California BPA ban faces hurdles – state senator

20 May 2008 23:36  [Source: ICIS news]

HOUSTON (ICIS news)--A California bill banning bisphenol A (BPA) in children’s products could face steeper challenges in the state’s lower house after it cleared the state senate last week, a government official said on Tuesday.

The California state senate voted 22-15 on 15 May to ban the manufacture, sale or distribution of toys and child-care products with a BPA concentration of more than 0.1%. The bill, currently in the state Assembly’s rules committee for review, would take effect on 1 January 2009.

“We expect it will be a challenge in the Assembly,” said Tracy Fairchild, spokeswoman for Democratic state Senator Carole Midgen, who introduced the bill. “It’s always easier to get a bill passed in your own house."

She added: “We continue to talk to people in the Assembly, but so is the opposition”.

Opposition is led by the American Chemistry Council (ACC), Fairchild said. The Arlington, Virginia, chemical industry group that has called concerns about BPA’s link to cancer and obesity “overblown.”

An ACC representative in California did not immediately return calls for comment.

If the bill clears the Assembly and is signed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, California would become the first government in the US to ban the chemical.

BPA is found in polycarbonate (PC) containers and has been shown to leak out of the plastic in certain circumstances. Lab rats that ingested high doses of BPA exhibited developmental deficiencies and certain forms of cancer, but government regulators are calling for more study on the effects of low doses in humans.

The US Food and Drug Administration bolstered the ACC’s case when its associate commissioner of science, Norris Alderson, was quoted in news reports as telling a US Senate committee on 14 May that food and beverage containers made with BPA are safe.

A California ban on BPA in children’s products would have ramifications for BPA and PC producers. The state’s economy, which the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) considered the 10th largest in the world as of 2005, is responsible for 13% of US gross domestic product.

Food and beverage containers constitute about 5% of the overall PC market, industry sources said.

US senators last month introduced a bill that would ban BPA in children’s products. Canada is currently mulling its own BPA ban, taking public comment on the proposal until 18 June.

A spokesman for state Assembly Speaker Karen Bass (Democrat), declined to comment on the bill’s chances there. A spokeswoman for Republican Minority Floor Leader Michael Villines declined to comment until consultants for the state Republican caucus looked at the bill.

US consumers have expressed enough concern about BPA that retailers such as Wal Mart and Babies R US have removed PC children’s products from their shelves.

For more information on BPA or PC, visit ICIS chemical intelligence
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By: Ben Lefebvre
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