Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau June 2013 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) proposes to amend its regulations concerning denatured alcohol and products made with industrial alcohol. The proposed amendments would eliminate outdated specially denatured spirits formulas from the regulations, reclassify some specially denatured spirits formulas as completely denatured alcohol formulas, and issue some new general-use formulas for manufacturing products with specially denatured spirits. The proposed amendments would remove unnecessary regulatory burdens on the industrial alcohol industry as well as TTB, and would align the regulations with current industry practice. The proposed amendments would also make other needed improvements and clarifications, as well as a number of minor technical changes and corrections to the regulations. TTB invites comments on these proposed amendments to the regulations.

Elsewhere in this issue of the Federal Register, by means of a temporary rule, the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) is amending its regulations pertaining to permits for importers of tobacco products and processed tobacco by extending the duration of new permits from three years to five years. Based on its experience in the administration and enforcement of importer permits over the past decade, TTB believes that it can gain administrative efficiencies and reduce the burden on industry members, while still meeting the purposes of the limited-duration permit, by extending the permit duration to five years. That temporary rule also makes several technical corrections by amending the definition of ``Manufacturer of tobacco products'' to reflect a recent statutory change, and by amending a reference to the sale price of large cigars to incorporate a clarification published in a prior TTB temporary rule. Finally, the temporary rule published elsewhere in this issue incorporates and reissues TTB regulations pertaining to importer permit requirements for tobacco products, and minimum manufacturing and marking requirements for tobacco products and cigarette papers and tubes, and, as a result, that temporary rule replaces temporary regulations originally published in 1999. The text of the regulations in that temporary rule published elsewhere in this issue of the Federal Register serves as the text of the proposed regulations.

As part of our continuing effort to reduce paperwork and respondent burden, and as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, we invite comments on the proposed or continuing information collections listed below in this notice.