A potential global standard for chemicals in a post-COVID sustainable world

The EU’s Chemicals Strategy for Sustainability: a Global Standard fo Chemicals?

By Tom Carter , Senior Associate

The European Commission has released an Chemicals Strategy for Sustainability to strive towards the European Green Deal zero-pollution ambition of a toxic-free environment. The Strategy is designed to increase innovation and use of safe and sustainable chemicals while prohibiting the riskiest applications of the most harmful chemicals in consumer products. The measure acknowledges that chemicals provide important benefits to welfare and the European economy, but also that unsustainable toxins and their manufacture, use, and disposal can cause risks to human and ecosystem health that outweigh these benefits. The Strategy’s objective is to encourage alternatives that impart the benefits without the risks.

Specific actions include:

• Phasing out the most harmful chemicals from the riskiest consumer applications, such as toys, textiles, cosmetics, detergents, food, and food packaging

• Limiting other uses of the most harmful chemicals as much as possible

• Finding non-toxic substitutes for all harmful chemicals 

• Learning more about how various chemicals work together to sometimes provide more total toxicity than the sum of their individual impacts

• Ensuring access to information on chemical risks and safe use to producers and consumers 

• Encouraging innovation and promoting Europe's competitiveness by developing “safe and sustainable by design” criteria and ensuring financial support for innovation and market penetration for products that meet these criteria

While the EU’s existing chemical standards and regulations set a global standard, making chemicals even safer and more sustainable provides an economic opportunity while improving well being. By enhancing the robustness of these standards and leading by example, the EU will not only reduce toxins in Europe, but throughout the world.