December marks the 50th anniversary of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which presents an opportunity to celebrate a half century of progress towards a cleaner, healthier environment. As EPA recognizes its 50th anniversary, we appreciate the opportunity to provide the following guest editorial in ACS Chemical Health & Safety. We have a lot to celebrate. Since 1970, EPA has improved awareness of the chemicals Americans are exposed to, spurred the development of more environmentally friendly chemical substitutes, and put safeguards in place when needed. For instance, as a result of multiple federal laws and regulations, including EPA’s historic Residential Lead-Based Paint Hazard Reduction Act of 1992, the amount of lead in children’s blood has decreased by 95% since 1976. Over the last four years, EPA has worked hard to sustain this momentum. For example, in June 2019, we announced a stronger, more protective standard for lead dust in homes and child-occupied facilities across the country—the first update to these standards in nearly two decades. As we celebrate our past, we also look to the future. In the spirit of the EPA’s theme for its 50th anniversary—Progress for a Stronger Future—we are thinking about how we will continue to make enduring progress toward a cleaner, healthier environment for generations to come. The answer lies in staying true to four principles that have brought us success over the last five decades:

• protecting human health and the environment;
• improving engagement with stakeholders;
• increasing transparency and certainty in the work that we do;
• reducing unnecessary burden in our work.

protecting human health and the environment; improving engagement with stakeholders; increasing transparency and certainty in the work that we do; reducing unnecessary burden in our work. The starting point for chemical safety and a stronger future is EPA’s mission to protect human health and the environment. Everything our office does centers around this mission, and a good example of this in-action is our work under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA). We have set up the processes, policies, and resources to review over 40 000 existing chemicals in the marketplace. We are also reviewing new chemicals or significant new uses of a chemical before they can enter the market. In January 2017, the backlog of new chemicals under review for greater than 90 days had grown to over 500. The Trump Administration put policies and procedures in place, standardized the review process, developed metrics to measure progress, and automated manual processes. As of today, the agency has completed over 2900 new chemical submissions and reduced the number of chemicals under review for over 90 days to under 200. We have taken the necessary time to do this in a way that increases transparency, produces high-quality work using sound science, and ensures that Americans are protected from unreasonable risks. We have also taken meaningful action on lead, asbestos, PFAS, and methylene chloride to protect the American public from the dangerous health effects of these chemicals. These actions have laid the groundwork for a new era of chemical safety whose impact will be felt for years to come. An essential component of achieving EPA’s mission is public participation which is why we are always looking for ways to improve stakeholder engagement. Stakeholders help ensure that our decisions are based on the best available data and reflect real-world needs. One way we are demonstrating this commitment is by embarking upon a robust stakeholder engagement effort for the TSCA risk management process. We are ensuring there will be multiple opportunities for us to gain input from all stakeholders, including public comment periods, webinars, and one-on-one meetings. The goal is to end with a path forward that mitigates risks and meets the needs of everyone involved in a thoughtful way. For stakeholders to provide meaningful input, they need to have confidence in the process, which is why we also focus on increasing transparency and certainty in the work that we do. As we work to create efficiencies and fine tune our processes, we are also increasing collaboration with our stakeholders, making sure they stay informed and know what to expect during our chemical reviews. We are also looking at ways to make our risk evaluation documents more streamlined and accessible. Transparency also helps increase certainty, and we have been making great strides in this area, too. We have taken transparency to the next level in our new chemicals program, providing the public with more information on new chemical submissions than ever before. Not only can you follow the progress of a submission online through our Case Tracker, but you can also see the documents supporting each submission. Finally, we are sensitive to the burdens we place on our stakeholders, and we are always looking for ways to reduce those burdens without limiting the integrity of our work or the protection of America’s environment and public health. One way we are doing this is by advancing alternatives to animal testing. Last year, Administrator Wheeler issued a directive calling for EPA to reduce, and eventually eliminate, animal testing. In support of that effort, we have developed a strategic plan to reduce the use of chemical testing on vertebrate animals in the TSCA program and released a list of acceptable new approach methods for chemical testing. This is just a snapshot of some of the work underway at EPA that advance with the agency’s mission to protect health and the environment, and with the principles we follow to improve the effectiveness of chemical safety for all stakeholders. We can all be proud of EPA’s accomplishments over the past 50 years, and together, I look forward to creating a stronger future for chemical safety in the next half century. Views expressed in this editorial are those of the author and not necessarily the views of the ACS. This article has not yet been cited by other publications.

中文翻译：

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EPA拥有50年的化学安全性，拥有更强大的未来

12月是美国环境保护署（EPA）成立50周年，它为庆祝朝着建立更清洁，更健康的环境迈进了半个世纪提供了机会。随着EPA成立50周年，我们很高兴有机会在ACS化学品健康与安全领域提供以下客座社论。我们有很多值得庆祝的事情。自1970年以来，EPA增强了人们对美国人接触的化学品的认识，促进了对环境更友好的化学品替代品的开发，并在需要时采取了相应的保护措施。例如，由于多项联邦法律和法规，包括EPA历史悠久的1992年《减少住宅含铅油漆危害法案》，自1976年以来，儿童血液中的铅含量已减少了95％。在过去的四年中，EPA已努力保持这种势头。例如，在2019年6月，我们宣布了更严格，更具防护性的全国家庭和儿童居住设施中铅尘的标准，这是近二十年来对这些标准的首次更新。在庆祝过去的同时，我们也展望未来。本着EPA成立50周年的主题精神，即“建设更美好的未来”，我们正在思考如何在为子孙后代创造更清洁，更健康的环境方面继续取得持久的进步。答案在于忠于过去四十年中为我们带来成功的四项原则：

• 保护人类健康和环境；
• 加强与利益相关者的互动；
• 提高我们所做工作的透明度和确定性；
• 减少工作中不必要的负担。

保护人类健康和环境；加强与利益相关者的互动；提高我们所做工作的透明度和确定性；减少工作中不必要的负担。化学品安全和更美好的未来的出发点是EPA的使命，即保护人类健康和环境。我们办公室的所有工作都围绕这一使命而展开，而这种无所作为的一个很好的例子就是我们根据《有毒物质控制法》（TSCA）所做的工作。我们已经建立了流程，政策和资源来审查市场上超过4万种现有化学品。我们还在审查新化学品或该化学品的重大新用途之前他们可以进入市场。2017年1月，超过90天的待审核新化学品积压已超过500天。特朗普政府制定了政策和程序，标准化了审核流程，制定了衡量进度的度量标准，并实现了自动人工流程。截止到今天，该机构已经完成了2900多种新化学品的提交，并将90天内审查的化学品数量减少到200多种。我们已经花了必要的时间来增加透明度，提高质量，使用可靠的科学，并确保美国人免受不合理的风险。我们还对铅，石棉，PFAS和二氯甲烷采取了有意义的行动，以保护美国公众免受这些化学物质对健康的危害。这些行动为化学安全的新纪元打下了基础，这一新纪元将在未来几年中产生影响。实现EPA使命的一个重要组成部分是公众参与，这就是为什么我们一直在寻找提高利益相关者参与度的原因。利益相关者帮助确保我们的决策基于最佳可用数据并反映现实需求。我们证明这一承诺的一种方式是，为TSCA风险管理流程着手进行有力的利益相关方参与。我们确保我们将有多种机会获得所有利益相关者的意见，包括公众意见征询期，网络研讨会和一对一会议。目标是以降低风险并以周到的方式满足每个参与人员的需求的道路作为结尾。为了让利益相关者提供有意义的意见，他们需要对流程充满信心，这就是为什么我们还专注于提高工作透明度和确定性的原因。在我们努力提高效率和调整流程的同时，我们也正在与利益相关者加强合作，以确保他们了解情况并知道在进行化学审查时会发生什么。我们也正在寻找使我们的风险评估文件更加简化和易于使用的方法。透明度还有助于提高确定性，我们在这一领域也取得了长足的进步。在新化学品计划中，我们已将透明度提高到了一个新的水平，为公众提供了有关新化学品提交的更多信息。您不仅可以通过我们的案例跟踪器在线跟踪提交进度，而且还可以查看支持每个提交的文档。最后，我们对我们给利益相关者带来的负担很敏感，我们一直在寻找减轻这些负担的方法，而又不限制我们工作的完整性或对美国环境和公共健康的保护。我们这样做的一种方法是通过推进动物试验的替代方法。去年，局长惠勒（Wheeler）发布了一项指令，要求EPA减少并最终消除动物试验。为了支持这项工作，我们制定了一项战略计划，以减少TSCA计划对脊椎动物进行化学测试的使用，并发布了可接受的化学测试新方法列表。这只是EPA正在进行的一些工作的快照，这些工作随着该机构保护健康和环境的使命而前进，并遵循我们遵循的原则，以提高所有利益相关者的化学安全性。我们都为EPA在过去50年的成就而感到自豪，并且我共同期待在下半个世纪为化学安全创造更美好的未来。本社论中表达的观点只是作者的观点，不一定是ACS的观点。本文尚未被其他出版物引用。