Maine
Maine gives companies more time to disclose PFAS use after requests from lobbying groups
One problem with “ceaselessly chemical compounds” is that the general public can’t all the time know which merchandise include them, which means folks can’t determine for themselves whether or not they wish to purchase gadgets with poisonous substances.
That was the argument Maine lawmakers leaned on once they handed a regulation final 12 months to require all producers promoting gadgets in Maine — from vehicles to T-shirts — to inform the state whether or not their merchandise include the chemical compounds. Requiring disclosure was additionally a step towards Maine’s plan to ban the sale of merchandise containing the per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, often called PFAS.
Because the deadline to make the data public approaches, nonetheless, the state has been permitting nationwide lobbying teams to delay the requirement on behalf of their members, a few of whom stated they didn’t even know that they had been granted an extension.
The Bangor Every day Information spoke to 13 entities to whom the state gave a six-month extension. Of these, seven stated they weren’t conscious that they had requested an extension, not to mention been granted one. One firm stated it had been planning to satisfy the Jan. 1 deadline and was shocked when the BDN knowledgeable it that the state was giving it six months extra.
The Maine Division of Environmental Safety is just not counting on particular standards to grant the extensions. Relatively it’s permitting entities to delay primarily based on whether or not it might be troublesome for them to adjust to the regulation, Deputy Commissioner David Madore stated.
The division “critiques the substance of every request. Lowering the demand on restricted laboratory capability is a precedence consideration,” Madore stated.
Thus far the division has granted 1,010 firms, commerce associations and nonprofits six-month extensions to make public whether or not their merchandise include the chemical compounds which have been related to elevated danger of kidney most cancers, decreased toddler and fetal progress, and decreased immunity.
By way of landfill leachate, wastewater, land spreading and groundwater contamination, PFAS have discovered their means into consuming water, vegetation and animals in Maine and throughout the nation.
So far, the state has rejected 4 extension requests, all from chemical firms — BASF, Chemours, 3M and 3M Marine, Madore stated.
Others questioned whether or not the state was making it too simple for firms giant and small to evade authorized necessities that they’ve identified about for 15 months and allow associations to use for extensions on their members’ behalf.
“I’m actually disillusioned that that is the path wherein the division goes when it comes to granting these extensions,” stated Rep. Lori Gramlich, D-Outdated Orchard Seashore, who sponsored the PFAS reporting invoice, LD 1503. “To me it appears there are events that need to get out of compliance with this regulation.”
The regulation requires producers to report back to the state the quantity of every of the PFAS of their merchandise, and the aim they serve within the merchandise, together with any product parts.
Katherine O’Brien, a senior legal professional at Earthjustice, an environmental regulation group primarily based in California, stated she was involved in regards to the lack of constant standards for extensions. The reporting necessities are a important step towards successfully implementing the state’s ban on PFAS in merchandise by 2030, she stated.
“The important thing concern with the division granting blanket extensions to many or all members of a commerce affiliation is whether or not it’s making the required discovering that each a type of firms qualifies for an extension,” O’Brien stated.
The overwhelming majority of entities granted extensions to date are a part of marine and boat-related industries. Tech giants equivalent to Amazon and Microsoft additionally had been allowed to delay their reporting. Others embody {a magazine}, a nonprofit that cleans up islands and marinas.
Whereas the PFAS reporting regulation is taken into account the strictest of its sort within the nation, it isn’t novel, as a result of firms are already required to check for and report quite a lot of different substances to state and federal companies. Some stated industries are utilizing their affect to delay the regulation’s enforcement to stop customers from realizing how a lot PFAS are of their merchandise.
“The chemical business doesn’t wish to report this info. They are not looking for folks to know whether or not they’re being uncovered to these things,” stated Sarah Woodbury, the director of advocacy for Defend Our Well being Motion, the advocacy accomplice for the Portland-based nonprofit Defend Our Well being.
Over the previous 12 months, a number of firms and lobbying teams really helpful the division grant a blanket extension, however the division instructed them extensions may solely be thought of for particular person producers, Madore stated.
However nationwide lobbying teams have discovered a method to get giant teams of firms accepted rapidly: itemizing related members in an extension request to the division.
The division has allowed six associations to delay reporting necessities on behalf of their members: the Alliance for Automotive Innovation, Affiliation of House Equipment Producers, Nationwide Council of Textile Organizations, Leisure Off-Freeway Automobile Affiliation, Bike Trade Council and Specialty Automobile Institute of America.
Some legislators, equivalent to Rep. H. Sawin Millett Jr., R-Waterford, agreed that producers must be vetted individually.
“In the end, it’s the producers that we’d wish to be informing the customers of any merchandise that may contaminate our sources right here in Maine, and I believe it’s official to cease there,” Millett stated.
However restricted sources can have an effect on how companies implement a regulation, stated Millett, who has run a number of state companies prior to now.
“When you may have restricted sources, it’s possible you’ll not be capable to implement it on every producer and each product,” Millett stated.
The Division of Environmental Safety has an absence of devoted employees to develop rulemaking and handle the reporting regulation’s enforcement, Madore stated. There shall be no different funding accessible for the implementation of this program till reporting charges are obtained, he stated.
The BDN reached out to the six lobbying teams and spoke with 5 that stated there isn’t sufficient time for his or her members to check their product parts to satisfy the state’s reporting requirement. The Nationwide Council of Textile Organizations didn’t reply to a request for remark.
Gathering the required info may take automakers years, stated a spokesperson for the Alliance for Automotive Innovation, which represents the producers that produce practically 98 p.c of vehicles and lightweight vans within the nation.
“Automakers manufacture extremely complicated client items, containing as much as 30,000 particular person elements and using as much as 10 tiers of suppliers,” the spokesperson stated.
The state granted a delay to twenty members of the alliance, together with BMW, Ferrari, Ford and Basic Motors, based on an Oct. 25 letter from the division.
The state additionally accepted a six-month extension to 104 members of the Bike Trade Council, Leisure Off-Freeway Automobile Affiliation and Specialty Automobile Institute of America.
There’s an “extraordinarily quick timeline for testing and compliance,” they wrote in a collective request to the division on Sept. 19. The division accepted it 10 days later.
Seven entities had been confused to listen to they had been on the state’s checklist for an extension, and a few weren’t certain they had been liable for reporting PFAS as a result of they don’t take into account themselves producers.
The state defines a producer as “the individual that manufactures a product whose model identify is affixed to the product.” If the product is made exterior the U.S., the producer is taken into account the distributor or importer of a product.
Paul Bowden, who owns Bowden Marine Service, a marine dealership for boats and motors primarily based in Bar Harbor, stated he wasn’t conscious of, nor had he requested, an extension. He wasn’t certain why he needed to report, believing it must be the duty of the makers of the merchandise, he stated.
John Hanson, the founder and writer emeritus of Maine Boats, Properties, and Harbors Inc., a Rockland-based journal, laughed when he heard it made the checklist of extensions.
“It doesn’t make any sense to me,” Hanson stated. “We print the journal in Burlington, Vermont, and speak to folks on telephones, and write issues on computer systems.”
The Maine State Chamber of Commerce stated it has been encouraging its members to individually submit requests for extensions.
“This regulation is way extra broad and complex than anybody anticipated,” stated Ben Lucas, the chamber’s lobbyist. “That is going to take a major period of time for companies in Maine to have the ability to adjust to, as we’ve heard from a few of our members.”
It seems a variety of firms shall be affected by the regulation.
“If any entity sells or distributes on the market a product with their model identify on it or that they’ve assembled from different producers’ parts, they could possibly be a producer required to report,” Madore stated.
This might embody customized constructed boat tools, magazines with beauty samples and even path membership T-shirts, he stated.
A Swiss firm, Katadyn Desalination-Spectra Watermakers, stated it had by no means requested an extension individually or by a commerce affiliation, and was set to satisfy the deadline.
The corporate had been testing its merchandise for the previous six months, based on Basic Supervisor Abel Nolasco. Nolasco stated maybe a commerce affiliation, concerned within the marine business, selected to request for an extension, however the firm may discover no such paper path or notification to verify this was the case.
Mehr Sher is a Report for America corps member. Extra help for this reporting is supplied by the Unity Basis and donations by BDN readers.