News

How can operators of critical infrastructures in the health sector also ensure an effective water supply in an emergency? Are the maximum action levels (MHWK) derived for the normal population suitable for ensuring the health protection of sick and hospitalised people? Or should different values be derived for this group? These questions were addressed in a project commissioned by the Federal Office of Civil Protection and Disaster Assistance (BBK), in which FoBiG presented a feasibility study on the derivation of MHW for sick and hospitalised people. The final report on the project has now been published.
 

On this year's works outing, we were able to get a smell of courtroom air: we visited the Federal Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe and learned many new and interesting things on an exciting guided tour of the building.

Epoxy Europe, a sector group of the European Chemical Industry Council (Cefic) representing the interests of Europe's epoxy resin manufacturers, has taken another step toward the safe use of epoxy resin products. The ‘Epoxy Safety App’ was released in early November. The multilingual application was developed for smartphones and tablets. The app is intended for information and training purposes, and offers advice in a short, concise form on, for example, first aid measures or the use of personal protective equipment when handling epoxy resins.

The OECD workshop on approaches for establishing Occupational Exposure limits (see news from 27. September 2022) is now open for registration.

This international online workshop on methodological aspects of OEL derivation is held on the 21.10.2022 and 24.10.2022. At the workshop Klaus Schneider will present results from the BAuA project F2437 („Derivation of occupational exposure limits for airborne chemicals - Comparison of methods and protection levels“).

On 20 September, the European Commission launched the 4-week public comment period for new CLP hazard classes.

The following new classes are planned:

• ED Category 1: Known or suspected endocrine disruptors (EDs).
• ED Category 2: Suspected endocrine disruptors (ED)

The classification is to be made separately for human health (EUH380 or 381) or the environment (EUH430 or 431).

Evidence should be based on human and/or animal data. For classification in category 1, evidence shall be provided that the substance meets the following criteria:

(a) endocrine activity;

(b) an adverse effect in an intact organism or its progeny and future generations;

(c) a biologically plausible link between the endocrine activity and the adverse effect.

Category 2 is to be chosen if the evidence is not strong enough to assign it to category 1.

There will also be changes in the area of environmental fate of substances. Classification for PBT ("persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic", EUH440), vPvB ("very persistent and very bioaccumulative", EUH441), PMT ("persistent, mobile and toxic", EUH450) and vPvM ("very persistent and very mobile", EUH451) will be introduced.

The concentration limits for the classifications of mixtures are consistently 0.1%. The only exception is ED Cat. 2 substances (1%).

Be quick, the comment period of the accelerated procedure for these amendments ends already on 18 October 2022.

If you have any questions about these endpoints, please contact our experts Jan Oltmanns (environmental fate) and Ulrike Schuhmacher-Wolz (endocrine disruptors)

As of August, our newly revised homepage will go online. The previous content, such as our services, the latest news and job vacancies, will continue to be clearly presented for you at https://www.fobig.de. 

As published in the EU- Official Journal on 11 April 2022, the authorization requirements under Annex XIV are extended to the following five substances:

• Tetraethyllead (TEL) (EC 201-075-4, CAS 78-00-2)
• 4,4'-bis(dimethylamino)-4''-(methylamino)trityl alcohol [with ≥ 0.1% w/w of Michler's ketone (EC 202-027-5) or Michler's base (EC 202-959-2)] (EC 209-218-2, CAS 561-41-1)
• Reaction products of 1,3,4-thiadiazolidine-2,5-dithione, formaldehyde and 4-heptylphenol, branched and linear (RP-HP) [with ≥ 0,1% w/w 4-heptylphenol, branched and linear (4-HPbl)] (EC -, CAS -)
• 2-ethylhexyl 10-ethyl-4,4-dioctyl-7-oxo-8-oxa-3,5-dithia-4-stannatetradecanoate (DOTE) (EC 239-622-4, CAS 15571-58-1)
• Reaction mass of 2-ethylhexyl 10-ethyl-4,4-dioctyl-7-oxo-8-oxa-3,5-dithia-4-stannatetradecanoate and 2-ethylhexyl 10-ethyl-4-[[2-[(2-ethylhexyl)oxy]-2-oxoethyl]thio]-4-octyl-7-oxo-8-oxa-3,5-dithia-4-stannatetradecanoate (reaction mass of DOTE and MOTE) (EC -, CAS -)

These substances have been classified as substances of very high concern (SVHC) in 2019 due to their reprotoxic, carcinogenic or endocrine disrupting properties. Companies wishing to use these substances beyond 1 Mai 2025, need to apply for authorization to ECHA by 1 November 2023.

On 5 April 2022 the international workshop on the BAuA research project F 2437 („Derivation of occupational exposure limits for airborne chemicals - Comparison of methods and protection levels“) on methods for derivation of occupational exposure limits took place, with close to 200 participants. All presentations are available at the workshop website. The streamed workshop (available for two weeks) and a summary of the workshop will be added there soon.
 

Two EU regulations were passed within a short period of time, both bringing changes to the information requirements of the REACH regulation (Regulation (EC) 1907/2006). Regulation (EC) 2021/979 of 17 June 2021 applies since 8 January 2022. Regulation (EC) 2022/477 of 24 March 2022 will apply from 14 October 2022. Both regulations bring changes regarding the REACH Annexes. ECHA plans to update relevant guidance documents in the second half of 2022. Registrants are requested to revise their registrations accordingly.

We are proud to announce that two new papers of FoBiG staff members were published in the Journal of Applied Toxicology (Dilger et al., 2022; Schneider et al., 2022). These papers summarise the results of the BAuA research project F2437 on methods to derive occupational exposure levels. 

The results of this project will also be presented at a workshop (online and in Dortmund, Germany). The workshop is still open for registration.

The final project report can be found here.

A workshop will take place in Dortmund (conference langueage English, participation on site and online) on 5 April 2022 to present results of a FoBiG project on methods to derive occupational exposure limits (OELs) and analogue values in the EU and in Germany (research project F2437). The objective of this project was to analyse and disclose the differences between the current methods for deriving OELs and the resulting differences in protection levels. Based on own new data evaluations we developed distributions for time, inter- and intraspecies extrapolation, which we combined using probabilistic methods to analyse protection levels. The overarching aim was to develop a common understanding of the necessary methodological steps in the setting of exposure limits and in this way to support harmonisation of the derivation of occupational exposure limits in the EU.

The workshop is now open for registration. Please follow the instructions here.

The final project report can be found at here.

For some years now, prepolymers have been used in epoxy resin systems. These are compounds in the hardener component of the systems in which epoxy resin and amine are pre-reacted. Within the framework of a research project funded by the DGUV (FP-0451, German only), their sensitising potency was investigated in more detail experimentally. Under certain conditions of the composition of the prepolymers, their lower sensitising potency could be proven. Accordingly, they can be considered as substitutes for the monomeric starting materials.