Environmental Protection Agency November 17, 2011 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

In compliance with the Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA) (44 U.S.C. 3501 et seq.), this document announces that EPA is planning to submit a request to renew an existing approved Information Collection Request (ICR) to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). This ICR is scheduled to expire on April 30, 2012. Before submitting the ICR to OMB for review and approval, EPA is soliciting comments on specific aspects of the proposed information collection as described below.

EPA is announcing a 30-day public comment period for the draft document titled, BASINS and WEPP Climate Assessment Tools (CAT): Case Study Guide to Potential Applications (EPA/600/R-11/123A). EPA also is announcing that an EPA contractor for external scientific peer review will select an independent group of experts to conduct a letter peer- review of the draft document. The document was prepared by the National Center for Environmental Assessment within EPA's Office of Research and Development, and is intended to support application of two recently developed water modeling tools, the BASINS and WEPP climate assessment tools. The report presents a series of short case studies designed to illustrate the capabilities of these tools for conducting scenario based assessments of the potential future effects of climate, land use, and management change on water resources. EPA intends to forward the public comments that are submitted in accordance with this notice to the external peer-reviewers for their consideration during the letter review. When finalizing the draft document, EPA intends to consider any public comments received in accordance with this notice. EPA is releasing this draft assessment for the purposes of public comment and peer review. This draft assessment is not final as described in EPA's information quality guidelines, and it does not represent and should not be construed to represent Agency policy or views. The draft document is available via the Internet on the NCEA home page under the Recent Additions and the Data and Publications menus at https://www.epa.gov/ncea.

As a supplement to the proposed rule to declare a prion (i.e., proteinaceous infectious particle) a ``pest'' under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA), and to amend its regulations to expressly include prion within the regulatory definition of pest, EPA is now proposing to amend its product performance data requirements to clarify that efficacy data are required for all products with prion-related claims. The existing product performance data requirements already require efficacy data to be submitted when the ``pesticide product bears a claim to control pest microorganisms that pose a threat to human health and whose presence cannot readily be observed by the user including, but not limited to, microorganisms infectious to man in any area of the inanimate environment. * * *'' Since this general requirement applies to products with prion-related claims, EPA is proposing to amend the regulation to specifically identify that efficacy data are required for products with prion- related claims. In addition, EPA is announcing the availability for public review and comment of draft test guidelines concerning the generation of product performance data for prion-related products.