Toxics

A federal appellate court has found that EPA’s controversial policy barring agency grant recipients from serving as EPA science advisors is unlawful because it skewed representation on the panels toward state and industry representatives, the second court defeat for the controversial policy in the past few weeks.

As science advisors prepare to review EPA’s draft evaluation of the common solvent trichloroethylene (TCE), environmentalists and former officials are urging the agency to take “immediate action” to address any “imminent and serious” acute risks while also calling for the draft to be strengthened so the substance can be banned going forward.

The Defense Department (DOD) is weighing whether to develop policy that would manage cleanup and disposal of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) across a range of media, including contaminated soil, stormwater runoff, biosolids and sludge, a potentially significant widening of its current focus on contaminated drinking water.

Environmental groups have made good on their threat to sue EPA over inadequate transparency in its new chemicals review program, charging it’s a “black box” that violates requirements in the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) as well as the Administrative Procedure Act (APA).