According to the latest Greenpeace report, brands are making progress in reducing polyvinyl chloride (PVC) plastic and brominated flame retardants (BFRs) in products. Apple is leading the pack in completely eliminating these chemicals in personal computers (PCs), while TV manufacturers are lagging their PC peers in reducing PVC and BFRs. On the supply chain front, Greenpeace challenges the brands to be transparent on chemicals use and to eliminate all chemicals of high concern in manufacturing.… …
Brominated and other flame retardants are losing the health care market. Four health care providers -- Advocate Health Care, Beaumont Health System, Hackensack University Medical Center, and University Hospitals -- announced they will stop buying upholstered furniture treated with flame retardant chemicals. With Kaiser Permanente, which made a similar announcement in June, these organizations spend about $50 million annually on furniture. Questions going forward: How will this move… …
The two US retail giants joined together with their supply chain last week in Chicago at the “Beauty and Personal Care Products Sustainability Summit.” At the top of their agenda: “impacts of chemicals (health & environment)” and “transparency.” The question is, will Target and Walmart have the moxie to convince the chemical industry to disclose all chemicals in their products and to use inherently safer chemicals. That these issues have brought the… …
Some novel innovations aimed at reducing waste have been garnering attention this summer, including one pioneered by the company WikiFoods, Inc. The company describes its new material, WikiPearl, as “a protective electrostatic gel formed by harnessing interactions between natural food particles, nutritive ions and a polysaccharide” that is strong enough to serve as packaging and is also edible. Product development is far enough along to have been tested at Whole Foods Market stores… …
While the 1976 Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) banned new production and most uses of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), it allowed some historical uses to continue and set allowable limits for PCBs that occur as manufacturing by-products in other products. Washington State, which has some of the country’s most stringent PCB limits, discovered that these by-product PCBs – including pigments and dyes used in paper, plastics and textiles – appear to be contributing to the… …
Apple placed restrictions on benzene, beryllium, n-hexane, trichloroethylene (TCE), and other chlorinated solvents in manufacturing operations as part of its new Regulated Substances Specification. Apple also says “All suppliers subject to breathing zone restrictions are encouraged to eliminate the use of n-hexane in cleaning agents or degreasers, as safer alternatives exist.” The NGOs Green America and China Labor Watch, which launched campaigns asking Apple to… …
A new report from the Canadian Environmental Law Association (CELA) and Clean Production Action (CPA) uses GreenScreen® to evaluate two antibacterial chemicals and concludes that triclosan is a high hazard chemical whose use should be avoided. An alternative antibacterial, triclocarban, is less hazardous overall than triclosan, but is a very high aquatic toxicant. According to the report, most of these chemicals used in soaps and other consumer products end up down the drain and in… …
Businesses praise bill to avoid chemicals of high concern to human health and the environment Business leaders today urged the U.S. Senate to pass the Protecting America’s Families from Toxic Chemicals Act of 2014. The bill just introduced by Senator Merkley (D-OR) would reduce chemicals that are persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic (PBTs). PBTs are uniquely hazardous. An example is mercury: it travels the globe and increases in concentration up the food chain, it does not break down in… …
Senator Edward J. Markey (D-MA) and Representatives Lois Capps (D-CA) and Grace Meng (D-NY) have introduced the Ban Poisonous Additives (BPA) Act to bar the use of bisphenol A (BPA) in food and beverage containers nationwide in both reusable containers and food and beverage packaging. The bill has the support of 20 national labor unions and nearly three dozen health and environmental groups. More than a dozen states now have BPA restrictions in place and the FDA has discontinued its approval of… …
A new report from the Food Packaging Forum identifies 175 potentially hazardous substances used legally in food contact materials. According to the report, many of these substances – chemicals used in food packaging or to produce those materials – are classified as carcinogenic, mutagenic or reprotoxic. Others are endocrine disrupters, and some are persistent and bioaccumulative. Most of these materials are plastics, highlighting the need for measuring chemicals of concern in… …