Environmental Protection Agency December 19, 2022 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is planning to submit an information collection request (ICR), ``Evaluating End User Satisfaction of EPA's Research Products'' (EPA ICR No. 2593.02, OMB Control No. 2080-0085) to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review and approval in accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA). Before doing so, EPA is soliciting public comments on specific aspects of the proposed information collection as described below. This is a proposed extension of the ICR, which is currently approved through August 31, 2023. An Agency may not conduct or sponsor and a person is not required to respond to a collection of information unless it displays a currently valid OMB control number.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is announcing the availability of the final revision to the risk determination for the n- methylpyrrolidone (NMP) risk evaluation issued under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA). The revision to the NMP risk determination reflects the announced policy changes to ensure the public is protected from unreasonable risks from chemicals in a way that is supported by science and the law. EPA determined that NMP, as a whole chemical substance, presents an unreasonable risk of injury to health when evaluated under its conditions of use. In addition, this revised risk determination does not reflect an assumption that workers always appropriately wear personal protective equipment (PPE). EPA understands that there could be adequate occupational safety protections in place at certain workplace locations; however, not assuming use of PPE reflects EPA's recognition that unreasonable risk may exist for subpopulations of workers that may be highly exposed because they are not covered by Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) standards, or their employers are out of compliance with OSHA standards, or because many of OSHA's chemical- specific permissible exposure limits largely adopted in the 1970's are described by OSHA as being ``outdated and inadequate for ensuring protection of worker health,'' or because OSHA has not issued a chemical-specific permissible exposure limit (PEL) (as is the case for NMP), or because EPA finds unreasonable risk for purposes of TSCA notwithstanding OSHA requirements. This revision supersedes the condition of use-specific no unreasonable risk determinations in the December 2020 NMP Risk Evaluation and withdraws the associated TSCA order included in the December 2020 NMP Risk Evaluation.

EPA is required under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), as amended by the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act, to make information publicly available and to publish information in the Federal Register pertaining to submissions under TSCA Section 5, including notice of receipt of a Premanufacture notice (PMN), Significant New Use Notice (SNUN) or Microbial Commercial Activity Notice (MCAN), including an amended notice or test information; an exemption application (Biotech exemption); an application for a test marketing exemption (TME), both pending and/or concluded; a notice of commencement (NOC) of manufacture (including import) for new chemical substances; and a periodic status report on new chemical substances that are currently under EPA review or have recently concluded review. This document covers the period from 11/1/ 2022 to 11/30/2022.