This is a print on demand edition of a hard to find publication. The EPA is authorized under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) to obtain information on the risks of chemicals and to control those that it determines to pose an unreasonable risk. EPA also conducts assessments of chemicals under its Integrated Risk Information System (IRIS) program. Nonetheless, EPA does not have sufficient information to determine whether it should establish controls to limit public exposure to many chemicals that may pose substantial health risks. This testimony addresses EPA's implementation of TSCA and IRIS and options for: (1) obtaining more information on chemical risks; (2) controlling these risks; and (3) sharing more of the information collected under TSCA. Illustrations.

Chemical Regulation: Observations on Improving the Toxic Substances Control Act

The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) is an independent agency that works for Congress. The GAO watches over Congress, and investigates how the federal government spends taxpayers dollars. The Comptroller General of the United States is the leader of the GAO, and is appointed to a 15-year term by the U.S. President. The GAO wants to support Congress, while at the same time doing right by the citizens of the United States. They audit, investigate, perform analyses, issue legal decisions and report anything that the government is doing. This is one of their reports.

During the first decade of the twenty-first century, the United States increasingly has relaxed its regulatory posture in the face of critical challenges to public health and the environment. This is true for regulation of recycling of end-of-life products, including autos and electronic components; potentially hazardous chemicals; and health claims on food labels. Coincidentally, the European Union has gravitated toward more restrictive regulation in these very same areas. How might we explain these diverging regulatory trajectories of the world s two largest market economies in an era of rising public awareness of dangers to the public and the planet? The explanation derives not from cultural differences in willingness to tolerate risk, but rather from distinctive regulatory tradeoffs - between environment and competitiveness in the United States and environment, competitiveness, and integration in the EU.

The US Department of Justice is under fire for failing to prosecute banks that caused the 2008 economic meltdown because they are too big to jail. Prosecutors have long neglected to hold corporate executives accountable for chronic mistakes that kill and injure workers and customers. This book, the first of its kind, analyzes five industrial catastrophes that have killed or sickened consumers and workers or caused irrevocable harm to the environment. From the Texas City refinery explosion to the Upper Big Branch mine collapse, the root causes of these preventable disasters include crimes of commission and omission. Although federal prosecutors have made a start on holding low-level managers liable, far more aggressive prosecution is appropriate as a matter of law, policy, and justice. Written in accessible and jargon-free language, this book recommends innovative interpretations of existing laws to elevate the prosecution of white-collar crime at the federal and state levels.

"[The author] warns that America's water crisis isn't looming on the horizon--it's already here ... the most precious resource on planet Earth is alarmingly polluted by toxins, hazardous waste, lead, fracking chemicals, and more. In the 20 years since her eponymous film, Brockovich has kept up the fight for clean water one town at a time ... Brockovich has become a modern-day superhero responding to pleas for help throughout our country, from citizens whose letters and pleas have been ignored by their local representatives, the EPA, the Department of Natural Resources, the CDC, their local water authority--with troubling situations that go unheeded and conditions not magically righting themselves. Brockovich can't fight all the fights and save our water on her own ... She lays out the facts, and gives us the tools to take steps--large and small--to make changes in our own counties, cities and towns, and help to preserve our selves, our water, our planet"--