EPA releases Fall 2020 Regulatory Agenda, forecasting a busy year ahead for TSCA

EPA recently released its Fall 2020 regulatory agenda, which includes several important updates to planned actions under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) concerning section 5 pre-manufacture notification (PMN) content and review procedures, section 6 risk evaluation and management for existing chemicals, CBI claim procedures, risk evaluation fees, and chemical data collection, according to a report by The National Law Review. The Biden administration may significantly change the regulatory agenda consistent with its priorities; here is a summary of the current plan affecting chemical control regulation:

• EPA confirmed its plans to propose a rule by May 2021to revise the TSCA new chemical review regulations. The revisions are intended to “align [EPA’s] processes and procedures with the new statutory requirements” for PMN decision-making from the Lautenberg Chemical Safety Act of 2016. The rule revisions also are intended to “improve the efficiency of EPA’s review process” for PMNs. 
• EPA’s long-awaited final ruleupdating the hazard communication requirements in the TSCA regulations is nominally scheduled to be released in October 2021. Among other things, proposed amendments were intended to align the TSCA SNUR regulations for hazard communication with the revised OSHA hazard communication standard (HCS). The OSHA HCS was updated in 2012 to align with version 3 of the Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labelling of Chemicals. 
• EPA plans to propose a procedural rule for determining TSCA risk management controls and exemptions for existing chemicals that have completed risk evaluation and are found to present unreasonable risks in connection with one or more of their conditions of use. EPA plans to publish the proposed rule in October 2021. The rule is expected to establish consistent risk management rules and standard procedures for agency collaboration and stakeholder input.

• The regulatory agenda discloses EPA’s current plan to implement a TSCA one-time reporting rule for PFAS manufactured or imported after January 1, 2011, which is scheduled for proposal in April 2021, and revisions to the EPCRA Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) reporting rules to automatically add certain PFAS to the reporting list, expected to be issued as a final rule in January 2021.