All Knowledge & Insights By Date

On July 29, 2024, the California Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) announced that it will move forward with an emergency rulemaking package to revise the fees for pesticide registrations and renewals in late August with a proposed effective date of no later than October 1, 2024. DPR states the fee increase is necessary to meet current baseline funding needs and the new positions approved as part of the Fiscal Year (FY) 2024-2025 budget. DPR states...

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) announced on July 30, 2024, that it issued a Decision and Order against Amazon.com, Inc. (Amazon). CPSC states that, in a unanimous vote, it “determined that Amazon was a ‘distributor’ of products that are defective or fail to meet federal consumer product safety standards, and therefore bears legal responsibility for their recall.” According to CPSC, more than 400,000 products are subject to the Order, specifically faulty carbon...

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) posted a blog item on August 1, 2024, entitled “When Nanoparticles Blow Up — Explosion Hazards of Nanoparticles.” According to the blog item, little is known about the potential explosivity of any material when subdivided down to the nanoscale, prompting the NIOSH Nanotechnology Research Center (NTRC) to study the explosivity of several classes of nanoparticles: The blog item states that “[c]ombustibility should...

This week, I welcomed to the studio Lara Hall, Senior Regulatory Scientist/Quality Assurance Specialist at B&C and our consulting affiliate, The Acta Group, to discuss the critical importance of understanding the role of the study sponsor. As our listeners know, chemical data — testing results, chemical studies, exposure information, environmental fate and monitoring data, to name a few — are the new currency in the chemical community. These data are incredibly valuable, often...

On July 31, 2024, the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO) announced the release of the first two parts of the Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) State-of-Industry Report. Released by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) in partnership with BETO, the report focuses on how to achieve the near-term fuel production goals set forth in the SAF Grand Challenge, a joint effort between DOE, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), the U.S. Department...

The 2024 National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) Nanotechnology Research Center (NTRC) Nanotechnology Health and Safety Summit will be held October 9-10, 2024. During the conference, industry, academic, and government experts will share the latest advancements in occupational exposure to nanotechnology and advanced materials. The conference will also address critical safety and health challenges and offer valuable insights and foresights on a range of cutting-edge topics,...

The Agile BioFoundry’s (ABF) 2024 Industry Day will be held virtually on September 12, 2024. Funded by the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO), ABF aims to develop biomanufacturing tools, processes, and partnerships that enable sustainable industrial production of renewable fuels and chemicals. Attendees will:...

On July 25, 2024, the Center for Environmental Health (CEH) and Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) filed suit against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia seeking a rule under Section 6 of the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) to prohibit the production of perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) during Inhance Technologies, LLC’s (Inhance) fluorination process. As reported in our May 23, 2024, blog item on their...

On July 10, 2024, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) published a compliance guide for its final methylene chloride risk management rule issued under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA). According to EPA, the compliance guide will help industry, workers, and other interested stakeholders understand and comply with the new regulations to prevent injuries, long-term illnesses, and deaths. EPA also announced that in June 2024, it released a fact sheet on the rule containing...

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced on July 25, 2024, that it is proposing to designate acetaldehyde, acrylonitrile, benzenamine, vinyl chloride, and 4,4-methylene bis(2-chloroaniline) (MBOCA) as high-priority substances (HPS) for risk evaluation under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA). 89 Fed. Reg. 60420. EPA is providing a 90-day comment period, during which interested persons may submit comments on the proposed designations of these chemicals as HPSs for risk...