Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. After nearly 35 years at EDF, I am retiring this week. While I have had the privilege of working on many things in my time at EDF, for the last 20+ years my main focus has been on the Toxic Substances Control Act: making the case for why […]

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. [I delivered a shorter version of these comments at the September 22, 2021 webinar titled “Hair on Fire and Yes Packages! How the Biden Administration Can Reverse the Chemical Industry’s Undue Influence,” cosponsored by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), NH Safe Water Alliance, and EDF.  A recording […]

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. [I delivered these comments at the July 28, 2021 webinar titled “Toxic Chemicals, Whistleblowers, and the Need for Reform at EPA” cosponsored by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), NY PIRG, and EDF.  [A recording of the webinar is available here.]  The webinar followed on whistleblower disclosures in […]

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. Reprinted by permission from The Environmental Forum®, May/June 2021. MAY/ JUNE 2021 | 55 Copyright © 2021, Environmental Law Institute®, Washington, D.C. www.eli.org. [NOTE:  This post is my contribution to a debate on TSCA implementation published by ELI.  I wrote this piece, which ELI titled “Reversing New Chemicals […]

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. Part 2 of a 2-part series (see Part 1 here) Last week’s announcement by EPA about improvements it is making to EPA’s reviews of new chemicals under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) indicated it will begin by reversing two of the most damaging policy changes the Trump […]

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. Part 1 of a 2-part series (see Part 2 here) With last week’s announcement by EPA that it intends to reverse two of the most damaging policy changes the Trump EPA made to EPA’s reviews of new chemicals under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), there is hope […]

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. Part 4 of a 4-part series – see Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 here This series of blog posts is looking ahead toward opportunities to advance a more robust and holistic vision for implementing the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) as reformed in 2016. We discussed […]

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. Part 3 of a 4-part series – see Part 1, Part 2, and Part 4 here This series of blog posts is looking ahead toward opportunities to advance a more robust and holistic vision for implementing the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) as reformed in 2016. In the […]

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. Part 2 of a 4-part series – see Part 1, Part 3, and Part 4 here After our look back in Part 1 of this series at the damage done over the past four years, the remainder of the series will look ahead and explore opportunities to advance […]

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. Part 1 of a 4-part series – see Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4 here It wasn’t that long ago, June 2016, when there was hope that our nation was at last embarking on the enormous task of reinvigorating and greatly strengthening our chemical safety system, 40 years […]

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. Today the Environmental Protection Agency announced it is conducting a thorough review of its policies and procedures for assessing the safety of new chemicals prior to allowing their entry into commerce. EPA’s announcement flags two immediate changes it is making to restore and realign the program’s practices with […]

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. You know how sometimes you know something is going on behind closed doors, but you just can’t prove it?  Well, this isn’t one of those cases. At numerous points in recent years, we heard tell of secret meetings that Trump EPA political appointees were holding with the chemical […]

Decision epitomizes administration’s disdain for public health protection (Washington, DC – January 14, 2021) Tomorrow, the Trump EPA will announce the formal withdrawal of proposed bans on high-risk uses of the dangerous chemicals methylene chloride, trichloroethylene, and N-methylpyrrolidone. By taking this action, the Trump EPA seeks to prevent the new administration from finalizing any of these bans without […]

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. Yesterday EDF submitted comments on a supplement to EPA’s 1,4-dioxane risk evaluation under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), which the agency issued a scant three weeks ago. This solvent is a likely human carcinogen that contaminates drinking water nationwide and is present in millions of consumer products. […]

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. In recent weeks EPA has issued for public comment significant modifications to its draft risk evaluations under the Toxic Substances Control Act for two chemicals:  Pigment Violet 29 (PV29) and 1,4-dioxane.  Because EPA initially provided relatively brief comment periods on the modifications, both were subject to requests for […]

Jennifer McPartland, Ph.D., is a Senior Scientist.  Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. Today the Trump Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued its final risk evaluation for trichloroethylene (TCE).  It largely tracks the agency’s draft document, retaining numerous flaws that severely understate the highly toxic chemical’s risks to workers, the general public and those most susceptible […]

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. In June 2016, Congress passed historic, bipartisan legislation overhauling the Toxic Substances Control Act, the country’s main chemical safety law, to better protect the public from harmful exposure to toxic chemicals. The Trump administration has spent the last four years working to undermine TCSA by driving its implementation […]

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. Today Environmental Defense Fund, Earthjustice, Natural Resources Defense Council, Physicians for Social Responsibility, and Union of Concerned Scientists filed comments on EPA’s list of nominees for appointment to its Science Advisory Committee on Chemicals (SACC).  The SACC conducts peer reviews of chemical risk evaluations EPA conducts under the […]

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. Readers of this blog will recall the major concerns EDF, EPA’s science advisors, and many others have raised about the Trump EPA’s systematic exclusion from its risk evaluations of all human exposures to chemicals released to air, water and land.  EPA has taken this illegal, unscientific and un-health […]

Richard Denison, Ph.D., is a Lead Senior Scientist. What a mess.  That’s the best that can be said from the outside about the process EPA has followed to decide which companies are to pay fees to help defray the agency’s costs of conducting risk evaluations for the next 20 chemicals under the Toxic Substances Control Act […]