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News
EU Court Determines Titanium Dioxide was Wrongly Classified as Carcinogenic
Last month, the European Court of Justice determined that titanium dioxide (TiO2) in powder form has been wrongly classified by the European Union (EU) as carcinogenic. As a result, the Court declared a corresponding regulation of the EU Commission null and void. And it announced that the EU Commission committed a “manifest error” in assessing the reliability of the study on which the classification was based.
The good news.
The EU Court’s ruling based on the lack of science-based evidence in determining regulation was a welcomed outcome in the PVC industry. Providing the EU Commission does not appeal the court’s decision, the earliest titanium dioxide will be delisted as a carcinogenic is in the Spring of 2023.
The bad news.
However, this ruling has come late in the process for PVC manufacturers. When the initial regulation came into law in 2019, companies throughout the EU PVC supply chain went to great expense to change their formulations to comply with the regulation, which was based on activist rhetoric and no scientific data.
What can the U.S. vinyl industry learn from the EU’s titanium dioxide issue?
As an industry, we need to come together and actively push back against unfounded proposed regulations like the ones happening in Europe with the ECHA. Activists in the U.S. are using similar tactics and rhetoric to influence regulatory rulemaking with insufficient scientific evidence to back their claims. Examples of this are common in the Center for Biological Diversity’s RCRA petition. If adopted into law, this will have a negative ripple effect throughout the vinyl value chain.
What can you do?
The VI is actively engaged at the legislative and regulatory levels, but we also need value chain members to weigh in. This can be in the form of writing a letter to regulators, or meeting with your elected officials and educating them and their staff about the effects of poor regulatory rulemaking will have on your businesses and your employees.