04.27.23
The American Cleaning Institute (ACI) will co-chair regulatory and sustainability sessions at the 2023 AOCS Annual Meeting & Expo, April 30-May 3 in Denver, CO.
ACI will share information about its Cleaning Chemistry Catalog (C3), a database that provides information related to the safety of ingredients used in household cleaning products. C3 illustrates how safety assessment data from publicly available sources can be used to determine if human and environmental risks are anticipated to be negligible or if additional data are required to make a more realistic assessment.
As sustainability continues to be a driving force for companies to remain competitive, meet consumer needs, and address the climate and environmental crises of today, new ingredient development should consider the entire lifecycle, from extraction and procurement to its final use and disposal. ACI will lead a session highlighting surfactant chemistries and associated technologies that are looking to improve the life cycle impacts and produce more sustainable products.
Highlights of ACI’s participation at the AOCS Conference include the following:
ACI is cosponsoring the annual networking reception of the AOCS Surfactants and Detergents Division May 1;
ACI annually supports the award honoring the best paper published in the Journal of Surfactants and Detergents, which will be recognized on May 2 at the Surfactants and Detergents Division luncheon;
Darius Stanton, ACI director, regulatory science, will co-chair the Regulatory Issues session and will discuss how ACI’s ingredient database supports regulatory compliance for cleaning ingredients in cleaning products on May 3 at 8:25 am; and
Nathan Sell, ACI senior director, sustainability, will co-chair the session Surfactant LCA/Sustainability on May 3 at 10:55 am.
EPA Maintains Safer Choice Status of Essential Chemistry Used to Make Detergents
The ACI applauded a decision by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to reject a petition requesting increased testing and changing the safety status of a key chemistry used to make concentrated detergent unit-dose packets and sheets from its Safer Choice program.
At issue was a call from a single cleaning products manufacturer and non-governmental organizations for the EPA to require more human and environmental health testing under Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) for the polyvinyl alcohol (known as PVA or PVOH) used in laundry and dishwasher detergent packets and sheets. The petitioner also requested that regulators inappropriately act by removing the “green” designation PVA currently has from the agency’s Safer Chemical List, which denotes its safe use in detergent products.
“We commend EPA for sticking to the science on the use of polyvinyl alcohol film in laundry packets and automatic dishwasher detergent tablets and rejecting the petitioners’ requests,” said Kathleen Stanton, ACI Associate Vice President, Technical & International Affairs.
“In denying the petition, the EPA’s published response in the Federal Register provides a cogent analysis of the scientific facts that are readily available. It is highly critical of underlying research and arguments put forth by the petitioners and cites a significant number of easily findable studies demonstrating the safety and biodegradability of PVA that the petitioners overlooked or ignored. The EPA’s extensive response should be sufficient to settle this quite conclusively in favor of PVA’s safe and sustainable use.”
EPA denied the petitioners’ request to change PVA’s status on the Safer Chemicals Ingredient List (SCIL) to indicate future removal. Quoting directly from EPA’s comments:
“The petition does not demonstrate that PVA fails to meet the Safer Choice criteria. The supporting data cited in the petition relied on a study estimating the persistence of PVA and several studies on the health and environmental impacts of microplastics, rather than the soluble PVA used in Safer Choice-certified products. EPA notes that only certain PVA structures are allowed for use in Safer Choice-certified products.”