February 2018

February 2018

Food Safety

9th amendment of Plastics Regulation

The European Commission has published the 9th amendment to Regulation (EU) No 10/2011 on plastic materials and articles intended to come into contact with food. The 9th amendment approves the use of 4 new food contact substances. In addition, the amendment extended the authorisation of 1 polymer by specifying additional conditions for its safe use in food contact materials.

9th amendment | Regulation

REACH

236 substances shortlisted for possible regulatory action

The European Chemicals Agency has selected 236 substances for further scrutiny by the Member State competent authorities in its annual screening exercise. The competent authorities will carry out a manual examination of dossiers they prioritise to decide whether regulatory action is needed. Companies that have registered one of the shortlisted substances will receive a letter to inform them of the potential examination of the registration. ECHA will organise a webinar for companies on the 1st of February to explain the screening process and next steps.

News item

7 new substances added to the Candidate List, entry for bisphenol-A updated

ECHA has added 7 new substances to the Candidate List of substances of Very high concern (SVHC) and updated the entry for bisphenol-A (BPA) following the SVHC identification process.

The BPA entry was updated to reflect an additional reason for inclusion due to its endocrine-disrupting properties causing adverse effects to the environment.

The Candidate List of SVHCs for authorisation now contains 181 substances.

Candidate List for authorisation

New cut-off date for registrants reg. late test results

There is a new deadline for companies that expect their substance test results may not be ready by the 31 May registration deadline. These companies need to provide proof that laboratory-testing contracts have been secured before the 31 March to be able to apply for consideration as an “exceptional case”.

Please find the notice from the Directors contact group here, which also outlines other situations, such as difficulties in obtaining data on substances in mixtures and cases where Lead Registrants have failed to submit the registration dossier before the deadline.

BREF STS

The 1st draft of the revised BREF STS was issued in October. Afera submitted comments ahead of the deadline in December. As a next step, Afera will evaluate the comments received from other parties to the relevant chapters. The Joint Research Centre will issue an updated draft taking into account the comments later in the year.

Recycling/sustainability

New EPRC Recycling Monitoring Report available

On track to reaching its commitment of achieving a 74% paper recycling rate across Europe by 2020, the European Paper Recycling Council (EPRC), in which Afera has a seat, revealed its latest figure of 72.5%. The full report can be found here.

EU legislation on waste

The Council of the European Union and EU Parliament provisionally agrees on the 4 legislative proposals for revision of EU waste legislation, focussing on the waste framework, landfill, packaging and electrical and electronic waste directives. Final endorsement is planned for the 1st quarter of 2018, with the legislation then moving to the European Parliament for a vote.

New documents have been released by the Commission here, outlining, amongst others, the Plastics Strategy and Monitoring Framework.