All Knowledge & Insights By Date

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will host its first annual conference to discuss alternative test methods and strategies to reduce animal testing on December 17, 2019, in Washington, D.C.  According to EPA, the conference will bring together some of the leading voices in environmental and health research to discuss efforts to reduce testing on mammals.  The conference will focus on the New Approach Methods (NAM) and will feature presentations by U.S. and...

On October 15, 2019, EPA posted a total of 11 documents to the registration review docket for paraquat dichloride (EPA-HQ-OPP-2011-0855).  Of primary interest in the registration review process under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) are the draft human health and ecological risk assessments.  Additional supporting documents posted to the docket include dietary, residential, and occupational exposure assessments; a review of analytical...

On September 17, 2019, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) opened a consultation period on two pilot assessments of the risks posed to humans by residues of multiple pesticides in food.  EFSA is seeking comments from interested parties on the assessments.  The first assessment considers the chronic effects of multiple pesticides on the thyroid system.  The second looks at acute effects on the nervous system. EFSA produced the assessments in collaboration with the...

By Lynn L. Bergeson On September 3, 2019, the Chinese Ministry of Ecology and Environment (MEE) and National Health Commission (NHC) jointly issued a final Technical Framework Guideline for Environmental Risk Assessment of Chemical Substances (Trial). This Trial Guideline provides a basic framework, including evaluation steps, technical requirements, and report preparation, for the environmental risk assessment of a single chemical substance under standard production and uses. The Trial...

On September 4, 2019, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Pesticide Programs’ Environmental Fate and Effects Division (EFED) announced that the next Environmental Modeling Public Meeting (EMPM) will be held on October 16, 2019.  The EMPM is a semi-annual public forum for EPA, pesticide registrants, and other stakeholders to discuss current issues related to modeling pesticide fate, transport, and exposure for risk assessments in a regulatory...

On August 2, 2019, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Office of Pesticide Programs (OPP) announced that it has decided to reduce the Food Quality Protection Act (FQPA) safety factor for infants and children for pyrethroids from its current value of 3X to a new value of 1X.  This decision is based on a July 1, 2019, OPP report entitled “USEPA Office of Pesticide Programs’ Re-evaluation of the FQPA Safety Factor for Pyrethroids: Updated Literature and CAPHRA Program Data...

On May 31, 2019, Health Canada’s Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) issued its Proposed Re-evaluation Decision PRVD2019-05, Chlorpyrifos and Its Associated End-use Products: Updated Environmental Risk Assessment (Updated Environmental Risk Assessment).  PMRA states that this re-evaluation “considers data and information from pesticide manufacturers, published scientific reports, and other regulatory agencies” and that “Health Canada applies internationally accepted...

On May 9, 2019, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced it will hold the first meeting of the Science Advisory Committee on Chemicals (SACC) under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), for Pigment Violet 29 (PV29), the first chemical of the initial ten chemicals undergoing review, on June 18-21, 2019, from 9:00 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. (EDT) at the Holiday Inn Rosslyn at Key Bridge, Rosslyn Ballroom, 1900 North Fort Myer Drive, Arlington, Virginia.  84 Fed....

Beginning on January 23, 2018, the European Commission (EC) opened a consultation period on the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) risk assessment process (scientific advice).  The EC states it is seeking feedback on its process both as  a “follow-up to the commitments made by the Commission in reply to the European Citizens’ Initiative on glyphosate,” and in response to “citizens [that] have put into question the risk assessment based on studies provided by the...

On December 18, 2017, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced it is releasing for public comment the draft human health and ecological risk assessments for glyphosate.  EPA’s Draft Human Health and Ecological Risk Assessments for Glyphosate website states that the “draft risk assessments and supporting documents will be available in glyphosate’s registration review docket EPA-HQ-OPP-2009-0361 on www.regulations.gov in early 2018,”...

On December 15, 2017, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced its release of preliminary ecological and human health risk assessments for three neonicotinoid insecticides:  clothianidin, thiamethoxam, and dinotefuran, as well as a preliminary ecological risk assessment for imidacloprid, assessing risks to birds, mammals, non-target insects, and plants.  The assessments are available in the dockets linked below: Imidacloprid Registration Review Docket ID...

On May 31, 2017, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced the release of its Food Contact Sanitizing Solutions Model (FCSSM), a pesticide risk assessment model that has been developed to “estimate indirect dietary exposure to components of sanitizing solutions used in commercial settings.”  EPA states that “the model offers guidance for estimating exposure where there may be inadvertent transfer of residue to edible items prepared or transported on surfaces...

On May 25, 2017, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced the release of ecological risk assessments for four neonicotinoid active ingredients for public comment as well as the Registration Review Update for Four Neonicotinoid Insecticides (Update).  82 Fed. Reg. 24113.  The ecological risk assessments are: The preliminary aquatic risk assessment for imidacloprid; The combined preliminary bee risk assessment for clothianidin and thiamethoxam; and The draft...

According to press reports, Nancy Beck, Ph.D., DABT has been hired as the Principal Deputy Assistant Administrator for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention (OCSPP).  Dr. Beck holds a doctorate in environmental health from the University of Washington.  For the past five years she served as the Senior Director for Regulatory Science Policy at the American Chemistry Council (ACC).  For a decade prior to ACC, she was an analyst...

On November 29, 2016,  the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced the initial ten chemical substances on which risk evaluations will be conducted under Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) Section 6(b)(2)(A).  The chemicals, all of which were to be drawn from the TSCA Work Plan for Chemical Assessments, are: 1,4-dioxane1-bromopropaneTrichloroethylene (TCE)Carbon tetrachlorideHexabromocyclododecane (HBCD)Methylene chloridePigment violet 29Perchloroethylene...

Like so many other regulatory programs in China, pesticide regulations are changing.  At the 8th China High-Level Forum on Pesticides, Ying Ji, Chief Agronomist of the Institute for the Control of Agrochemicals, Ministry of Agriculture (ICAMA), stated that the future of pesticide regulation in China will see more emphasis placed on industrial development, registration security, the application of more risk assessment techniques, and will focus more on reducing the burden of procuring...

In an opinion issued on September 10, 2015, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit vacated the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) unconditional registration for the pesticide sulfoxaflor and remanded the matter to EPA to obtain further studies and data regarding the effects of sulfoxaflor on bees and bee colonies.  Sulfoxaflor is a new insecticide in the class of insecticides referred to as neonicotinoids, but its mechanism of action is distinct from other...

Along with the release of the revised human health risk assessment for chlorpyrifos, in late December 2014, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) filed a Response to the Petition for a Writ of Mandamus that the Pesticide Action Network North America and the Natural Resources Defense Council, among others, filed in September 2014 in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. This action is the latest of several brought to try to achieve a ban of chlorpyrifos and a revocation...

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) January 5, 2015, release for public comment of the revised human health risk assessment of chlorpyrifos (http://www.regulations.gov/#!documentDetail;D=EPA-HQ-OPP-2008-0850-0195) reflects another step taken to implement its new spray drift and volatilization policies. These policies were long in the making and the subject of significant discussion and controversy over the years. EPA, with this assessment, has also taken a very public step to...

On November 16, 2010, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Office of Risk-Assessment and Cost-Benefit Analysis (ORACBA) convened a Risk Forum on “Moving Beyond Nanogeneralities — Providing Focus to Nanopolicy Progress.” Presenters included Richard Canady, Ph.D., DABT, Director, Center for Human Health Risk Assessment Research Foundation of the International Life Sciences Institute; Steve Froggett, Expert Consultant, ICF International, Inc; and Guillaume Gruere, International...