Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) has filed a complaint against the US EPA for allowing onto the market a new substance whose synthesis entails an environmentally beneficial but cancer-causing solvent – a decision the organisation says exemplifies the agency’s harmful inaction on existing substances’ latest toxicity research.
According to the group’s complaint, submitted last month to the agency’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) on behalf of two EPA clients, agency managers barred scientists from evaluatingcancer threats linked to the existing chemical parachlorobenzotrifluoride (PCBTF) during the pre-market review of a novel paint ingredient that uses the solvent as a processing aid.
