Australia publishes new Industrial Chemicals

The European Commission and ECHA have signed an agreement for the Agency to provide recommendations on a regular basis for occupational exposure limits (OELs) that protect workers exposed to hazardous chemicals. The agreement requires ECHA to assess four to five OELs per year from 2020 onwards. "The preparation of scientific dossiers proposing...

First, the good news: plaintiffs in a 2013 lawsuit against the Environmental Protection Agency(EPA) can allow themselves a small victory dance. In that suit, plaintiffs made a number of claimsrelated to EPA’s failure to protect pollinators from dangerous pesticides, its poor oversight of the bee-killing pesticides clothianidin&...

SAICM Launches Project on Best Practices for Chemical Policy Issues of Concern. The project will focus on three components: phase out of lead in paint; lifecycle management of chemicals in products; and knowledge management and stakeholder engagement. The project seeks to accelerate the adoption of national and value chain initiatives to...

The European Commission’s (EC) Scientific Committee on Health, Environmental and Emerging Risks (SCHEER) published on January 14, 2019, a statement and a position paper on emerging health and environmental issues.  SCHEER identified and prioritized 14 emerging issues to bring to the attention of the EC services, inclu...

Another tumultuous year in the Australian Parliament concluded with no Senate consideration of the Industrial Chemicals Bill 2017. A push by some parties in the Senate for amendments to Industrial Chemicals Bill 2017 may stand in the way of the timely introduction of a workable animal test ban that matches the approach currently in place in Eu...