New Chemicals Exposure to Get Closer Look in EPA Policy Update

The EPA will more closely analyze new chemicals to better understand the extent to which they’ll get into the environment, where people might breathe, touch, or ingest them, the agency announced Monday.

The Environmental Protection Agency’s review of new chemicals—ones never made in or imported into the US before—will routinely examine a few more ways people and the environment could be exposed to a chemical if the agency allows it to be made or used domestically, the agency said.

The EPA is ending a policy developed in the 1990s when exposure estimates largely had to be calculated by hand. ...