127 



standard, thereby removing the substantial evidence standard con- 

 tained in section 19. 



Second, the Fifth Circuit's ruHng also raised the stakes for deter- 

 mining how the agency could proceed on a valid agency finding of 

 unreasonable risk. The court narrowly interpreted unreasonable 

 risk and least burdensome alternative requirements such that any 

 future determinations by the agency must attain a degree of con- 

 clusiveness that it exceeds what we can reasonably expect from 

 governing bodies. 



An agency charged with monitoring and regulating a commercial 

 activity as expansive as the chemical industry must be empowered 

 to achieve the legislative goals Congress intends. Moreover, such 

 burdensome standards do not permit informed communities to 

 meaningfully participate in the regulatory process because their 

 concerns are not always quantified in cost-benefit terms. 



TSCA can be restored to a functional state by amending the least 

 burdensome alternative language and adding pollution prevention 

 hierarchies as legitimate provisions for regulatory action under sec- 

 tion 6. The ruling in the asbestos case cannot be reconciled with 

 the Pollution Prevention Act of 1990 unless pollution prevention is 

 articulated and authorized under TSCA, both in the general pur- 

 poses clause of the act and in section 6. 



Congress should include as a general purpose of TSCA that the 

 public information, collection, and dissemination mission of the act 

 is information that is collected and placed in the public domain. In 

 other words, Congress must properly affirm information collected 

 under TSCA is presumptively information in the public domain. 

 This critical pronouncement is necessary to ensure public participa- 

 tion and will reduce the amount of information which is directed 

 to EPA as confidential business information. 



Furthermore, Congress should also adopt language specifically 

 stating that health and safety information contained in health and 

 safety studies and substantial risk notices required under section 

 8(d) and 8(e), including chemical identity, is presumptively not en- 

 titled to confidential treatment. 



With regard to State access, it is well understood that the bar 

 on State access to confidential data cripples the utility of the stat- 

 ute and limits the usefulness of the data which is collected at great 

 expense by the agency. All information that is collected under 

 TSCA is potentially useful not only to EPA and the States but to 

 the public. Most information submitted to EPA is in the form of 

 broad data, so placing information in the public domain carries 

 with it a need to provide meaningful ways of using that data. 



In summary, we must establish as a general purpose of TSCA 

 that information collected on toxic chemicals is information that 

 should be accessible to the public. Furthermore, TSCA must 

 enunciate that pollution prevention is the principle of first choice 

 to achieve environmental stewardship and that promoting public 

 understanding of risk of chemicals through the development and 

 dissemination of information on toxic chemicals and public involve- 

 ment is an essential element of the act. 



Thank you. 



Senator Reid. Dr. Smith, would you introduce your associate at 

 the table? 



