable risk to health or the environment.’ Once that determination has been made, EPA must apply such restrictions ‘to the extent necessary to protect adequately against such risk, using the least burdensome requirements.’”

Precise Language Drives Success

The CEI study, “The Real Meaning of TSCA ‘Modernization’: The Shift from Science-based Standards to Over-Precaution,” warns “reforming” TSCA may transform the law into the antithesis of what it was created to do.

Because TSCA has a risk-based approach to regulation, the carefully crafted language of TSCA has generally avoided creating controversies like those that have surrounded the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and other more loosely worded laws. Weakening the statute’s scientific safeguards could bestow EPA with far-reaching discretionary power to regulate as it sees fit, the study warns, which will dramatically change the intended nature of the law.

“Contrary to many claims,” the study explains, “the EPA has managed to use [the TSCA] to impose thousands of regulations, collect substantial data under both mandatory and voluntary programs, and demand testing of chemicals.”

Activists Seek Presumption of Guilt

Ironically, it is the clear and carefully tailored language of the TSCA that has frustrated environmental activists and prompted them to pressure the Obama administration to call for “modernizing” the statute. Richard Dennison of the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), for example, advocates a “presumed guilty until proven innocent” approach to a restructured TSCA.

On the legislative front, Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) introduced a bill in 2009 to, in his words, “put the burden of chemical safety where it belongs: on the chemical companies.” Lautenberg’s bill was not enacted, but that hasn’t kept environmental activists from urging Congress to scrap TSCA’s current risk-based standard for a more speculative “precautionary” approach.

“Some would model the new rule after the ‘reasonable certainty of no harm’ standard set in the Food Quality Protection Act, which has produced a host of unnecessary bans and regulations on valuable products that are used to ensure affordable food production and control of dangerous pests,” Logomasini explained.

Where Is the Need?

“Where is the evidence that we, the people, need to be protected from environmental exposure to tiny amounts of chemicals?” asks Gilbert Ross, M.D., medical director of the New York-based American Council for Science and Health.

“The cries for ‘reform’ emanate from the same environmental activist groups that oppose so many other beneficial chemicals and technologies,” Ross continued. “These well-funded groups, whose raison d’etre is to foment regulation and litigation, say the law is creaking at age 36, and only a handful of chemicals have been regulated under its auspices. Talk about circular logic—the chemicals assessed have been found to be safe, so they say something must be wrong with the law!”

We will keep you informed about any changes to the TSCA.

From Environmentalexpert.com:

If anyone is thinking big penalties under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) are a thing of the past, think again. On February 7, 2012, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that Dover Chemical Corporation has agreed to pay a $1.4 million civil penalty for the unauthorized manufacture of chemical substances at facilities in Dover, Ohio, and Hammond, Indiana. The settlement resolves alleged violations of TSCA premanufacture notice (PMN) obligations for the production of various chlorinated paraffins. According to EPA, Dover Chemical produces the ‘vast majority’ of chlorinated products sold in the U.S. As part of the settlement, Dover Chemical has ceased manufacturing short-chain chlorinated paraffins (SCCP), which have persistent, bioaccumulative, and toxic (PBT) characteristics. More information is available online.

According to the proposed settlement agreement, which was lodged in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio, EPA’s December 15, 2009, notice of violation alleged that Dover Chemical manufactured ‘new’ chemical substances while failing to comply with TSCA’s PMN requirements.

While Dover Chemical denies all alleged violations, it agreed to pay $1.4 million, as well as the following compliance requirements:

• Defendant shall not manufacture or distribute in commerce any chemical substance composed of a SCCP or combination of SCCPs, unless and until the particular SCCP or combination of SCCPs has been added to the TSCA Inventory or exempted from the TSCA Inventory requirements pursuant to TSCA and its implementing regulations; and
• Defendant shall not manufacture or distribute in commerce any chemical substance composed of a medium-chain chlorinated paraffin (MCCP), long-chain chlorinated paraffin (LCCP), or a combination of MCCPs or LCCPs, for which a new PMN is not submitted within 30 days of the effective date of the consent decree, unless and until the MCCP, LCCP, or particular combination of MCCPs or LCCPs, has been added to the TSCA Inventory or exempted from the TSCA Inventory requirements pursuant to TSCAand its implementing regulations.

The proposed settlement agreement is subject to a 30-day public comment period and approval by the federal court. It is available online.

We will keep you updated with future proceedings.

From: Quarles & Brady LLP

The five-month period to submit required reporting under the Inventory Update Rule, now known as the Chemical Data Rule (“CDR”), begins February 1 and runs through June 30. EPA finalized the CDR on August 16, 2011. The CDR requires manufacturers to report information to EPA regarding the volume of commercial chemical substances and mixtures manufactured, processed, and used by facilities located in the United States. The rule has changed significantly in the five years since reporting was last required in 2007, and the vague nature of the guidance provided with the rule has lead to concerns from some in Congress that EPA is setting industries up for enforcement.

The CDR requires reporting of chemical production volumes for 2010 and chemical production, processing, and use information from 2011. The CDR also requires the reporting of byproducts that are being recycled or reprocessed. Under guidance issued by the agency with the rule, byproducts such as metallic or coke fines, as well as spent solvent solutions may be considered chemicals “manufactured” by a given facility and may require reporting under the rule.

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From: The Wall Street Journal

Colorado and Texas adopted rules Tuesday that require oil and natural-gas companies to disclose the chemicals they inject underground in the drilling technique known as fracking.

The rules are part of a broader effort by states to show they are serious about regulating the rapidly expanding hydraulic fracturing ahead of possible new federal rules governing chemical disclosure, water disposal, air emissions and well construction.

Next month, the federal government is expected to issue guidelines for disposal of water used in fracking, and the Interior Department later will publish rules governing such operations on public lands.

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From: theguardian

The US Environmental Protection Agency announced Thursday for the first time that fracking — a controversial method of improving the productivity of oil and gas wells — may be to blame for causing groundwater pollution.

The practice is called hydraulic fracturing and involves pumping pressurized water, sand and chemicals underground to open fissures and improve the flow of oil or gas to the surface.

The EPA found that compounds likely associated with fracking chemicals had been detected in the groundwater beneath Pavillion, a small community in central Wyoming where residents say their well water reeks of chemicals. Health officials last year advised them not to drink their water after the EPA found low levels hydrocarbons in their wells.

For more information on this study, please click the above link.

From: EPA

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency today announced that SSH Management, LLC and 1500 Walnut Enterprises, LLC have signed a consent agreement with EPA resolving alleged violations of federal regulations for polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) in an office building located at 1500 Walnut St., Philadelphia, Pa.

The consent agreement resolves alleged Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) regulatory violations discovered when EPA inspectors conducted a compliance evaluation inspection at the building on May 6, 2009. The alleged violations include storage of combustible materials within each of two PCB transformer enclosures; failure to prepare and maintain annual visual inspection and maintenance history records for three PCB transformers; and failure to develop and maintain annual written document logs of the PCBs located onsite for 2006, 2007 and 2008.

PCBs, a probable human carcinogen, were commonly used as a nonflammable coolant for transformers and other electrical equipment until the 1970s, when Congress strictly limited the manufacture and use of this toxic substance.

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From: Occupational Health & Safety

The American Chemistry Council proposed a comprehensive, scientifically based system that could be used by EPA to decide which chemicals require additional review and assessment, possibly offering a solution to the agency’s quest to update the Toxic Substances Control Act.

“As outlined in ACC’s principles for modernizing the Toxic Substances Control Act, establishing a clear and scientifically sound prioritization process is key to creating a world-class chemical management system,” ACC President and CEO Cal Dooley said Sept. 6. “We believe the prioritization tool we’re proposing today will help EPA evaluate chemicals more efficiently and effectively and improve public confidence in the agency’s regulation of chemicals.”

The system would evaluate chemicals against consistent scientific criteria that take into account both hazard and exposure, giving each chemical a score based on the criteria and then ranking it based on the scores and EPA’s best professional scientific judgment. The rankings would be used to determine which chemicals are referred to EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety & Pollution Prevention for further assessment.

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From The Huffington Post :

On August 10, 2011 Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand wrote an article in the Huffington Post about the need to modernize the TSCA. Below is an excerpt from the article:

Back in 1976, Congress passed the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), a law that was meant to give the EPA the tools to research and regulate chemicals found in everyday products from shampoos, to sippy cups, to shower curtains. Nearly 40 years later only 5 chemicals have been successfully regulated.

I have read too many studies and reports that have found toxic chemicals in everyday products. Since TSCA became law, we have seen an unacceptable rise in cases of childhood cancers, learning disabilities, birth defects, asthma, allergies, autism and infertility. Our children are being exposed to these toxic chemicals before they are even born. Umbilical cord blood samples show exposure to over 200 chemicals ranging from BPA, which is found in plastic bottles, flame retardants, which are used in TV’s and furniture, and PCB’s, a known-carcinogen that remains in our soil and water.

It is clear that TSCA has failed, and we need to fix it.

For the full article, visit the above link.

From Switchboard:

Earlier this week, Fisk Johnson, the CEO of the consumer products company SC Johnson said in a speech (Inside EPA, subscription required) that “Your child has a better chance of becoming a major league baseball player than a chemical has of being regulated by EPA,” under TSCA.  He identified the problem as being, in large part, the lack of good information available about the hazards of chemicals in the marketplace, and the limited ability of EPA to regulate chemicals.

It is exactly this problem that has led to both widespread calls for reform from “downstream” companies that use chemicals in their products – like SC Johnson — and unilateral actions from large retailers and individual companies such as Wal-Mart, Target, Toys R Us and Staples to control the use of chemicals in products stocked on their shelves. The same problem has spurred unprecedented action in state legislatures across the country, and a groundswell of health, scientific and medical associations expressing concern about the health threat from toxic chemicals and calling for reform.

Follow the link above for the complete article.