Legislative & Regulatory Issues

There are many legislative and regulatory issues facing the specialty chemical industry. The Toxic Substances Control Act is the hottest industry issue with the recent introduction of a bipartisan bill to reform the nation's chemical laws – the Lautenberg-Vitter Chemical Safety Improvement Act of 2013.

Toxic Substances Control Act

In a show of bipartisanship, Senator David Vitter (R-LA) and the late Senator Frank Launtenberg (D-NJ) recently introduced a bill to reform the nation's chemical laws - the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA). The Lautenberg-Vitter Chemical Safety Improvement Act of 2013 (S. 1009) has 20 co-sponsors, who are almost evenly split between Democrats and Republicans.

Lautenberg, who will long be remembered for his dedication and continued efforts on TSCA reform, died June 3, 2013, less than two weeks after introducing the bill. Despite Lautenberg’s passing, SOCMA is confident the legislation will proceed and serve as a legacy for the five-term senator, who had a passion for this issue.

SOCMA believes there's a lot to like in the legislation, and the bipartisan process should be commended. As it stands today, SOCMA supports the bill.

Some of the positive highlights include:

The confidential business information (CBI) provision was strengthened to allow for protection of chemical identity; the CBI section is an improvement over the previous version.
The new law makes clearer trade secret protection of chemical identity. The current law is ambiguous in this regard. The new version clarifies that aspect of TSCA.
The new chemicals program is largely left unchanged.
No minimum data sets or minimum information sets are mandated, unlike previous bills.

The bill has already garnered broad support in a short time, and industry groups overall appear to be supportive of the legislation.

Despite the current optimism, the bill has a long way to go. But SOCMA looks forward to working with lawmakers and the specialty chemical industry on next steps.

For more information on the bill, contact Dan Newton at (202)721-4158

Other Legislative & Regulatory Issues

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