UK REACH Deadline Consultation & TiO2 Announcement

UK REACH Deadline Consultation

The Department for Environmental, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) has published its summary of responses to the Consultation on extending submission deadlines for transitional registrations – UK REACH.

Last year, Defra committed to consulting on extending submission deadlines, to allow time to develop an alternative model for transitional registration, and if the decision is made to proceed, to develop and pass the necessary legislation. It is also necessary to allow industry time to comply with any new arrangements. 

The consultation closed on 1 September 2022 with 289 responses.  Option 1 received 82% of votes whilst Option 2 received 13%.

DEFRA concluded:

“On balance, we acknowledge that the extra time Option 1 provides could lessen burdens on SMEs and downstream users without significantly reducing levels of protection of human health and of the environment. Therefore, subject to the consent of the Scottish and Welsh governments, the UK government intends to introduce legislation that would give effect to extending the submission deadlines across all tonnage bands by 3 years. “

You can find the full summary here: https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/uk-reach-extending-submission-deadlines-for-transitional-registrations.

TiO2 Announcement

The EU court (Court of Justice of the EU) has overturned the EU Commissions decision on the harmonised classification and labelling of titanium dioxide (TiO2) as a carcinogenic substance by inhalation in certain powder forms.

The classification of TiO2 was based on a study of such extreme measures as to be not possible in real life. Moreover, the effects were due to a lung overload, in animals, of titanium dioxide powder at exceedingly high air concentrations. As such it was not the substance that was the issue.

Our concerns were that this could have a knock-on effect to other powders of similar size, but the EU Court concluded that the decision on which the regulation and classification was based was flawed. It remains to be seen whether this then results in the European Food Safety Authority re-instating its approval and whether the proposed migration limit for food contact materials is suspended.

We welcome this decision and will continue to monitor this closely and keep you updated.