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Agency calls for chemical testing

2 min read

WASHINGTON (AP) – The government has provided only “limited assurance” that the 700 new chemicals entering the marketplace each year are safe and won’t harm the environment, Congress’ investigative arm reported Wednesday. The Government Accountability Office’s report to three Democratic senators said Congress should strengthen the 1976 Toxic Substances Control Act to give the Environmental Protection Agency more authority to require more test data from chemical manufacturers, and to share that data publicly.

“Most chemicals used in consumer products today have never undergone any federal safety review,” said Sen. Jim Jeffords, I-Vt., ranking minority member of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. “We do know, however, that most of us are carrying in our bodies dozens – if not hundreds – of synthetic chemicals to which our grandparents were never exposed.”

The senators’ release of the report coincided with a legislative proposal Wednesday by Jeffords and six Democrats that they said would protect more children from harmful chemical exposure. It would require chemical makers to demonstrate to the EPA that “a reasonable certainty of no harm” exists before putting a chemical on the market.

Currently, the EPA has to demonstrate a chemical poses an “unreasonable risk” to restrict or ban it. But uncertainty about what that means, combined with another requirement that the agency balance costs and benefits, has made it difficult for the EPA to ban any chemical.

The American Chemistry Council, a trade group, said the law already gives the EPA adequate tools to judge the risks of chemicals and “chemicals makers have a long history of working closely with EPA to make publicly available safety information on chemicals.”

Erik Olson, a senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group, said the bill, if passed, would be “a major step forward.”

“It’s so arcane and complicated that it’s almost impossible to regulate,” Olson said.

In 1991, a federal appeals court in New Orleans overturned a 1989 EPA rule banning most asbestos-containing products. Olson said that court ruling created “so many hurdles” for the EPA’s regulation of other chemicals as well.

On the Net:

American Chemistry Council: http://www.americanchemistry.com

Natural Resources Defense Council: http://www.nrdc.org

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