EPA Strengthens TSCA Initiative's 'Conflict' Rules Ahead Of Pending Guide

摘要

EPA's toxics office has strengthened the steps contractors must take to prevent selection of peer reviewers who may have conflicts of interest and operate more transparently when they review five pending risk assessments, seeking to bring its practice in line with an imminent new agency guidance on contractor peer reviews even before final publication. While the new conflict-of-interest policy has yet to be published, an agency source says that changes were made to the toxics office's peer review plans for its pending chemical assessment initiative under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), "anticipating as much" as possible the new peer review guidance, including requesting public nominations of potential peer reviewers and comment on those experts selected as candidates to serve on the peer review. The toxics office's efforts to implement the guide's stricter anti-bias and transparency approaches signals the priority the agency is likely to place on its new practices once the document is issued.