All Knowledge & Insights By Date

On March 20, 2017, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) published in the Federal Register a notice that it was delaying the effective date of five regulations, including the final rule on the certification of pesticide applicators.  The effective date for this final rule is now May 22, 2017 (original effective date was March 6, 2017).  In the notice, EPA states that it is “taking this action to give recently arrived Agency officials the opportunity to learn more about these...

On February 21, 2017, the Northwest Environmental Advocates (NWEA) filed a Clean Water Act (CWA) lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Western District that involves a number of pesticide active ingredients in addition to other chemicals.  The lawsuit seeks to compel the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) response to NWEA’s 2013 Petition for Rulemaking to Update the Water Quality Criteria for Toxics in the State of the Washington (NWEA v. EPA, No.: 2:17-cv-00263)....

President Trump’s February 28, 2017, Executive Order (E.O.) directing the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) to rescind and replace the Clean Water Rule (CWR) is the latest development in the attempt to resolve the long-standing question of which surface waters and wetlands may be federally regulated and subjected to permitting under the Clean Water Act (CWA).  Critics of the CWR assert that it would have drastically expanded the reach...

On February 22, 2017, the California Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) announced it was extending the filing date for applications to register products made from pesticide impregnated materials bearing pesticide claims from March 1, 2017, to July 1, 2017.  Specifically, each retailer (or authorized representative) of an affected product must submit an Application for Pesticide Registration (DPR-REG-030) to DPR by July 1, 2017.  DPR’s California Notice 2015-13 issued...

On February 17, 2017, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued guidance revising its recommendation regarding controlling Candida auris (C. auris) infections in U.S. healthcare facilities.  The CDC guidance now recommends a “thorough daily and terminal cleaning and disinfection” of patient rooms in which C. auris infection or colonization was present … with the use of an...

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has scheduled a final rule to be published on on January 26, 2017, which will temporarily delay the effective date of certain regulations until March 21, 2017.  This final rule is being issued in accordance with the Presidential directive entitled “Regulatory Freeze Pending Review” issued January 20, 2017.  Among the 30 regulations that meet those criteria is the final rule Pesticides; Certification of Pesticide Applicators, which revises...

In a final rule issued on January 12, 2017, EPA adjusted the level of statutory civil monetary penalty amounts under the statutes EPA administers. 82 Fed. Reg. 3633. The adjustments are mandated by the Federal Civil Penalties Inflation Adjustment Act of 1990, as amended through the Federal Civil Penalties Inflation Adjustment Act Improvements Act of 2015. The latter law prescribes a formula for annually adjusting statutory civil penalties to reflect inflation, maintain the deterrent effect of...

On January 12, 2017, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released its Policy to Mitigate the Acute Risk to Bees from Pesticide Products (Mitigation Policy) which describes methods for addressing acute risks to bees from pesticides.  EPA states that this Mitigation Policy is “more flexible and practical than the proposed policy” that was issued on May 29, 2015, and it has “made modifications to its approach with the goal of better targeting compounds that pose an...

On January 4, 2017, the White House announced the release of the 2017 Update to the Coordinated Framework for the Regulation of Biotechnology (2017 Update).  The Update to the Coordinated Framework provides a comprehensive summary of the roles and responsibilities of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) with respect to regulating biotechnology products.  Together with...

Predictions and Outlook for EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention (OCSPP) 2017 Click here for a PDF brochure of the memorandum 2016 was full of surprises, two of which will drive much of the agenda for OCSPP during 2017. First, Congress significantly amended the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA). The changes are intended to reform the program to address the widely recognized deficiencies in the law, especially regarding existing chemicals, chemical testing,...

On December 20, 2016, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced the start of a pilot program to evaluate the usefulness and acceptability of a mathematical tool (the GHS Mixtures Equation), which is used in the Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labeling of Chemicals (GHS).  EPA states that the goal of the pilot program is to “evaluate the utility and acceptability of the GHS Mixtures Equation as an alternative to animal oral and inhalation toxicity...

On November 29, 2016, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced the issuance of its new guidance for testing pesticides designed to reduce animal testing for acute dermal toxicity for pesticides, Guidance for Waiving Acute Dermal Toxicity Tests for Pesticide Formulations & Supporting Retrospective Analysis, in final.  This guidance was issued as part of the Office of Pesticide Programs’ (OPP) Strategic Vision for implementing the 2007 National Research Council’s...

On November 1, 2016, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) published its Final National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) Pesticide General Permit for Point Source Discharges from the Application of Pesticides in the Federal Register, which regulates discharges to waters of the United States from the application of biological pesticides and chemical pesticides that leave a residue. 81 Fed. Reg. 75816.  The 2016 NPDES Pesticide General Permit (PGP)...

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has recently announced the availability of two proposed test methods and associated testing guidance for evaluating antimicrobial pesticides against two biofilm bacteria, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Staphylococcus aureus, for comments.  EPA states that registrants of antimicrobial products with public health claims are “required to submit efficacy data to EPA in support of the product’s registration” under the Federal Insecticide,...

The California Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) recently proposed a regulation that it states is intended to “(1) provide minimum statewide standards for all agricultural pesticide applications near public K-12 schools and child day care facilities; (2) provide an extra margin of safety in case of unintended drift or when other problems with applications occur (e.g., equipment failure causes an unintended release of pesticide, or an abrupt change in weather conditions); (3) increase...

On August 23, 2016, the European Chemicals Agency’s (ECHA) Board of Appeal (BoA) adopted its first decision on a data sharing dispute under the Biocidal Products Regulation (BPR). Thor GmbH (Thor) lodged the appeal in 2015 after ECHA granted permission to a company to cite studies owned by Thor for the substance reaction mass of 5-chloro-2-methyl-2H-isohtiazol-3-one and 2-methyl-2H-isothiazol-3-one (CIT/MIT).  According to ECHA, Thor had insisted on a technical equivalence assessment of...

The fourth Biocides Stakeholders’ Day took place on September 1, 2016, at the European Chemicals Agency’s (ECHA) headquarters in Helsinki, Finland.  The event provided biocides stakeholders with information on the Biocidal Products Regulation (BPR) and the tools and support available.  The focus was on experiences from companies, ECHA, and the European Commission (EC).  ECHA stated “[t]he objective was to equip companies with information about their roles and obligations to...

On September 19, 2016, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Inspector General (OIG) issued a report, EPA Needs a Risk-Based Strategy to Assure Continued Effectiveness of Hospital-Level Disinfectants, the result of OIG’s review of EPA’s Antimicrobial Testing Program (ATP) to “determine whether the program ensures the efficacy of EPA-registered hospital sterilants, disinfectants, and tuberculocides (“hospital-level disinfectants”); and to evaluate options for...

On September 2, 2016, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued guidance to registrants on the process for making claims against emerging viral pathogens not on EPA-registered disinfectant labels (Guidance).  A draft of this guidance was issued in April 2016 and comments were sought at that time.  More information concerning the draft guidance is available in our blog item EPA Combats Emerging Pathogens Through Updating Guidance for Antimicrobial Pesticide Products....

The threat of the Zika Virus grows every day, and the need for clear information is especially pressing if you are pregnant.  How do you prevent getting infected with the Zika Virus, and what insect repellents are best?  The first question is easy to answer:  public health experts agree that women who are pregnant or who might be pregnant should use insect repellents.  The answer to the second question is not so simple. I am a former senior official at the U.S. Environmental...