ECHA has published a comprehensive update to its Guidance on requirements for substances in articles. It gives more clarity on the communication and notification obligations of companies when substances of very high concern are contained in articles.

ECHA publishes a new website that gives citizens, workers and professionals access to information on nanomaterials on the EU market in 23 languages.

On 1 June 2017, the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) is 10 years old. ECHA has been working to protect human health and the environment from the toxic effects of chemicals, promote their safe use, control the most dangerous ones and encourage innovation.

EU 2017/852 has been published repealing Regulation EC 1102/2008.

This regulation adds to the drive across the European Union as enactment of the Minamata Convention on mercury 2013 to remove mercury and its compounds from the supply chain by placing restriction on the import, use in manufacturing and export of materials and products containing mercury.

17^th May Brussels – The European Parliament publishes regulations laying down due diligence obligations for those businesses importing to the European Union: Tin, Tantalum, Tungsten (their ores) and Gold originating from conflict affected high risk areas.

The Rapid Alert System enables quick exchange of information between 31 European countries and the European Commission about dangerous non-food products posing a risk to health and safety of consumers.

Deadline Before 31st May 2017

Thursday 1st June 2017 is the date set in the Classification, Labelling & Packaging Regulations (CLP) when it will become illegal to supply (chemical) substances and mixtures carrying the old classification system markings on materials such as cements, mortars, grouts, adhesives, sealants, aerosols, paints.

Since 2015 EOTA has been publishing EADs which are cited in the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU).

113 EADs are now cited http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=uriserv:OJ.C_.2017.118.01.0043.01.ENG&toc=OJ:C:2017:118:TOC

Restriction proposal adopted on four phthalates.

The Committee for Risk Assessment (RAC) and the Committee for Socio-Economic Analysis (SEAC) agreed on a restriction proposal on four phthalates (DEHP, DBP, DIBP and BBP) in articles and on TDFA in sprays used by the general public. 

Do you market treated articles? For example paints that contain an in-can preservative, timber products treated with fungicide or sofas where the fabric has been treated with a preservative.

This is to reflect  that a number of New Legislative Framework (NLF) alignment Directives concerning: electrical equipment (Low Voltage Directive), pressure equipment (PED), simple pressure vessels (SPVD), equipment for use in potentially explosive atmospheres (ATEX), and lifts (LD) have now been implemented in to UK Law.

In Annex XVII to Regulation (EC) No 1907/2006, the following entry is added:

Entry No 67

Bis(pentabromophenyl)ether (decabromodiphenyl ether; decaBDE) CAS No 1163-19-5, EC No 214-604-9

A new product group "Wood-, Cork- and Bamboo-based Floor Coverings" is replacing the previous criteria for "Wooden Floor Coverings", enlarging the scope of floor covering products.

A significant update to the CLP Regulation will see Poison Centre information harmonised across the EU, the addition of a new Annex VIII into the CLP Regulation and is expected to be adopted by the end of February 2017.

ADR is the European Agreement concerning the International Carriage of Dangerous Goods by Road with the 2017 version released online by UNECE (The United Nations Economic Commission for Europe) this week.

Research suggests that in Britain nearly 800 people die a year from lung cancer caused by breathing in silica dust at work. In the European Union, around 7,000 cases of lung cancer are caused by this carcinogen annually. Worldwide, it’s estimated that millions of employees are exposed to silica dust.

On 22 November 2016, the EU Institutions reached an agreement on the final shape of an EU Regulation on conflict minerals, which aims to stop the financing of armed groups in developing countries through the trade of the following substances:

Tin [CAS# 7440-31-5]

Tantalum [CAS# 7440-25-7]

Tungsten [CAS# 7440-33-7]

Gold [CAS# 7440-57-5]

The agreement on the Regulation, brokered by the EU Commission, will ensure that the vast majority of these minerals and metals imported to the EU are sourced responsibly.

EOTA, through its Members (TABs), provides for the necessary tools to individually assess construction products with regard to their reaction and resistance to fire. Therefore, EOTA is pleased to be supporting the involvement in Fire Safety as being a major issue for coordinated action in Europe.

Updated interactive Guide on safety data sheets and exposure scenarios available.

The Senior Labour Inspectors’ Committee (SLIC) together with the Dutch ministry of Labour (labour inspection) have published guidance for National Labour Inspectors on addressing risks to workers from exposure to respirable crystalline silica (RCS) on construction sites.

The EU’s Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Regulation establishes rules for the import of timber products covered by Voluntary Partnership Agreements (VPAs) between the EU and timber-exporting countries. Once VPAs are fully implemented, timber-exporting countries will issue FLEGT licenses which verify the timber’s legality.

This update of the Guidance on labelling and packaging in accordance with Regulation (EC) No 1272/2008 consists of a full revision of the guidance.

The European Commission has recently amended the Classification, Labelling and Packaging (CLP) Regulation, updating the list of substances with a harmonised classification. Companies have to apply the revised classifications for the safe use of these chemicals by 1 March 2018 at the latest. EU 2016/1179

Methylisothiazolinone [CAS# 2682-20-4] a.k.a MIT

The Scientific Committee on Consumer Safety (SCCS) has concluded that current clinical data indicates that the concentration of 100 ppm of Methylisothiazolinone in cosmetic products is not safe for the consumer.

BSI, as the UK’s National Standards Body appointed by the UK Government, is a Member of CEN and CENELEC and has issued a statement stating that they see no change to BSI’s status and obligations as a full member of CEN and CENELEC in light of BREXIT.  

1^st July 2016 the Control of Electro Magnetic Fields at Work Regulations (2016) come in to force.

An enforcement project has shown that a high proportion of products with hazardous chemicals that should be sold in packaging with child resistant fastenings and can be found on supermarket shelves in the EU, do not comply with the CLP requirements and do not adequately protect children.

All EU manufacturers, importers and distributors of chemical substances, mixtures and certain articles must apply CLP labelling to new production and support the supply with a CLP format SDS.

On May 13th, the European Commission presented a draft for a revised Directive for the protection of workers against the exposure to carcinogens and mutagens at the workplace.

The European Federation of Building and Woodworkers welcomes the proposal, but has made additional requests in a policy paper available in five languages regarding a number of carcinogens and the inclusion of reprotoxicants into the scope of the Directive.

Based on input from scientists, employers, workers, Member States' representatives and labour inspectors, the Commission has proposed limit values for 13 of a list of priority chemical agents identified through the consultation process. For the remaining chemical agents there is additional analysis to be done and a proposal for limit values will follow by end 2016.

The Rapid Alert System enables quick exchange of information between 31 European countries and the European Commission about dangerous non-food products posing a risk to health and safety of consumers.

The PPE Directive was one of the first New Approach Directives and is now over 20 years old. in order to reflect current technologies and processes for developing and bringing PPE to the market, it is in the process of being superseded by a new PPE Regulation (EU) 2016/425.

The Low Voltage Directive (LVD) 2006/95/EC ensures that electrical equipment within certain voltage limits provides a high level of protection for European citizens, and benefits fully from the Single Market. However, as of 20 April, 2016, this Directive will be repealed by the new LVD Directive 2014/35/EU.

All HM Government construction tenders need to demonstrate BIM Level 2
after 4 April 2016

A short guide for users of chemicals in the workplace on how to get the most from the classification and labelling information you receive

For over a year SIG Assured has established itself in the industry as an important resource for contractors and continues to grow in strength.

The new sentencing guidelines for health & safety offences are in force from today, 1 February 2016. They were intended to increase the level of fines, particularly for larger organisations. However, unintended consequences of the way punishments are now calculated mean that judges will be forced to hand out very much greater fines than expected and send many more directors, managers and junior employees to jail for breaching health & safety laws.

4,615 skills cards revoked after 'dodgy' safety tests.  Thousands of industry skills cards have been revoked following fraud at five test centres.

ECHA have changed the manner in which information on chemicals is presented

The third REACH-EN-FORCE project by ECHA's Enforcement Forum shows that 13 % of inspected companies have missed some of their REACH registration duties. Only representatives and importers are more at risk of non-compliance than manufacturers of substances.

ECHA has published an update of Chapter R.12 of the Guidance on information requirements and chemical safety assessment (IR&CSA) on use description.

ECHA has published a corrigendum to the Guidance on the compilation of safety data sheets to correct the quotation of the legal text of Regulation (EU) 2015/830 and the highlighting of the new legal text in some of the translated versions. Minor editorial corrections have also been made in all language versions (except Danish).

At its November meeting, the Forum for Exchange of Information on Enforcement decided on two new pilot projects for 2016 and 2017.

Following the judgement of the Court of Justice, ECHA will update its Guidance on requirements for substances in articles in two stages.

CE marking for construction products 'step-by-step' guide now available in all EU languages

ECHA/NA/15/31 - If you use a substance for which an actor up your supply chain has an authorisation, you have to notify your use of that substance to ECHA.

The European Chemical Agency (ECHA) has produced new support pages and concise guidance regarding chemical safety in the EU supply chain.

Construction companies are being urged to check their rebar stocks following the latest warning over the quality of Chinese imports.

Manufacturers of construction products need to be aware of the following areas of obligation under these Regulations