The Center for Public Integrity published this article last week entitled Obama’s EPA breaks pledge to divorce politics from science on toxic chemicals. Having pledged to “restore science to its rightful place” in his inaugural address, CPI argues that the Obama Administration’s plan, in fact “has been a failure. In the past three years, the EPA has assessed fewer chemicals than ever. Last year, it completed only one assessment. Today, the agency has even embraced measures sought by the chemical industry that have led to endless delays.”
As we’ve blogged regularly, the state of commercial chemicals regulation in the United States is outdated, at best, and dangerous, at worst. Certainly it has not inspired confidence in products made with phthalates and BPA, for example, as consumer campaigns and state chemicals laws evidence. The most recent reform bill, the Chemicals Safety Improvement Act (CSIA), remains stuck in a congressional committee.
Read more here on how “the story of how this happened is a lesson in how Washington works.”