Pediatricians urge tougher chemical safety law

Among the American Academy of Pediatrics recommendations:

• The consequences of chemical use on children and their families should be "a core component" of the new chemical policy.
• Chemicals should meet standards similar to those required for new drugs or pesticides.
• Decisions to ban chemicals should be based on reasonable levels of concern, rather than demonstrated harm.
• The health effects of chemicals should be monitored after they are on the market, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency should have the authority to remove a chemical from the market if it's deemed dangerous.

Since the Toxic Substances Control Act took effect in 1976, the EPA has tested only 200 of the 80,000 chemicals in commerce and regulated just five.

"Right now, a company manufactures a chemical and puts it out on the market and reaps the economic reward," said Dr. Jerome Paulson, lead author of the policy statement. "And then the public is responsible for trying to figure out if there is any harm associated with the use of that chemical. And then it's almost a criminal procedure, requiring proof beyond a reasonable doubt."

Democratic Sen. Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey this month introduced the Safe Chemicals Act of 2011. The law would require chemical manufacturers to demonstrate the safety of industrial chemicals used in everyday household products.

Read more at CNN

Or take action to support the Safe Chemicals Act of 2011

State and Local Governments Form Interstate Chemicals Clearinghouse to Promote Toxics Reduction

Environmental officials from 10 state and local governments announced today that they have formed an umbrella organization - the Interstate Chemicals Clearinghouse (IC2) - to promote a clean environment, healthy communities, and a vital economy through the development and use of safer chemicals and products...
  

Read the Press Release from NEWMOA

More information about IC2

Green Chemistry: Definitions and Principles

The Twelve Principles of Green Chemistry

1. Prevention
   It is better to prevent waste than to treat or clean up waste after it has been created.
2. Atom Economy
   Synthetic methods should be designed to maximize the incorporation of all materials used in the process into the final product.
3. Less Hazardous Chemical Syntheses
   Wherever practicable, synthetic methods should be designed to use and generate substances that possess little or no toxicity to human health and the environment.
4. Designing Safer Chemicals
   Chemical products should be designed to effect their desired function while minimizing their toxicity.
5. Safer Solvents and Auxiliaries
   The use of auxiliary substances (e.g., solvents, separation agents, etc.) should be made unnecessary wherever possible and innocuous when used.
6. Design for Energy Efficiency
   Energy requirements of chemical processes should be recognized for their environmental and economic impacts and should be minimized. If possible, synthetic methods should be conducted at ambient temperature and pressure.
7. Use of Renewable Feedstocks
   A raw material or feedstock should be renewable rather than depleting whenever technically and economically practicable.
8. Reduce Derivatives
   Unnecessary derivatization (use of blocking groups, protection/ deprotection, temporary modification of physical/chemical processes) should be minimized or avoided if possible, because such steps require additional reagents and can generate waste.
9. Catalysis
   Catalytic reagents (as selective as possible) are superior to stoichiometric reagents.
10. Design for Degradation
    Chemical products should be designed so that at the end of their function they break down into innocuous degradation products and do not persist in the environment.
11. Real-time analysis for Pollution Prevention
    Analytical methodologies need to be further developed to allow for real-time, in-process monitoring and control prior to the formation of hazardous substances.
12. Inherently Safer Chemistry for Accident Prevention
    Substances and the form of a substance used in a chemical process should be chosen to minimize the potential for chemical accidents, including releases, explosions, and fires.

From the book Green Chemistry: Theory and Practice by Paul Anastas and John Warner

Check out Advancing Green Chemistry's website for more information

Massachusetts introduces bill for "Safer Alternatives" to toxic chemicals

Source: (http://www.flickr.com/photos/pikespice/3774854067/)

Massachusetts legislators are filing a bill this week to protect children, families and workers from harmful chemicals found in everyday household products from window cleaner to shampoo... 

..The legislation, called The Safer Alternatives Bill, would require businesses to replace toxic chemicals with safer ones if there are ones available. It also sets up a review system for other chemicals. This is the 6th year the bill will be filed in Massachusetts, but despite the budget woes of the state, environmentalists say they expect to make headway.

Read the full story by Beth Daley at Boston.com's Green Blog

Call or write your Massachusetts legislator today to let them know you support this bill

New York State: 85 chemicals to avoid

Source: ny.govThis is a great initiative, but it will be interesting to see if state agencies can "avoid" cadmium and lead (and others) which are ubiquitious in computers and other electronics.

When someone with $8 billion a year in purchasing power tells the world what they don’t want, marketers and manufacturers pay attention.

That’s what’s happened recently in New York, where state agencies operate 16,000 facilities and a fleet of 17,000 vehicles and generate more than 800,000 tons of waste a year. Those agencies are now working with an official policy that urges them, for the sake of public health, to avoid products, equipment and other items containing any of 85 toxic chemicals whenever safer, cost-effective alternatives are available. The goal is to minimize New Yorkers’ exposure to these chemicals as much as possible and prevent them from ending up in the state’s landfills.

The unprecedented step is a victory first and foremost for the people of the New York, but potentially also for other states that may be inspired to follow the Empire State’s example. If they do, New York’s “Chemical Avoidance List” gives them a huge head start in developing their own policies.

Two days before the end of 2010, the Interagency Committee on Sustainability and Green Procurement approved the policy directing all state agencies to consider avoiding the 85 toxic chemicals. The list consists of known and probable human carcinogens identified by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the National Toxicology Program as well as substances that accumulate in the human body and don’t readily break down in the environment. They are known as persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic chemicals, or PBTs for short....

Read the full story by Olga Naidenko at EWG.org

List of Chemicals for Consideration in Green Procurement