ENVIRONMENTAL
NEWS
EPA says chemical use reporting proposal due in early 1997
E
PA's plan to propose that companies report on chemicals used in production is being opposed by an army of industries that charge the agency with moving well beyond its statutory authority. The agency announced in September its intention to propose early next year a rulemaking on chemical use reporting. Chemical use data are key to a material accounting system, a process many companies say they already use to track chemicals in production (Federal Register 1996, 61 (191), 51322-331). The proposal would build on the agency's Toxics Release Inventory (TRI), but instead of focusing on chemicals that leave the plant, it would compel companies to track chemicals that enter their facilities and are transformed into products and waste, as well as those that leave the plant.
thority to collect the information, adding that a good deal of it is already in government hands. Others say the request is unnecessary because it doesn't deal with releases that could harm the public, which has been the primary job of the TRI. "They have sort of proposed an answer without having a question," said a spokesperson for the Chemical Manufacturers Association. "We would like to know what the problem is." EPA officials explain that they would rely on the authority provided by several statutes, such as the Toxic Substances Control Act, which allows EPA to require manufacturers to submit reports the administrator "may reasonably require." As for solving an environmental problem, the notice "is not crisis-driven at all," said Lynn Goldman, assistant administrator
The preliminary notice marks the one-year anniversary of the August 1995 directive from President Clinton urging EPA to develop a process for reporting chemical use information under TRI. Since then, EPA has concluded that adding the data to TRI will help companies track the use of toxics at the plant level and drive them to develop pollution prevention plans. Environmental and labor groups support the proposal, saying that chemical use knowledge is the surest way to encourage companies to substitute nontoxic substances in their products (ES&T, Dec. 1995, 540A).
Supporters say the proposal is the surest way to encourage companies to replace toxic substances in their products.
Industry representatives are alarmed at the prospect of a chemical use reporting rule, asserting that many companies have developed pollution prevention plans, and there is no need for EPA to get further involved in their production processes. Some argue that EPA lacks the statutory au-
for the Office of Prevention, Pesticides, and Toxic Substances. Companies also have complained that the proposal would require submitters to publicly release proprietary information that might allow rival companies to gain a competitive edge. However, regulators in Massachusetts and New Jersey report that businesses have been complying with their state-run chemical use reporting requirements for years—New Jersey's law is more than 10 years old—and few complain. Andy Opperman in the bureau of chemical release informa-
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Urging companies to track chemical use will encourage pollution prevention planning, said Lynn Goldman, assistant administrator for the Office of Prevention, Pesticides and Toxic Substances (photo courtesy of EPA).
tion and prevention of the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection said industry complaints about "industrial espionage" are almost nonexistent in his state. The reported information is at least 12 months old when it is released to the public, unless someone requests a data sheet for a particular company be released to them ahead of the annual report release date. Even so, "I have rarely had a company inside or outside of the U.S. request information on another company," Opperman said. As does the TRI, New Jersey and Massachusetts allow a company to apply for a "trade secret" reporting exemption. In New Jersey, only five or six companies out of 700 annually request such an exemption, less than 1% of the total companies reporting, Opperman said. The notice asks for public comment on an array of issues raised by industry and environmental groups, including questions about the usefulness of the information for various public sectors, existing sources of chemical use information, and the drawbacks of the Massachusetts and New Jersey programs. —CATHERINE M. COONEY
0013-936X/96/0930-474A$12.00/0 © 1996 American Chemical Society
