Audit Finds EPA’s New Chemicals Program Lacks Sufficient Guidance
On August 2, 2023, EPA’s Office of Inspector General (“OIG”) released a report on its audit of EPA’s New Chemicals Program. The audit identified recordkeeping and quality assurance issues with the program as administered by EPA’s New Chemicals Division (“NCD”). The audit, which began in October 2021, was conducted in response to several internal complaints submitted to OIG.
The New Chemicals Program reviews whether new chemicals or significant new uses of existing chemicals pose an “unreasonable risk” to human health or the environment under the Toxic Substances Control Act (“TSCA”). According to the report, NCD did not have finalized, up-to-date guidance for recordkeeping or for many of the steps in the new chemicals review process, contrary to EPA protocol. OIG stated that these issues resulted from insufficient staff resources, which prevented NCD from both conducting the chemical reviews within statutory time frames and finalizing guidance for the activities composing the review process. The report also found frequent technical issues with NCD’s TSCA Confidential Business Information systems.
Some of the complaints to OIG alleged that staff were pressured to focus on deadlines rather than chemicals’ potential risks during the new chemical review process. However, OIG found no evidence of this; for example, the report notes that NCD employees were not evaluated on the speed at which they reviewed chemicals.
OIG made the following four recommendations to EPA’s Office of Pollution Prevention and Toxics (“OCSPP”) based on its findings:
- Develop a plan to regularly review NCD’s guidance documents,
- Develop a plan to periodically assess the effectiveness of NCD’s recordkeeping system,
- Develop a plan to identify the root causes of the technical issues, and
- Conduct periodic reviews of NCD’s workload.
OCSPP’s response, which was included in the report, agreed with each of OIG’s recommendations and proposed corrective actions in line with the recommendations.
This audit was not the first to find issues with EPA’s implementation of TSCA provisions. A 2019 GAO report identified similar issues, such as insufficient guidance and resources, with the new chemicals review process. In 2020, OIG found that EPA had missed deadlines on existing chemical risk evaluations and that EPA’s ability to meet future deadlines was at risk. EPA has since proposed a fee adjustment designed to increase TSCA fee collections. Most recently, in February 2023, GAO determined that EPA had missed most TSCA deadlines for reviewing new and existing chemicals. In general, EPA agreed in part or in full when recommendations were made in these reports and corrective actions have been completed or are pending.
