ECHA committee rejects excluding ‘certain PFAS’ from blanket ban

Helsinki – The European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) has progressed an ongoing probe into a potential blanket ban on per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in the EU.

ECHA committees for risk assessment (RAC) and for socio-economic analysis (SEAC) provisionally concluded on four sectors that could be impacted by the proposal.

At their ‘June meetings’, the committees reached provisional conclusions on: Consumer mixtures; cosmetics; ski wax as well as metal plating and manufacture of metal products.

Furthermore, ECHA's 13 June release said that the RAC committee provisionally concluded on “the scope of the proposal and the hazards of PFAS.”

Here, the agency said, “RAC also considered that the exclusion of certain PFAS from the scope of the restriction based on their potential degradation in the environment is not sufficiently justified.”

The primary concern with PFAS, according to the committee, is their persistence, meaning that PFAS can remain in the environment for a very long time.

Moreover, RAC argued that some PFAS may be of additional concern to the environment and human health.

The conclusions agreed at RAC and SEAC meetings are provisional until the committees finalise the evaluation of the entire restriction proposal (including all sectors of use) and adopt their opinions.

In their next meeting in September, the committees with review the use of PFAS in: Textiles, upholstery, leather, apparel, carpets (TULAC); Food contact materials and packaging; and Petroleum and mining.

After September, the next sectors for discussion will be: Applications of fluorinated gases; Transport; and Construction products.

To conclude, ECHA said it was “making every effort to progress opinion making, following the updates made to the proposal by the five national authorities.”

The opinions, it said, will be delivered to the European Commission “as soon as possible.”