Environmental Protection Agency August 12, 2020 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is announcing the availability of the final Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) risk evaluation of 1-Bromopropane (1-BP). The purpose of conducting risk evaluations under TSCA is to determine whether a chemical substance presents an unreasonable risk of injury to health or the environment under the conditions of use, including an unreasonable risk to a relevant potentially exposed or susceptible subpopulation, without consideration of costs or other nonrisk factors. EPA has determined that specific conditions of use of 1-BP present an unreasonable risk of injury to health. For those conditions of use for which EPA has found an unreasonable risk, EPA must take regulatory action to address that unreasonable risk through risk management measures enumerated in TSCA. EPA has also determined that specific conditions of use do not present unreasonable risk of injury to health or the environment. For those conditions of use for which EPA has found no unreasonable risk to health or the environment, the Agency's determination is a final Agency action and is issued via order in the risk evaluation.

This regulation establishes tolerances for residues of pethoxamid in or on multiple commodities which are identified and discussed later in this document. FMC Corporation requested these tolerances under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FFDCA).

This action finalizes the residual risk and technology review (RTR) conducted for the Miscellaneous Organic Chemical Manufacturing source category regulated under national emission standards for hazardous air pollutants (NESHAP). The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is finalizing decisions concerning the RTR, including amendments pursuant to the technology review for equipment leaks and heat exchange systems, and also amendments pursuant to the risk review to specifically address ethylene oxide emissions from storage tanks, process vents, and equipment leaks. In addition, we are taking final action to correct and clarify regulatory provisions related to emissions during periods of startup, shutdown, and malfunction (SSM), including removing general exemptions for periods of SSM, adding work practice standards for periods of SSM where appropriate, and clarifying regulatory provisions for certain vent control bypasses. The EPA is also taking final action to add monitoring and operational requirements for flares that control ethylene oxide emissions and flares used to control emissions from processes that produce olefins and polyolefins; add provisions for electronic reporting of performance test results and other reports; and include other technical corrections to improve consistency and clarity. We estimate that these final amendments will reduce hazardous air pollutants (HAP) emissions from this source category by approximately 107 tons per year (tpy) and reduce ethylene oxide emissions from this source category by approximately 0.76 tpy. We also estimate that these final amendments will reduce excess emissions of HAP from flares that control ethylene oxide emissions and flares used to control emissions from processes that produce olefins and polyolefins by an additional 263 tpy.