Comprehensive Chemical Policy Reform

Our current system of chemical regulation is outdated. Chemicals are not adequately tested as to their toxicity and our system legally allows people to be exposed to potentially dangerous toxic chemicals. Toxic chemicals are widely found in our environment, homes, workplaces, and bodies.  Most people believe that the government ensures that chemicals--and the products that contain them--are safe. This is not true.  Chemicals are introduced into commerce without first testing whether they can harm human health.  Neither our government nor industry are protecting human health, in particular the health of our children who are at even greater risk of developmental and other disorders triggered by chemicals. 

We must transform our chemical regulatory system into one that is healthy for all Oregonians and the environment. The European Union has initiated a system of chemical evaluation and regulation known as Registration, Evaluation, and Authorisation of Chemicals (REACH), which is designed to keep the most persistent, bioaccumulative, and toxic (PBT) chemicals out of the environment and our bodies.  Such a system is needed in the U.S. Specifically, we call for the following policies to be implemented:

• Require that complete information be provided on chemical ingredients and their toxicity. The burden to prove that chemicals are safe before they are allowed on the market should fall to producers and manufacturers. Chemical safety data should be made available to the public and regulators. These data must take into account impacts on vulnerable populations. Due to the enormity of this information management task, Oregon should support the development of an interstate clearinghouse for chemical ingredients.

• Categorize chemicals into levels of concern.  The public, businesses, workers, and consumers should have tools to help distinguish between chemicals. A chemical categorization system will identify safer chemicals, chemicals to avoid, and chemicals that lack adequate safety data.

• Manage chemicals based on hazards and substitute those of highest concern with safer alternatives. Oregon should develop and use criteria to identify chemicals of concern and have the authority to restrict certain chemical uses. State agencies should have the authority to identify, collect data on, and mandate the replacement of chemicals of highest concern.

• Establish policies, practices, and incentives that move Oregon toward safer alternatives.

• Invest in and build in-state institutional alternatives research capacity.

• Promote least-toxic and biobased procurement policies for state, local, and municipal governments and other large institutions such as hospitals, universities, and schools.

• Ensure that all communities can participate in new green economy by creating incentives for investment.

• Create tax incentives for and provide technical assistance to firms working toward safer alternatives.

• Increase and direct research and economic development dollars to promote safer alternatives, particularly in key sectors ripe for alternatives.

• Provide adequate funding and enforcement. Oregon must create the funding and enforcement mechanisms to successfully implement chemical policy reform. Despite the new policies and programs funded in 2007, Oregon DEQ and other state agencies are still severely underfunded. Resources for technical assistance and program implementation are essential to ensuring a successful transition by the business community to these new, safer chemical policy standards.

• Ensure that workers and affected communities are protected.  Oregon should address concerns about any job losses that may result from a transition to safer chemicals.  This means incorporating policies that support a just transition to cleaner, safer jobs, worksites, and communities.  Oregon should ensure that communities facing environmental injustice are given particular priority for remediation.
  

The preventable costs of environmentally attributable diseases will continue to increase in the years ahead as our exposures to inadequately tested chemicals continues and grows.  While we spend valuable resources to treat and compensate for environmentally attributable diseases, there are approaches available would begin to eliminate many of these costs. It is imperative that we increase our investment in chemical policy reforms and safer alternative development to reduce and eliminate these unnecessary and costly exposures.