This week, I sat down with Jim Aidala , Senior Government Affairs Consultant at B&C and its consulting affiliate, The Acta Group. We discuss what to expect in 2023 from Capitol Hill and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention (OCSPP) when it comes to key chemical matters. Jim is, of course, one of the country’s most talented pesticide experts and, as a former Assistant Administrator of what is now OCSPP and a founding member of the ...
Feb 02, 2023•54 min
This week, Dr. Richard E. Engler , Director of Chemistry for B&C and The Acta Group (Acta®), our consulting affiliate, returned to the studio to discuss what to expect in Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) regulation in the New Year. While we cannot predict with precision, we know 2023 will be a consequential year for several reasons: the first final risk management rule will be issued, the final per- and polyfluoroalkyl substance (PFAS) reporting rule will be issued, and the final Confiden...
Jan 19, 2023•37 min
This week, Dr. Richard E. Engler , Director of Chemistry for B&C and The Acta Group, our consulting affiliate, returned to the studio to discuss the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) bold moves in developing new chemical categories to help streamline the review of new chemicals under Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) Section 5. While the categorical approach to new chemical review is by no means new, it has stalled out in recent years, and EPA’s renewed work in this area is both...
Jan 05, 2023•54 min
This week, Dr. Richard E. Engler , Director of Chemistry for B&C and The Acta Group, our consulting affiliate, returned to the studio to discuss the stubbornly vexatious problem of TSCA’s regulation of articles, a fancy name for products or finished goods. Most listeners to the podcast appreciate that this U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administration has specifically applied TSCA regulations to articles far more than in decades past. This policy pivot has caused a significant am...
Dec 08, 2022•46 min
This week, I welcomed back to the studio Karin F. Baron , Senior Regulatory Consultant at B&C and our consulting affiliate, The Acta Group. Karin and I discuss the controversial changes proposed by the European Commission to the regulation on classification, labeling, and packaging of substances and mixtures, better known as the CLP regulation. As our listeners know, no one knows this space better than Karin Baron. Karin explains why the proposed changes are likely to inject even greater dis...
Nov 10, 2022•47 min
This week, I sat down with Dr. Claire Skentelbery , Director General, EuropaBio -- The European Association for Bioindustries. Many of you may know Claire from her prior role as Director General of the Nanotechnology Industries Association, where she energized that Brussels-based trade association to new and exciting heights. Claire has brought her considerable scientific, science policy, and trade association management skills to EuropaBio at an exciting time, as biotechnology is widely recogni...
Oct 27, 2022•43 min
This week I sat down with Doug Charnas , a nationally- recognized corporate and tax attorney and partner at McGlinchey, in its Washington, D.C. offices, and our own Dr. Richard Engler , Director of Chemistry at Bergeson & Campbell and at our consulting affiliate, The Acta Group. We discuss the recently reinstated Superfund Tax, which entities the tax applies to, what exactly is a taxable chemical and how to distinguish between taxable chemicals and taxable substances, and why just about ever...
Oct 13, 2022•55 min
This week, I welcomed back to the studio Karin F. Baron , Senior Regulatory Consultant at B&C and our consulting affiliate, The Acta Group. Karin and I discuss the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) initiative called the New Era of Smarter Food Safety. The goal of this initiative is to diminish the number of foodborne illness, which, surprisingly, has not diminished since the Food Safety Modernization Act was enacted 11 years ago. We discuss FDA’s “blueprint for the future” as the ini...
Sep 29, 2022•37 min
This week I sat down with James Cox , M.S., Senior Scientist with B&C. James is an exceptional biologist with significant experience assessing the risk of industrial chemicals. Before joining B&C, James served in a variety of leadership positions in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Pollution Prevent and Toxics, one of which was Chair of the Risk Assessment Technical Team, which provided recommendations to inform EPA’s policy positions on New Approach Methodologi...
Sep 15, 2022•39 min
This week I sat down with Professor Delcianna J. Winders , Professor and Animal Law and Policy Institute Director at the Vermont Law School. Professor Winders is a total rock star in the exploding area of animal law. Prior to joining the Vermont Law School faculty and founding the Animal Law and Policy Institute, Professor Winders was on the faculty of Lewis & Clark Law School. She previously served as Vice President and Deputy General Counsel at the People for the Ethical Treatment of Anima...
Sep 01, 2022•56 min
This week I sat down with Dr. Richard E. Engler , B&C’s and The Acta Group’s (our consulting affiliate) Director of Chemistry, to discuss the new chemical bias. Our listeners know that Rich Engler has worked for decades reviewing Premanufacture Notifications submitted under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA). PMNs are applications to manufacture or import chemical substances that are not listed on the TSCA Inventory and thus are considered “new.” Much has changed in terms of the new che...
Aug 18, 2022•57 min
This week, I sat down with Dr. Dianne Barton , Water Quality Coordinator at the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission in Portland, Oregon, where she puts her Ph.D. in geochemistry to good use by providing technical expertise related to water quality, environmental toxics, regulatory processes, and the fate and transport of contaminants. Dr. Barton, who is a member of the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, Chairs the National Tribal Toxics Council (NTTC), which is a U.S. Environmenta...
Aug 04, 2022•1 hr 10 min
This week, I sat down with David Cragin , Ph.D., DABT®, Quality Assurance and External Affairs Director for a large multinational pharmaceutical company, to discuss his experience living and working in China. For many listeners, working with foreign regulators can be particularly challenging for a variety of reasons, including language barriers, cultural differences, and differing regulatory standards. Dave shares his experience working in China and explains his approach to managing these issues...
Jul 21, 2022•41 min
This week, I sat down with Sheryl Lindros Dolan , Senior Regulatory Consultant with B&C and Senior Regulatory Specialist with our consulting affiliate, The Acta Group, and Meibao Zhuang, Ph.D. , Senior Scientist/Regulatory Consultant with B&C and Acta, to discuss pesticide tolerances, what are they, how does the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) develop them, and how well government and industry stakeholders communicate their utility in ensuring a safe and reliable food supply. ...
Jul 07, 2022•41 min
This week, I sat down with Jake Li , Deputy Assistant Administrator for Pesticide Programs, Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and my colleague, Jim Aidala , Senior Government Affairs Consultant here at B&C. My guests have much in common -- they both have served (or in Jake’s case is serving) in senior policy positions in this space at EPA, and they both have a keen understanding of the legal, policy, and commercial implications of...
Jun 23, 2022•1 hr 3 min
This week, I sat down with Lisa R. Burchi , Of Counsel, Bergeson & Campbell, P.C., and resident expert on Proposition 65 (Prop 65), among many other chemical laws. Few state laws are more notorious, or controversial, as this 1986 California law that revolutionized the concept of a consumer’s or worker’s “right to know” whether a product or work space might present exposures to chemicals considered carcinogens or reproductive toxins. Fast forward 36 years, and the familiar label warning on pr...
Jun 09, 2022•52 min
This week, I welcomed back to the studio Karin F. Baron , Senior Regulatory Consultant at B&C and our consulting affiliate, The Acta Group. Karin is an internationally recognized expert on hazard communication, risk assessment, the regulation of food contact materials, and the Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labeling of Chemicals (GHS). Karin’s expertise in hazard communication and GHS was recently recognized as Karin was elected to the Board of Directors of the Society for ...
May 26, 2022•58 min
This week I had the pleasure of sitting down again with one of my favorite people on planet Earth, Kate Sellers , Technical Fellow at ERM, where Kate leads a multidisciplinary team of professionals dedicated to helping companies recognize the business value of product stewardship. Kate is also an adjunct professor at Harvard Extension School and Indiana University’s School of Public Health, where she is an instructor in the Master of Science in Product Stewardship program. Kate and I last spoke ...
May 12, 2022•47 min
This week, I sat down with Dr. Steven Bennett , Executive Vice President, Scientific & Regulatory Affairs, Household & Commercial Products Association, here in Washington, D.C. Steve’s membership represents an amazing diversity of products used to clean and disinfect homes and commercial environments. As Executive Vice President of scientific and regulatory affairs, Steve routinely addresses an equally diverse and challenging range of scientific, regulatory, and science policy issues, fr...
Apr 28, 2022•57 min
This week, I sat down with Jim Aidala , Senior Government Affairs Consultant at B&C and its consulting affiliate, The Acta Group. As a former Assistant Administrator in what is now the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention, Jim has a truly unique and exceedingly focused perspective on EPA and Congressional initiatives involving the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA). Unsurprisingly, the new (or not so new now)...
Apr 14, 2022•47 min
This week, I was delighted to visit again with Alexandra Dunn , now a Partner with Baker Botts and immediate past Assistant Administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention (OCSPP). As Assistant Administrator, Alex was respected and liked by a diversity of industrial and agricultural chemical stakeholders, revered by her immediate staff, and hugely popular as an EPA senior leader. Alex led OCSPP at a pivotal time in EPA’s implem...
Mar 31, 2022•58 min
This week, I sat down with Dr. Jane Vergnes , Director of Toxicology and Vice President, Scientific Affairs, here at B&C and its consulting affiliate, The Acta Group (Acta®), and Dr. Steven P. Brennan , Senior Manager of REACH at Acta, and resident in our UK office in Manchester, England. In our podcast, we seek to answer the question “How is the UK government doing in implementing UK REACH?” We are just past year one of UK REACH as it came into force at 11:00 p.m. UK time on December 31, 20...
Mar 17, 2022•57 min
This week I had the pleasure of sitting down with Kelly Scanlon , DrPH, CIH, Director of Environmental Policy & Research, Global Government Relations, at IPC. IPC, as many of you know, is an organization accredited by the American National Standards Institute as a standards development organization. It publishes the most widely used acceptability standards for the electronic industry. Dr. Scanlon was brought on at IPC in 2019 to direct environment, health, and safety (EHS) policy and researc...
Mar 03, 2022•49 min
This week I had the pleasure of sitting down with Baskut Tuncak , newly named Director, Toxics Use Reduction Institute (TURI), at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell. Baskut is a lawyer and former research chemist with a truly distinguished and fascinating career in a diverse range of public and private sector roles in toxics issues. Baskut most recently served as the United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on toxics and human rights. In our conversation, Baskut explains the role of rapporteu...
Feb 17, 2022•49 min
This week I was thrilled to sit down with James V. Aidala , B&C’s Senior Government Affairs Consultant, and Dr. Richard E. Engler , B&C’s and The Acta Group’s (our consulting affiliate) Director of Chemistry, to discuss what to expect in 2022 with regard to industrial and agricultural chemical regulation. As our listeners know, each year we publish a Forecast, a written summary of our best professional judgment as to the trends and key developments we expect in the New Year. Our 2022 For...
Feb 03, 2022•1 hr 2 min
Mathy Stanislaus was recently appointed as Vice Provost and Executive Director of Drexel University’s Environmental Collaboratory, which brings interdisciplinary expertise in environmental sciences, engineering, law, health, business, economics, policy, and humanities to co-design transformative environmental solutions in partnership with community leaders, nonprofits, corporations, and governments. He was formerly the Interim Director and Director of Public Policy and Engagement for the Global ...
Jan 20, 2022•45 min
This week I was delighted to sit down with Katherine Meighan , Associate Vice-President and General Counsel of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), a United Nations agency headquartered in Rome, Italy. We spoke with Katie in the summer of 2019, after an International Bar Association (IBA) webinar on sustainable investment in agriculture I helped organize in my role as Vice Chair of the IBA Agricultural Law Section. I was so impressed with Katie’s work, we decided to do a p...
Jan 06, 2022•32 min
This week I sat down with Dr. Richard E. Engler , B&C’s and The Acta Group’s (our consulting affiliate) Director of Chemistry, and Dr. Todd J. Stedeford , B&C’s Of Counsel, to discuss a range of issues regarding the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) all important implementation of the Lautenberg amendments to the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA). Rich was a 17-year veteran of EPA’s Office of Pollution Prevention and Toxics (OPPT) before joining our team. Todd is a more rece...
Dec 23, 2021•51 min
This week I was delighted to sit down with Dr. Michal I. Freedhoff , Assistant Administrator, Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention (OCSPP), U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), arguably the busiest person in Washington, D.C. Dr. Freedhoff is EPA’s top Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) official, and she also administers the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA). Dr. Freedhoff discusses OCSPP’s priorities, plans for the new year, and focuses on a few ke...
Dec 09, 2021•39 min
This week I sat down with Kurt M. Landgraf , former Chairman and CEO of DuPont Pharmaceuticals Company and most recently former President of Washington College located in Chestertown, Maryland. I have known Kurt for a number of years now, and I thought a conversation focusing on Kurt’s extraordinarily diverse background would be an interesting mix of pharmaceutical management issues, higher education, and Kurt’s observations on preparing students for careers in environmental disciplines. Kurt’s ...
Nov 11, 2021•32 min
