7. CHEMICALS: EPA chief to discuss toxics regs with Senate panel (12/01/2009)

Sara Goodman , E&E reporter

The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee meets tomorrow to discuss how the federal government is managing the tens of thousands of chemicals in the marketplace, with an eye toward overhauling federal toxics regulations.

Lawmakers plan to focus on the status of current efforts to assess and address potential human health and environmental threats from toxic chemicals, according to a committee aide.

In September, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson unveiled a series of steps the agency is taking to improve chemical management under the Toxic Substances and Control Act, including possible regulatory action on an initial list of chemicals for possible risk management actions. Those chemicals are benzidine dyes and pigments; bisphenol A (BPA); penta, octa, and decabromodiphenyl ethers (PBDEs); perfluorinated chemicals; phthalates; and short-chain chlorinated paraffins.

Jackson said EPA will also develop risk management plans such as proposed rules for phasing out or banning certain uses of mercury, lead, formaldehyde, PCBs, glymes (a solvent) and carbon nanotubes. Finally, EPA is working to require companies producing high-production volume chemicals to submit basic health and safety information.

There is widespread agreement among environmentalists, public health advocates and industry groups that TSCA -- the only environmental statute that has not been amended since it was created -- has not effectively governed the more than 80,000 chemicals on the TSCA inventory. Since the law was first enacted in 1976, EPA has used it to evaluate the safety of 200 chemicals and banned five.

Under current TSCA regulations, EPA faces what many critics call a catch-22 in regulating chemicals because of the burden of proof the law places on the government. The agency must prove a chemical poses a health threat before it can act, but regulators also need proof before they can require companies to provide more information about a chemical.

Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.), who chairs the Superfund, Toxics and Environmental Health Subcommittee, is taking the lead in the Senate at crafting a TSCA reform bill. He is co-chairing tomorrow's hearing, which will hear testimony from Jackson, as well as the Government Accountability Office's John Stephenson and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences Director Linda Birnbaum.

Meanwhile, the House has also begun debating how to reform TSCA. The House Commerce, Trade and Consumer Protection Subcommittee met last month to discuss how to prioritize chemicals to determine their safety (E&E Daily, Nov. 16).

Most observers agree that any meaningful chemical management policy reform must begin with prioritizing the highest priority chemicals. EPA has also joined with environmental and public health advocates to push for placing the burden of proving the safety of a chemical on industry, giving the agency sufficient authority to require additional information about specific chemicals and taking risk management actions when chemicals do not meet the safety standard.

Jackson has also stressed the need to have a system for prioritizing high-risk chemicals and giving both new and existing chemicals the same level of scrutiny -- a shift from current practice in which existing chemicals are generally exempted from TSCA regulation.

Schedule: The hearing is tomorrow at 2:30 p.m. in 406 Dirksen.

Witnesses: EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson; John Stephenson, director for natural resources and environment at the Government Accountability Office; and Linda Birnbaum, director of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.