TSCA, the Toxic Substances Control Act, is the primary U.S. law governing industrial chemicals. It gives the Environmental Protection Agency authority to track, evaluate, and restrict chemicals used in manufacturing, construction, consumer products, and other commercial applications. Originally passed in 1976 and significantly updated in 2016, TSCA covers tens of thousands of chemical substances and shapes how companies bring new chemicals to market and how existing ones are reviewed for safety.
What TSCA Covers (and What It Doesn’t)
TSCA applies broadly to chemical substances manufactured, imported, processed, or distributed in the United States. The EPA maintains a central inventory under the law that contains 86,741 chemicals, of which about 42,293 are currently active in U.S. commerce. Any company that wants to manufacture or import a new chemical not already on this inventory must notify the EPA before doing so.
The law deliberately excludes several categories of substances that fall under other federal regulations. Food, drugs, cosmetics, and pesticides are all carved out of TSCA because they’re already regulated by the Food and Drug Administration or under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act. If you’re looking at a chemical used in, say, plastics manufacturing or industrial solvents, that’s TSCA territory. If it’s a pharmaceutical ingredient or a food additive, it’s not.
The 2016 Overhaul
For decades, the original 1976 version of TSCA was widely criticized as ineffective. The law placed such a high burden on the EPA to prove a chemical was dangerous before restricting it that the agency struggled to regulate even well-known hazards like asbestos. In 2016, Congress passed the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act, which rewrote major sections of the law.
The most important change was creating a mandatory process for the EPA to systematically evaluate existing chemicals. Under the updated law, the EPA must designate chemicals as high-priority or low-priority, conduct risk evaluations on the high-priority ones, and take regulatory action when a chemical poses an unreasonable risk. The agency is also required to publish an annual schedule of the safety assessments and determinations it plans to complete that year, giving the public visibility into what’s being reviewed.
Another key shift: during risk evaluations, the EPA is prohibited from weighing costs and benefits. The evaluation must focus purely on whether a chemical poses an unreasonable risk to health or the environment, including risks to vulnerable groups like children and workers. Cost considerations only enter the picture later, when the agency designs specific restrictions.
How Chemical Reviews Work
The EPA’s process for evaluating existing chemicals under TSCA has three stages: prioritization, risk evaluation, and risk management.
Prioritization is a screening step. The EPA reviews available information on a chemical and designates it as either a high-priority substance (meaning it warrants a full risk evaluation) or a low-priority substance (meaning a full evaluation isn’t needed at the time). High-priority chemicals move immediately into the next phase.
During risk evaluation, the EPA examines how the chemical is actually used, who is exposed, and what health or environmental hazards it presents. This includes a formal scope document, hazard and exposure assessments, and a final risk determination stating whether the chemical poses an unreasonable risk under its real-world conditions of use.
If the answer is yes, the chemical enters risk management. The EPA is required to impose restrictions that eliminate the unreasonable risk. The agency has a range of tools: it can require warning labels and recordkeeping, limit how a chemical is manufactured or used, restrict who can buy it, or ban it outright.
Recent Actions: Asbestos and PFAS
The asbestos ban is one of the most prominent examples of TSCA in action. In March 2024, the EPA announced a ban on ongoing uses of chrysotile asbestos, the last form still in commercial use in the U.S. The rule immediately prohibited importing asbestos for chlor-alkali manufacturing and set phased timelines for other uses. Most asbestos-containing sheet gaskets face a two-year ban, while some industrial gaskets used in titanium dioxide production and nuclear material processing have five-year phase-outs. Oilfield brake blocks, aftermarket automotive brakes, and other friction products containing asbestos were banned six months after the rule took effect.
TSCA is also the legal basis for a major data-gathering effort on PFAS, the group of synthetic chemicals sometimes called “forever chemicals.” Under a rule finalized in late 2023, any company that manufactured or imported PFAS for a commercial purpose in any year between 2011 and 2022 must report detailed information to the EPA about exposure and health effects. The submission window runs from April 2026 through October 2026, with small manufacturers who only imported PFAS-containing articles getting until April 2027.
As of late 2024, the EPA designated five additional chemicals as high-priority substances for risk evaluation: acetaldehyde, acrylonitrile, benzenamine (aniline), vinyl chloride, and MBOCA. Each of these is now undergoing the full evaluation process.
What Businesses Must Do
TSCA imposes significant reporting and recordkeeping obligations on chemical manufacturers, importers, and processors. Depending on the substance and how it’s used, companies may need to report chemical identity, physical and chemical properties, production volumes, use categories, worker exposure estimates, environmental release data, and any existing information on health or environmental effects. Companies must also describe their risk management practices, including protective equipment, engineering controls, and hazard warnings provided to workers or customers.
The penalties for failing to comply are steep. Violations can result in civil penalties of up to $25,000 per day, and in serious cases, criminal prosecution. The EPA can also go to court to compel companies to submit required information.
How TSCA Compares to European Regulation
The most common international comparison is between TSCA and the European Union’s REACH framework, and the philosophical difference is significant. Under TSCA, the burden of proof falls on the EPA to demonstrate that a chemical poses a risk before it can be restricted. Under REACH, chemical companies themselves must demonstrate that their products can be used safely before placing them on the market.
This distinction plays out in practical ways. REACH requires companies to develop and submit data on a chemical’s health and environmental effects as part of the registration process. TSCA generally does not require companies to generate this data unless the EPA formally issues a rule demanding it. For chemicals of very high concern, REACH requires companies to obtain specific authorization to continue using them, effectively forcing a justification for each use. TSCA has no equivalent authorization requirement.
Transparency rules also differ. REACH requires public disclosure of basic chemical properties, safety guidance, and all health-related information, and it places tighter limits on what companies can claim as confidential business information. TSCA allows broader confidentiality protections, though the 2016 reforms did strengthen public disclosure requirements compared to the original law.