The 17th Persistent Organic Pollutants Review Committee (POPRC.17) consultation ended on 28 January 2022. Committee’s purpose is to evaluate chemicals for possible inclusion in the Stockholm Convention’s annexes, that provides for the elimination and restriction of persistent organic pollutants which leads, in Europe, to Regulation (EU) 2019/1021 (POPs).

One of the tasks was the evaluation of a significant number of substances. The inclusion process involves the following steps:

• Proposal for inclusion
• Evaluation by the Committee of inclusion’s criteria
• Committee’s preparation of a draft risk profile
• Risk Management Committee assessment
• Committee’s recommendation for inclusion at the Conference of the Parties (COP)
• COP’s final decision

During the recent consultation, the draft risk profile was discussed for two substances:

• Dechlorane Plus: used as a flame retardant, as a substitute for already banned flame retardants such as decaBDE
• UV-328: widely used as a UV stabiliser in polymeric materials to protect them from degradation.

For both substances, identification as POP has previously been subject of debate due to the lack of unanimity as to whether they meet the inclusion criteria.

The assessment is at more advanced stage for methoxychlor, a pesticide used as a substitute for DDT, for which the consultation task included the draft risk management assessment.

The following new substances were also on the agenda:

• Chlorpyrifos (CSP): used as a pesticide or biocide;
• MCCPs (chlorinated paraffins with carbon chain lengths in the range C14-17 and chlorination levels at or exceeding 45 per cent chlorine by weight), widely used as substitutes for the short chain paraffins SCCPs, already identified as POPs and consequently banned;
• LC-PFCASs (long-chain perfluorocarboxylic acids, their salts, and related compounds), a sub-family of the PFAS group.

The consultation was also an opportunity to assess the revision of the following items, already part of the Convention’s annexes:

• Decabromodiphenyl ether (decaBDE);
• short-chain chlorinated paraffins (SCCPs);
• perfluorooctane sulphonic acid (PFOS), and its salts;
• perfluorooctane sulfonyl fluoride (PFOSF);
• Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), its salts and PFOA-related substances.

Source: Stockholm Convention