The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released a list of 390 chemicals on April 29, 2021, stating that they are "anticipated to lose their confidential status and transfer to the public component of the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) Inventory. On May 14, 2021, the EPA announced that the notification deadline would be extended until June 30, 2021.
The American Chemistry Council and BASF, according to the EPA, asked for more time to study the list of 390 substances. Some of the compounds reported under the Active-Inactive rule overlap with those submitted under the 2020 Chemical Data Reporting (CDR) rule, according to EPA, and there is a view that EPA relied only on 2020 Chemical Data Reporting (CDR) rule submissions to identify these substances.
In response to industry concerns about relying exclusively on the 2020 CDR submission, the EPA intends to declassify the exact names of these compounds since one or more manufacturers identified them as non-confidential during 2012, 2016, and/or 2020 CDR reporting periods -“This means that at least one manufacturer did not request that each of the chemical identities is kept confidential in US commerce,” according to the report, which also did an “extensive review” of each instance where confidential status was not requested for these chemical identities to ensure the accuracy of the list.
According to the EPA, companies must identify chemicals made, imported, or processed in the United States within 10 years ending on June 21, 2016, and report them under the Active-Inactive regulation. It also states that to clear up submitter confusion and questions about confidentiality claims during the initial periods, there are one or more independent CDR-based (and EPA-validated) reasons to consider chemical identities no longer eligible for inclusion on the confidential portion of the Inventory for each of the 390 chemicals.
Stakeholders with questions or concerns regarding the change in confidential status should contact the EPA personnel indicated on its homepage no later than June 30, 2021, according to the EPA.
Reference: https://www.epa.gov/tsca-cbi/updates-confidential-status-chemicals-tsca-inventory
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