states house energy subcommittee on environment and economy. the main focus of this effort was to amend tsca's subsection s.1009, the chemical safety improvement act (csia). the environmental defense fund, felt it would have given the epa many critical tools to strengthen the provisions on public health protection and improved tsca. the bill's key revision included "mandating safety evaluations for all chemicals in active commerce, requiring new chemicals to be deemed likely safe before entering the market, fixing the key flaws in tsca’s safety standard that led to the epa’s inability to ban asbestos, allowing the epa to order testing without first having to show potential risk, and making more information about chemicals available to states, health professionals and the public by limiting current trade secret allowances." the csia would have required states to co-enforce any requirements laid out by the epa, i.e. to have funding and man-power to enforce all regulations that the epa decided on, and causing a disconnect in partnerships between the state, federal government, and communities. the 2014 west virginia chemical spill created many controversies regarding csia. no data on the spilled chemical were available, including data on repeated dose toxicity, carcinogenicity, reproductive toxicity, specific target organ toxicity, and repeated exposure. on february 4, 2014, the senate committee on environment and public works held hearings on the csia right after the incident. in the aftermath of the spill, the house approved a bill 95-0 which provides safeguards for chemical storage tanks and public water supplies. it included new requirements on early detection technology and plans that protect against drinking water contamination. the csia was supported by the national hispanic medical association, the environmental defense fund], the american academy of pediatrics, the humane society, the new york times, the washington post, the chicago tribune, the american alliance for innovation, the international association of machinists and aerospace workers, north america's building trades union smart-transportation division, international association of bridge, structural, ornamental and reinforcing iron workers, the american college of occupational and environmental medicine], the international brotherhood of electrical workers and third way. 2015 in march 2015, senator tom udall (d, nm) sponsored senate bill 697, to amend and reauthorize tsca, called the "frank r. lautenberg chemical safety for the 21st century act". environmental, health and labor organizations and several states criticized it, because "it would gut state chemical regulations"., but officials from the epa and administrator gina mccarthy have testified that the bill meets all of the obama administration's principles for tsca reform and that the administrator was "encouraged" by the bipartisan progress. in addition, the environmental defense fund supports s. 697, stating that it "will give epa the tools necessary to better ensure the safety of chemicals and significantly strengthen health protections for american families." senate bill 725, introduced by senator barbara boxer (d-ca) and senator edward markey (d-ma), also called the "alan reinstein and trevor schaefer toxic chemical protection act", would enable the epa to quickly assess the safety of more chemicals and allow new state policies. in june 2015 the house passed h.r.2576, the tsca modernization act of 2015, and was referred to the senate. on january 20, 2016, gina mccarthy, the epa administrator, sent a letter to congress detailing the epa's positions on s. 697 and h.r. 2576. the letter points out support and concern for a number of topics related to tsca reform, including: deadlines for action, elimination of the "least burdensome" requirement for section 6 regulation, a sustained source of funding, existing chemical review prioritization, consistent applicability of a new tsca safety standard for both new and existing chemicals, transparency and confidential business information, chemicals contained in articles, and state preemption. congress passed a reconciled version of the reform bill, the frank r. lautenberg chemical safety for the 21st century act, with bipartisan support in early june 2016. on wednesday, june 22, 2016, president barack obama signed the bill into law, remarking that "even in the current polarized political process here in washington, things can work." lawmakers and industry groups were largely supportive of the new law, while environmental advocates offered more mixed reactions. comparison with eu chemical regulation the european union (eu) has enabled similar laws called registration, evaluation and authorization of chemicals (reach) on june 1, 2007 to improve the former legislative framework on chemicals. there are three main points to emphasize on the comparisons of reach and tsca. reach vs. tsca requirements on developing chemical information developing a sufficient information is important for risk management and for prevention from potential hazardous substances. categories of information that are useful in risk management are first, scientific information including the composition of the chemical, secondly, technological information including monitoring, preventing or controlling, and finally, legal information including the rights and obligations of producers, consumers and general public . tsca requires chemical companies to submit to the epa any available human health and environmental data on the existing chemicals. tsca does not require chemical companies to conduct toxicity tests for new chemicals on their effects on human health or the environment, but the companies can perform test on voluntary base. in tsca's section 5, companies are required to submit such data if the effect already exists when they submit a premanufacture notice (pmn) to the epa. in order to compensate the gap of actual test data in section 5, a process involving structure-activity relationship (sar) was created to assess hazardous risks. consequently, and according to information dating from the 1980s, slightly less than 50% of new chemicals submitted for evaluation by the epa are accompanied by toxicity data, which mainly consists of local irritation (skin and eyes) or acute toxicity tests in laboratory animals. tsca also requires data on the physical and chemical properties, fate, health and environmental effects of the chemical (hazard information) that the companies possess or reasonably ascertainable when they submit the intent of manufacturing notice to the epa. the epa compares new and existing chemicals by their molecular structures in order to determine if any health and environmental effects are available. authorized by tsca section 8(d), the epa may require manufacturers and importers of a given chemical to submit copies of unpublished health and safety studies including the chemicals produced in the ten years before the effective date of the epa rule. in 2021, epa issued a data call-in rule under section 8(d) to help inform epa's assessment of dozens of chemicals that were either under evaluation or that epa was considering for prioritization. under reach and european chemicals agency (echa) regulations, chemical companies are required to provide quantity of chemicals and depending on the quantity, the companies need to further develop data on human health and environment for both existing and new chemicals. for example, at the one or more tonnage, chemical companies are required to register and submit information including chemical identity,production process, instruction of usage, safety guidance, summaries of physical and chemical properties, exposure and effects on human health and environment. at the 10 or more tonnage, the information for one or more tonnage must be included, additionally, chemical safety assessment, a physiochemical hazard, an environmental hazard, and chemical's persistent, bioaccumulative, and toxic pollutant assessment information are required. for 100 or more tonnage annually, bioaccumulation, simulation testing, identification of degradation data, long term toxicity to fish and aquatic species, short term toxicity to terrestrial organisms and plants, two generation toxicity study, subchronic toxicity to mammals data are required. under tsca, epa will rely upon models or analogs to fill data gaps for properties, toxicity, and fate if epa has data gaps for the substance. under reach, echa requires that registrants fill data gaps, but registrants may do so with data on the substance or analogs, model output, or waivers (if justified). tsca and reach regulations on potential chemical risks under the tsca, the epa needs to collect data to assess the potential risks of chemicals and requires developing substantial evidence in order to withstand judicial review and policy making. due to the section 6(a) of tsca, the epa has difficulty proving that certain chemicals pose unreasonable risks. in order to regulate those chemicals, the epa must find reasonable basis including the effects of substance on human and environment, magnitude of exposure, benefits and uses of the chemical, and availability of the substance. the epa also needs to determine the reasonably ascertainable economic consequences of the rule, after considering the effect to the national economy and businesses. however, the section 6 is taken into consideration to amend in the 2013 reform. section 6 also limits or restricts the production of pcbs, fully halogenated chlorofluoroalkanes, dioxin, asbestos, nitrosating agents, and hexavalent chromium. in addition for 160 existing chemicals, under section 5a2, tsca requires chemical companies to submit notices to the epa prior to manufacturing, importing, or processing of the substance for new usage. tsca also utilizes different models such as ecological risk assessment, quotient method for exceeding measurement endpoints, exposure assessment, pmn, assessment dose-response assessment, etc. reach requires chemical manufacturers, importers, and downstream users to ensure that the chemicals do not negatively affect human health or the environment and they should request authorization to produce or import hazardous chemicals and the companies to search for safer alternatives. the authorization procedure involves first, the european chemicals agency to publish a candidate list of chemicals, secondly, the european commission to determine the authorizations or exempts from candidate lists, and finally, if a chemical is deemed to require authorization, a chemical company will have to apply to the european commission for the authorization. if the chemical company can demonstrate the social and economic benefits outweigh the risks, the harmful chemical may be able to get authorization. likewise tsca, reach restricts chemicals that pose an unacceptable risk to health or environment. in order to restrict, reach must demonstrate the chemical's risk to human health or the environment that needs to be addressed at the community wide level and identify the most appropriate set of risk reduction measures and safer substitutes. tsca vs. reach disclosing information to the public information disclosure gives an opportunity to the public to immediately react and avoid exposure to potential chemical hazards and risks for example by changing consumer behavior or applying pressure on the chemical firms etc. in the other hand, information disclosure also can motivate firms to search for safer alternatives. tsca allows companies to claim their precise chemical volumes, components, chemical uses, and essentially any information provided to the epa as business confidential except in the cases that chemical need health and safety studies. in this extent of tsca, the epa’ s ability is restricted to share information including the company's identities, the chemical's structures to any public groups except the designated contractors, or to law enforcement officials. it is important that the state and local environmental non-governmental agencies, environmental advocates and other public groups in obtaining chemical information in order to develop contingency plans and effective emergency responses in cases of highly toxic exposures. however, the epa can only disclose confidential business information when it determines such disclosure is necessary to protect human health or the environment from an unreasonable risk. similar to tsca, reach mandates chemical companies to disclosure of health and safety information that allows public to have an access to the basic chemical information, including brief profiles of hazardous properties, authorized uses, and risk management measures. also one of the main strength of reach is in the extent to which the government intends to make the public receive as much as information possible, including identification of substances of a very high concern that are subject to authorization. reach considers the full chemical composition, the preparation, the precise use, the detailed function or application of the chemical, the precise tonnage or volume of the chemical manufactured or placed on the market and the relationships between manufacturers, importers and downstream users as confidential for the industry's economic purpose. for persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic substances (pbts), very persistent and very bioaccumulative and toxic substances (vpvb), and other chemicals that are classified as dangerous, reach requires firms to submit a safety data sheet so that downstream users, manufacturers, retailers, and importers have the information required to safely use and handle the chemicals. unlike tsca, reach can share the firm's chemical information with state, government authorities and eu organizations under an agreement between the