House Holds Hearing on Chemical Risks
March 18, 2019
Last week, the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s Environment and Climate Change Subcommittee held a hearing on EPA’s toxic chemicals assessment and management, focusing on the Agency’s failure to protect workers. Several Representatives criticized EPA’s conduct on legacy uses of chemicals and its failure to assess risks to vulnerable populations.
Several laws governing toxic chemical regulation were discussed, including TSCA, the Occupational Safety and Health Act, and the Clean Air Act. EPA’s recent TSCA risk evaluation for Pigment Violet 29 and rulemaking preserving legacy uses of asbestos were pointed to by subcommittee members as failure to adequately perform its duties under the “Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act” (Lautenberg Act).
The Lautenberg Act, enacted in 2016, added a mandatory duty for EPA to assess for “new chemicals” the risk to workers and other vulnerable populations likely to be exposed to chemicals. Several witnesses testified about expanding risk management and evaluation, including testing chemicals across their entire lifecycle and treating non-compliance with PPE requirements as a foreseeable risk.
Multiple written submissions for the hearing record were made by environmental interest groups and unions. They noted the lack of industry responses, coupled with witnesses selected to testify, on how EPA has failed in its chemical evaluations.
House Democrats are likely to step up calls for increased congressional oversight of the implementation of the TSCA amendments from the Lautenberg Act.