Broken chemical controls? European Environment Bureau lambasts EU’s slow action on life-threatening substances

13 Jul 2022 --- EU officials currently take over a decade to ban hazardous chemicals from consumer products despite evidence they cause cancer, infertility and other grave health problems. Loopholes, delays and over-analysis mean that thousands of chemicals have continued to contaminate products years after politicians were made aware of the dangers, according to a recent European Environment Bureau (EEB) study.

The report, titled “Need for Speed,” examined how long it took for all 1,109 chemical dossiers since 2007 to pass through the two main EU chemical regulations or remain pending. It found that EU laws are “broken from the start,” forcing officials to allow chemicals on the market within just three weeks, often without a basic understanding of their hazards. 

Furthermore, the report found that industry misleads regulators by systematically providing unreliable hazard data. It then takes concerned officials around a decade to gain accurate data and build cases for control measures – a process industry regularly challenges in court. 

EEB chemical policy manager Tatiana Santos tells PackagingInsights that “years of public poisoning is the result of inaction. Officials understand the serious harms being done, but take a decade to control them.” 

“In the meantime, people and the environment are unnecessarily exposed. That is too late for all those blighted by cancer, infertility, and other serious harms. These years of prolonged exposure and its health damage to generations of EU citizens could have been avoided,” she says. 

Paralysis by analysis 
Santos says that industry is mostly to blame for hiding the known dangers in their products, but political officials regularly freeze protections “without justification or explanation, or because of endless discussions and ‘paralysis by analysis.’” 

This inaction by the European Commission (EC) can be attributed to three central factors. First, there is a lack of clear deadlines written into law; the EC has the legal obligation to draft decisions within three months but no obligation to adopt final decisions. “That loophole results in decisions being stalled for years, de facto granting industry ample amounts of extra time to continue uncontrolled and therefore dangerous use of hazardous chemicals,” explains Santos.Legislative change is so slow that voluntary phase outs by industry bodies have moved faster for substances like PFAS.

Second, the EC lacks accountability to protect EU citizens and the environment by taking timely action against harmful chemicals. In almost all cases, the EC fails to meet its obligation to draft decisions in three months. “However, there is no justification provided to EU citizens for such delay. If they fail to act, there should be transparency and legal consequences for maladministration and inaction,” she says.

Third, political officials do not want change, as they favor the market over human and environmental health. “At the EC, officials regularly sit on files for years, allowing serious ongoing harms to continue. The result is that many chemicals in dangerous use remain stuck in the EU system. All the while, as officials dither or stall protections, firms are free to continue using high volumes of hazardous chemicals despite the known harms. The EC tips the balance in favor of industry,” adds Santos. 

Industry’s role 
As this lack of political oversight threatens consumers across the continent, Santos says that industry players should stop “routine gaming of the system.” 

“Firms submit hazard data to officials that are unreliable in almost all cases that officials check (93% at the last count). This would be considered gross negligence, except the EEB believes it is deliberate since acknowledging hazards invites unwanted regulatory action,” she asserts.

The EU’s current legislation Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH) obliges officials to grant market access before checking dossier quality, lumbering them with the major task of proving chemicals are in dangerous use. 

“The situation is compounded by a culture of resistance by industry, with firms routinely challenging European Chemicals Agency decisions through vexatious cases, even over basic hazard data that is supposed to be the foundation of market access. Moreover, registrations are valid indefinitely, regardless of their level of compliance,” Santos continues.

Only a cancellation, argue ECHA and the EC, could truly implement the REACH principle of “no data, no market” sustainably. “The outcome: the legal maxim of ‘no data, no market’ has become ‘no data, no problem,’ and firms have de facto permission to use chemicals dangerously in consumer and other products for a decade, even where officials are fully aware of serious harms being done,” she argues.

While industry is already fighting the early stages of legislative reform, as REACH stipulations are under revision, no challenge has yet been posed against the EEB’s findings in this report.Industry lobbying influence has kept power away from political leaders in the EU, says the EEB.

Trouble to come 
The EC is currently preparing to publish a study detailing how 1,300 chemicals, used at a volume of 23 million tons per year in Europe, are linked to cancer, infertility, stunted development in children and other serious health impacts and will be banned from all products in the coming years. 

Of those, over 600 chemicals totaling five million tons a year, go into consumer products.

Scientists recently declared that chemical pollution had passed the safe limit for humanity. Daily exposure to a mix of toxic substances is linked to rising health, fertility, developmental threats, as well as the collapse of insect, bird and mammal populations.

In Europe, it took officials a total of 11 years to ban a chemical that industry had already decided to phase out 20 years ago voluntarily and 40 years after scientists started raising the alarm. 

“It is safe to assume that countless suffering has been caused by the EU’s broken chemical controls. At the end of the day, it is significantly easier and faster for industry to market unsafe chemicals than for the authorities to take them off the market,” concludes Santos. 

By Louis Gore-Langton