Availability of the Draft Data Summaries and Draft Priorities for Chemicals with Respect to Their Potential to Cause Birth Defects or Other Reproductive Harm

Sep 12, 1997

The California Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA), as lead agency for the implementation of the Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986 (Proposition 65), has developed a procedure for prioritizing chemicals for consideration under Proposition 65 by the "State’s qualified experts". Two committees of the Science Advisory Board (SAB), known as the Carcinogen Identification Committee, and the Developmental and Reproductive Toxicant (DART) Identification Committee, serve as the State’s qualified experts for rendering an opinion as to whether a chemical has been clearly shown, through scientifically valid testing according to generally accepted principles, to cause cancer or reproductive toxicity.

The procedure used by OEHHA to identify, prioritize and select candidate chemicals for evaluation by the SAB Committees is described in, "Procedure for Prioritizing Candidate Chemicals for Consideration Under Proposition 65 by the State’s Qualified Experts," May 1997. This procedure ensures that chemicals posing the highest level of cancer, birth defects or reproductive hazard concern are addressed first and forthwith by the SAB. In accordance with the prioritization procedure, we are announcing the release of the draft data summaries and draft priorities concerning the potential for the chemicals indicated below to cause birth defects or other reproductive harm. This notice initiates a 60-day public comment period. The chemicals are:

Chemical	CASRN	Draft Priority
Chloroform	67-66-3	High
Manganese	--	High
Phenol	108-95-2	High
Progesterone	57-83-0	High
Carbamazepine	298-46-4	High
n-Hexane	110-54-3	Medium-high
Styrene	100-42-5	Medium-high
Xylenes	1330-20-7	Medium-high
1,1-Dichloroethylene	75-35-4	Medium-high
Folpet	133-07-3	Medium-high
Chromium (includes tri and hexavalent forms)	--	Medium
Copper sulfate	7758-98-7	Medium
Formamide	75-12-7	Medium
Methyl butyl ketone	591-78-6	Medium
Toxaphene	8001-35-2	Medium
1,2-Dichloropropane	78-87-5	Low
Beryllium	7440-41-7	Insufficient data
Toluene-2,4-diisocyanate	584-84-9	Insufficient data

CASRN = Chemical Abstracts Service Registration Number

Chemicals Postponed From Consideration

Chemical	CASRN	Draft Priority
Boric acid^a	10043-35-3	High
Sodium tetraborate^a	1303-96-4	High
Benzo-a-pyrene^a	50-32-8	High
Dichlorophenoxyacetic acid, 2,4 butyl ester^a	94-80-4	High
Endrin^a	72-20-8	High
Carbon dioxide (by inhalation)^a	124-38-9	Medium-high

CASRN = Chemical Abstracts Service Registration Number

^aUnder evaluation to determine whether the chemical meets the criteria for the authoritative bodies mechanism in 22 CCR Section 12306.

OEHHA also announces that a public workshop to receive external scientific peer review and public comments on the draft data summaries and draft priority assignments for these chemicals will be held on Wednesday, October 29, 1997. The workshop will commence at 10:00 a.m. in the Auditorium at 714 P Street, Sacramento, California, and will last until all business has been conducted or until 5:00 p.m.

OEHHA is committed to public participation and external scientific peer review in its implementation of Proposition 65, and welcomes public input. As part of its efforts to ensure that regulatory decisions are based upon a thorough consideration of all relevant information, OEHHA is soliciting information, scientific data and scientific peer review which may be relevant to the evaluation of these chemicals within the context of Proposition 65. The draft data summaries and draft priority assignments for these chemicals are available from the Proposition 65 Implementation Office at the address and telephone number indicated below, or from the downloads section below.

Written comments may be submitted to:

the Proposition 65 Office
Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment
Post Office Box 4010
Sacramento, CA 95812-4010
FAX (916) 327-1097
(916) 445-6900

In order to be considered, comments must be postmarked (if sent by mail) or received at OEHHA (if delivered in person or sent by fax) by 5 p.m. Wednesday, November 12, 1997.

A notice announcing the final data summaries and priority assignments of the chemicals under consideration for developmental and reproductive toxicity evaluation which were announced in the California Regulatory Notice Register on October 4, 1996 is published elsewhere in today’s register.