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Policy

Group Rallies For An Updated Chemicals Law

by Cheryl Hogue
April 19, 2010 | A version of this story appeared in Volume 88, Issue 16

SAFER CHEMICALS
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Credit: Cheryl Hogue/C&EN
Igrejas (right) addresses the TSCA reform rally.
Credit: Cheryl Hogue/C&EN
Igrejas (right) addresses the TSCA reform rally.

Activist groups took their effort to reform the nation’s law governing chemical production to the industry conference on chemical regulation in Baltimore last month. There, they spelled out key differences they have with industry about revamping the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) and unveiled the new symbol of their effort: a 20-foot-high yellow duck.

The inflatable duck, symbolic of a child’s bathtub toy, is intended to evoke thoughts of phthalates, a class of chemicals widely used in plastics. Phthalates are suspected of disrupting the endocrine system.

Tethered to a pier next to the Baltimore hotel where the Global Chemical Regulations Conference (GlobalChem) took place, the yellow critter sported a banner with the activists’ new slogan: “Chemical industry: You can’t duck REAL reform.”

On the surface, the activists and most major chemical trade groups have the same goal—revision of TSCA, a law that has been unchanged since 1976. But Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families, a broad coalition of environmental and public health groups, made clear three divergences between activists and industry on recasting TSCA for the 21st century.

Andy Igrejas, national campaign director for the coalition, laid out those differences at a rally held in front of the duck on March 30.

Activists want industry to supply the Environmental Protection Agency, which oversees TSCA, with basic health and safety data for all commercial chemicals, he said. In contrast, industry has backed EPA’s use of existing information, which is limited for many substances, to identify priority chemicals for further data requirements.

The coalition also wants Congress to ensure that EPA acts quickly to reduce the impact of substances widely known to be hazardous, such as certain persistent, bioaccumulative, and toxic chemicals that governments elsewhere in the world have restricted. They do not want EPA to get bogged down conducting full-blown risk assessments on these materials, as some in industry suggest.

Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families wants EPA to consider people’s aggregate exposures, which would include exposure from emissions, consumer products, and other sources. Igrejas contrasted this with an industry position calling for EPA to determine safe uses of a chemical, which he said fails to take into account all of a person’s exposure to that substance.

The American Chemistry Council and the Society of Chemical Manufacturers & Affiliates issued a joint statement in response to the activists’ rally. Noting the diversity of views on TSCA reform, the statement said, “It is with an eye toward narrowing or even eliminating some of those differences that ACC and SOCMA have been working to bring together stakeholders from industry, government, environmental, labor, and consumer groups to have frank and constructive dialogues.”

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