Environmental Protection Agency January 12, 2017 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

Pursuant to the provisions of the Federal Advisory Committee Act, Public Law 92-463, notice is hereby given that the next meeting of the Children's Health Protection Advisory Committee (CHPAC) will be held February 1 and 2, 2017, at Georgetown University Hotel and Conference Center, 3800 Reservoir Road NW., Washington, DC 20057. The CHPAC advises the Environmental Protection Agency on science, regulations, and other issues relating to children's environmental health.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is promulgating this final rule to adjust the level of statutory civil monetary penalty amounts under the statutes EPA administers. This action is mandated by the Federal Civil Penalties Inflation Adjustment Act of 1990, as amended through the Federal Civil Penalties Inflation Adjustment Act Improvements Act of 2015 (``the 2015 Act''). The 2015 Act prescribes a formula for annually adjusting statutory civil penalties to reflect inflation, maintain the deterrent effect of statutory civil penalties, and promote compliance with the law. The rule does not necessarily revise the penalty amounts that EPA chooses to seek pursuant to its civil penalty policies in a particular case. EPA's civil penalty policies, which guide enforcement personnel in how to exercise EPA's statutory penalty authorities, take into account a number of fact- specific considerations, e.g., the seriousness of the violation, the violator's good faith efforts to comply, any economic benefit gained by the violator as a result of its noncompliance, and a violator's ability to pay.

EPA is establishing reporting and recordkeeping requirements for certain chemical substances when they are manufactured or processed at the nanoscale as described in this rule. Specifically, EPA is requiring persons that manufacture (defined by statute to include import) or process, or intend to manufacture or process these chemical substances to electronically report to EPA certain information, which includes insofar as known to or reasonably ascertainable by the person making the report, the specific chemical identity, production volume, methods of manufacture and processing, exposure and release information, and existing information concerning environmental and health effects. This rule involves one-time reporting for existing discrete forms of certain nanoscale materials, and a standing one-time reporting requirement for new discrete forms of certain nanoscale materials before those new forms are manufactured or processed.