Attorney General Becerra Slams EPA for Inadequate Risk Evaluation of Harmful Chemical Used in Dry Cleaning

SACRAMENTO – California Attorney General Xavier Becerra today joined a multistate coalition in submitting comments opposing the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) draft risk evaluation of Perchloroethylene (PERC), a hazardous chemical commonly used in dry cleaning. In their comment letter, the Attorneys General explain how EPA has, once again, failed to issue a draft risk evaluation for one of the first 10 chemicals reviewed under the Toxic Substance Control Act (TSCA) that comports with its clear mandate from Congress. EPA must eliminate “unreasonable risk of injury to health or the environment” from the “intended, known, or reasonably foreseen” use or disposal of PERC. Instead, EPA has issued a draft risk evaluation with numerous deficiencies that underestimate PERC’s risks to human health and the environment. The coalition urges EPA to withdraw the draft risk evaluation and re-evaluate PERC’s risks in a manner that complies with its obligations under TSCA. 

"The EPA is once again making excuses and sidestepping responsibility at the expense of public health and the environment,” said Attorney General Becerra. “PERC is a known public health hazard. The EPA's own science shows that exposure to PERC results in serious health consequences. We urge the EPA to put in the work, look at the science, and redo this risk evaluation. Our communities deserve better.”

PERC is widely used as a dry-cleaning solvent, a metal degreaser, a chemical intermediate, and an ingredient in a variety of other common consumer products. Long term exposure to PERC can cause liver, kidney, or central nervous system damage. Because many who face exposure to PERC are low income individuals or communities of color, EPA’s failure to comply with TSCA is an environmental justice failure.

The draft risk evaluation is an integral aspect of the TSCA process for addressing the potential risks from “high priority” chemicals – those that may pose unreasonable risks to human health or the environment.  On May 4, 2020, the EPA released its preliminary conclusions, findings, and determinations about PERC’s risks in the draft risk evaluation. In the comment letter, the coalition argues that in the draft evaluation, among other things, the EPA improperly:

• Omits numerous significant pathways in which the general population and environment are exposed to PERC,
• Ignores the well-documented risks of PERC to those who live near dry-cleaning facilities and hazardous waste sites, as well as the risks to infants, children, and pregnant women; and
• Underestimates the risk of PERC by failing to consider aggregate exposure to the chemical.

Attorney General Becerra is committed to safeguard California's communities from the risks posed by toxic chemicals. In 2018, Attorney General Becerra and Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healy co-led a coalition in submitting comments criticizing the EPA’s “problem formulation” for PERC, an early scoping document for the draft risk evaluation that contained many of the same deficiencies. On June 2, 2020, Attorneys General Becerra and Healey co-led a multistate coalition in submitting comments criticizing the EPA’s draft risk assessment for asbestos for violating the TSCA. Attorneys General Becerra and Healey also led a coalition of attorneys general in calling on EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler to initiate rulemaking to issue a new “asbestos reporting rule” to eliminate exemptions for asbestos in the current Chemical Data Reporting rule, and then filed a lawsuit challenging the EPA’s failure to initiate the rulemaking. 

Attorneys General Becerra joins the attorneys general of New York, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, North Carolina, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington, and the District of Columbia, in filing the comment letter. 

A copy of the comment letter is can be found here.