Memoranda

Last month, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) updated its table listing the sunset dates of chemicals subject to final Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) Section 4 and related Section 12(b) actions. The table lists, in ascending Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS) Registry Number order, all chemical substances and mixtures that are and/or have been the subject of final TSCA Section 4 test rules and/or TSCA Section 4 enforceable consent agreements/orders (ECA) issued by EPA under...

On March 11, 2011, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) announced the availability of the SaferProducts.gov database mandated by Congress, as part of the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act. CPSC encourages consumers to visit www.SaferProducts.gov to submit reports of harm or risks of harm, and to search for safety information on products they own or may be considering buying. According to CPSC, reporting product safety incidents through the site will help CPSC...

On March 4, 2011, the California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) proposed to list four chemicals as known to the State to cause cancer under the Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986 (Prop 65) under the “Labor Code mechanism” for listing contained in Health and Safety Code Section 25249.8(a). The four substances are: Chemical CAS No. Endpoint Reference Cyclopenta[cd]pyrene 27208-37-3 Cancer (2010a; 2010b) Ethanol in alcoholic beverages —...

March 1, 2011, is the deadline for owners or operators of facilities covered under Section 312 of the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act (EPCRA) to file annual “Tier II” reporting forms to the appropriate state and local agencies. Under EPCRA Section 312, any facility required under Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) regulations to maintain material safety data sheets (MSDS) for hazardous chemicals and that stores these chemicals on-site during the...

On February 10, 2011, during a hearing on “Regulatory Impediments to Job Creation,” the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform released a preliminary staff report entitled Assessing Regulatory Impediments to Job Creation. In December 2010, Committee Chair Darrell Issa (R-CA) sent letters to over 150 businesses, industry organizations, and think tanks asking for examples of existing and proposed regulations that have negatively impacted job growth, as well as...

Both Turkey and South Korea are working to implement chemical management programs to comply with broader international initiatives. In December 2009, Turkey implemented new legislation concerning the classification, labeling, and packaging (CLP) of dangerous substances and preparations, and a regulation on safety data sheets (SDS) for dangerous substances and preparations. South Korea has initiated a process for the management of chemicals, with the objective of minimizing the harmful effects...

On February 3, 2011, the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works Subcommittee on Superfund, Toxics, and Environmental Health held a hearing entitled “Assessing the Effectiveness of U.S. Chemical Safety Laws.” Subcommittee Chair Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) last year introduced the Safe Chemicals Act of 2010, a bill that would have reformed the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) by shifting the burden of proof to industry to show chemicals are safe, rather than the U.S....

On January 18, 2011, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lisa Jackson signed a proposed rule that would revise EPA’s February 6, 2006, final rule concerning protections for subjects in human research. According to EPA, the proposed amendments would broaden the applicability of the rules to cover human testing with pesticides submitted to EPA under any regulatory statute it administers. The proposed amendments would also disallow participation in third-party pesticide...

The Center for Devices and Radiological Health (CDRH) of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) published on January 19, 2011, a “plan containing 25 actions it intends to implement during 2011 to improve the most common path to market for medical devices.” See FDA News Release, “FDA to improve most common review path for medical devices” (Jan. 19, 2011), available online. That path is the Premarket Notification, or 510(k) process, used for the bulk of...

On January 7, 2011, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) announced that it will hold two live web conferences on the publicly available consumer product safety information database. During the first web conference, scheduled for January 11, 2011, CPSC will demonstrate key functions of the database, such as how a consumer will be able to use the new online reporting form to submit a report of harm related to the use of a consumer product...