To date, California has relied on the federal government’s
failed regulatory system to protect its residents from industrial chemicals
used in commerce. California has no regulatory framework for
reviewing these chemicals prior to their introduction to the market and use in
consumer products. Nor does the state
have a comprehensive program for assessing the safety of those chemicals
currently in use.
Last year, California
Environmental Protection Agency Secretary Linda Adams launched the Green
Chemistry Initiative to develop a comprehensive approach for dealing with
hazardous chemicals. Over the past year,
Environment California has participated in the initiative through stakeholder
meetings, individual meetings with the director of the California Department of Toxic Substances
Control and staff, the submission of comments
describing our core principles for comprehensive chemicals policy reform, and
extensive work with partnering organizations in the coalition Californians for
a Healthy and Green Economy (CHANGE), including the submission of comments and
responses to questions on the Green Chemistry Initiative blog and the
development of chemicals policy options and a framework for implementing reform
measures.
Environment California views the following principles as central
to the success of California’s Green Chemistry Initiative and,
ultimately, to protecting Californians from toxic chemicals:
1. Decisions affecting human health
and the environment should be based on the intrinsic hazards of a chemical and
a new approach to toxicity testing.
California
should adopt a hazard-based approach to chemicals policy whereby policy actions
to reduce or eliminate a chemical’s use should be triggered by a chemical’s
intrinsic hazards, including a chemical’s toxic, persistent, or bioaccumulative
qualities and a chemical’s ability to cause biological changes that are likely
to lead to diseases. Based on a
chemical’s intrinsic hazards, the state should determine any necessary
immediate action to be taken, including removing a chemical from the
market. Further, information on
mutagenicity, genetic toxicity, reproductive effects, developmental toxicity, carcinogenicity,
immunological effects, neurological and neurodevelopmental effects, effects on
organs, respiratory effects, epigenetic effects, and endocrine disruption
should guide decisions about how and whether chemicals should be used in
society. Where there is uncertainty in
the evidence, policies should err on the side of protecting health and the
environment.
Currently, most decisions regarding
chemicals are based on a complicated, time-consuming, and resource-intensive
process that attempts to assess risk through a calculation of exposure and
potential harm, rather than err on the side of protecting health and preventing
disease by avoiding chemical use where there is evidence of potential harm. This means that even when there are good data
on the dangers of chemicals, these substances are still allowed on the market with
regulators simply trying to “manage” the risk by finding “safe” levels. Such a process typically relies on inadequate
hazard information and an assessment of exposure, which only provides a
snapshot into the particular time the chemical is being evaluated. Most often, risk assessments are conducted
with incomplete information on the range of potential health and environmental
impacts with which we are concerned.
Moreover, because the uses of chemicals and exposures to chemicals can
and do change, the fundamental assumptions about exposures relied upon to
ultimately assess and manage risk lack long term validity with respect to the
protection of human health and the environment.
California must invest in the development of
new testing methods to assess and characterize chemicals. Current methods are outdated; fail to
incorporate key concepts, such as the timing of exposure, cumulative exposures,
synergistic effects of chemicals, and low-dose impacts; and do not address all
of the important hazard traits, especially those of concern for women and
children. Decisions about chemicals should
be based on a new approach that accounts for these and other emerging
concepts.
2. Chemical manufacturers should
prove their products are safe.
For existing chemicals, chemical
manufacturers should be required to prove their products are safe in order to
allow their continued manufacture and use.
By 2010, chemical manufacturers should be required to provide to the
appropriate governmental body all hazard and safety information for existing chemicals
for which little or inadequate data are available. Required data should include detailed
information on the physical properties and intrinsic hazards of a chemical as
described above. For new chemicals, such
information should be required before they are permitted to be manufactured.
In addition, the reliability and
adequacy of the information must be validated.
Through either an independent third party without a conflict of interest
or the recipient governmental body, information provided by chemical manufacturers
must be evaluated for its adequacy in meeting the requirements and reliability
as scientific evidence.
3. Hazardous chemicals and
chemicals with inadequate safety data should be phased out.
If a chemical is known to pose a
hazard to human health or the environment and a safer alternative exists, it should
be tracked for immediate phase out. If a
chemical is known to pose a hazard to human health or the environment and a
safe alternative does not exist, its use and potential
exposures should be minimized and a timeline for its phase out should be
established.
If a chemical has not been
adequately evaluated for potential hazards and a safer alternative exists, it
should be tracked for immediate phase out.
If a chemical has not been adequately evaluated for potential hazards
and a safer alternative does not exist,
its use and potential exposures should be minimized and a timeline for its
phase out should be established.
4. Industry should bear the costs associated with their chemical
production or use.
Manufacturers and users of chemicals
should be held responsible legally and financially for the costs and
consequences of producing and/or using hazardous or potentially hazardous
chemicals. Manufacturers should bear the
financial burden of testing chemicals for safety and making the data available
to potential users. Users should pay fees
in order to use a hazardous chemical in advance of an eventual phase out of the
chemical. Users of hazardous chemicals
incorporating them into consumer products should be required to take back their
products from consumers to ensure proper disposal. With respect to past behavior, those
responsible for contaminating California’s environment and households should
bear the costs of clean up.
5. Safer alternatives to hazardous chemicals should be required.
With the mandated phase out of
hazardous chemicals, safer alternatives should be required. In addition to chemical-for-chemical
substitutions, chemical users should consider changing their manufacturing
processes, selecting alternative materials, and redesigning their
products. Safer alternatives must be
evaluated for their intrinsic hazards, as described above.
6. The public has a right to know
about chemicals in use and participate in decisions affecting the impact of
these chemicals on their communities.
The public has a right to know about
chemicals currently on the market, including their specific uses, potential
hazards to health and the environment, and potential exposures. Such information should never be considered
confidential business information. California should create an easily understood
matrix of all chemicals currently in use with information on their hazard
traits for use by downstream users, consumers, and other interested
parties. Such a matrix would: 1) identify
missing data, 2) enable businesses and consumers to compare the safety of
chemicals, and 3) support the promotion of and create demand for safer
alternatives.
Right to know laws also should
include mandatory labeling on consumer products and disclosure regarding
manufacturing processes indicating the presence of chemicals that are or may be
hazardous. Until health and safety data are
available for a particular chemical, there should be mandatory labeling for
consumer products indicating the presence of chemicals that have not been
tested for their impact on human health.
The public
also has a right to participate in decisions about chemicals that could affect public
health or the environment.
