Cal/EPA Extends Comment Period on Proposal to List Styrene Under Prop. 65

The California Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of Environmental
Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) has extended the comment
period about whether styrene meets the criteria for authoritative bodies
listings under the Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of
1986 (Prop. 65) until April 29, 2015. OEHHA announced its intent
to list styrene as a chemical known to the state to cause cancer under
the authoritative bodies listing mechanism of Prop. 65 on February
27. Styrene is used in the manufacture of various consumer products,
including polystyrene packaging, synthetic rubber and food containers.

Two previous attempts to list styrene as known to cause cancer under
Prop. 65’s Labor Code listing mechanism failed. The agency’s latest
attempt relies on findings in the National Toxicology Program’s (NTP’s)
2011 Report on Carcinogens which concluded that styrene is “reasonably
anticipated to be a human carcinogen” based on studies showing that inhalation and oral exposure to the chemical increased the incidence of
malignant and combined incidence of benign and malignant lung tumors
in male and female mice. The National Research Council confirmed
NTP’s findings on the carcinogenicity of styrene in a 2014 review assessment.
See OEHHA News Release, March 26, 2015.

Issue 560