On July 20, 2022, China’s Ministry of Ecology and Environment (MEE) issued a notice to solicit public proposals for the first batch of priority chemical substances subject to environmental risk assessment as part of the country’s efforts to promote the control of new pollutants in China.
The public can submit proposals to MEE by filling in the below two Annexes of the notice before July 31, 2022, including:
New pollutants, in most cases, come from the production and use of toxic and hazardous chemicals. The Action Plan for New Pollutants Treatment (officially released in May 2022, hereinafter referred to as the Action Plan) deploys the major measures for the control of new pollutants, of which the measure "Establishing an environmental risk assessment system for chemical substances" is of great importance. It is also clarified in the Action Plan that ‘The first batch of priority chemicals subject to environmental risk assessment will be published by the end of 2022’. According to the notice, the candidate priority chemical substances are required to be proposed in line with HJ 1229-2021 Guidelines for Screening of Priority Assessment Chemical Substances which stipulates the applicable scope, screening principles and procedures, technical requirements, and report preparation requirements for the screening of priority assessment chemical substances.
The solicitation of proposals for the priority chemical substances subject to environmental risk assessment from the public is an important step in promoting the implementation of the Action Plan. The MEE calls on more stakeholders to be more engaged in. Relevant units, associations, and enterprises are welcome to provide the corresponding information in accordance with the requirements of the Annexes within the short window period, including chemical name (Chinese & English), CAS number (if any), hazard classification, physicochemical properties, toxicological properties, production and use, etc.
