EPA staff are weighing whether individual industrial sectors can “effectively administer” stringent workplace chemical exposure limits as they craft the agency’s ongoing raft of TSCA risk management rules amid a barrage of objections from industry that the proposals are too strict, according to one source with knowledge of the toxics program’s work.
September 16, 2026
The semiconductor industry is urging the White House to limit workplace safety provisions in EPA’s upcoming TSCA rule for the solvent n-methylpyrrolidone (NMP) to codifying the sector’s existing practices, arguing that those safeguards already reduce exposures to near zero.
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A Small Business Advocacy Review (SBAR) panel that OSHA convened to gather input on its long-awaited heat safety standard has issued a report laying out a wide range of recommendations for the rulemaking, such as flexibility for employers to tailor worker protection plans to their sectors and generous exemptions for small companies.
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An industry attorney is highlighting novel language in EPA’s proposed TSCA rule for the solvent trichloroethylene (TCE) that requires companies to limit worker exposures only “to the extent possible” as evidence that its occupational exposure standard is unworkably strict, underlining likely objections to the policy from trade groups and employers.
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The Labor Department (DOL) Office of Inspector General (OIG) has again identified worker safety issues among the top “management challenges” facing the department in its annual report on those high-priority issues, and is recommending a slew of new actions at both OSHA and the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA).
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Unions and their allies, including elected Democrats, are supporting OSHA’s proposal to allow compliance officers inspecting a workplace to bring worker representatives on walkarounds even if they are not affiliated with that employer, arguing that the policy will bolster workers’ rights while seeking relatively minor changes to the agency’s text.
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Employer attorneys are urging California companies to begin crafting documents and developing training procedures to comply with the state’s newly enacted law requiring general industry employers to implement workplace violence-prevention plans -- measures that must be fully in place by next summer.
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Two environmental groups are renewing their push for EPA to strengthen its upcoming Risk Management Program (RMP) update, citing data on chemical-facility accidents as recent as Oct. 15, as supporters of a strict policy continue to raise public concerns that the agency’s upcoming final rule will fall short of their goals in several key areas.
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The Office of Management & Budget (OMB) has finalized the first major update to its cost-benefit review guide in two decades, including changes that aim to put new emphasis on the distributional effects of regulations on disadvantaged populations.
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EPA has sent its proposed TSCA rule governing the solvent n-methylpyrrolidone (NMP) to the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB), likely teeing up renewed battles over the Trump-era risk evaluation and any workplace exposure limit based on it, after industry groups asked the agency to rewrite the review over alleged scientific errors.
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