Increasing scientific knowledge about chemicals and their impacts combined with highly publicized disasters-such as Love Canal in the late 1970s, the gas leak in Bhopal, India, in 1984, and the ozone hole-led to new laws regulating chemicals. In the 1960s, the impacts of chemicals on the environment began to be publicly acknowledged when marine biologist and conservationist Rachel Carson documented the impacts of the insecticide DDT and other pesticides on ecosystems and humans. These innovations contributed to a widespread increase in quality of life-but these chemicals and materials were designed with only cost and performance in mind, without considering their environmental and health impacts. The chemicals revolution of the 1950s and ’60s coincided with a period of unprecedented economic growth in the United States and elsewhere as discoveries spurred the development of new and improved materials, efficient agricultural processes, new industrial sectors, and innovative products designed to make daily life easier for a growing middle class. But the effort still requires Congress to appropriate funds and also needs leadership from the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), an interagency committee, and support and coordination across multiple agencies.ĭone right, this initiative could bring about a new era of significantly safer, more sustainable chemicals freed of their association with fossil fuel feedstocks while catalyzing innovation and creating jobs and economic development opportunities in the United States.Īs a former Congressional staffer who led efforts to advance the bill (Rubin Shen), a scientific association lobbyist who worked on the bill for most of its history (Maxwell), a former assistant administrator for the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) who led the office that oversees EPA’s green chemistry efforts and its chemicals regulatory program (Jones), and the directors of two green chemistry organizations (Tickner and Kirchhoff), we believe that insights for the bold leadership that could unleash the potential of sustainable chemistry can be found in the history of the act itself, as well as in the precedents set by previous successful government-led initiatives. Done right, this initiative could bring about a new era of significantly safer, more sustainable chemicals freed of their association with fossil fuel feedstocks while catalyzing innovation and creating jobs and economic development opportunities in the United States. Its long route to passage offers a sense of the challenges to come in implementation. The bill’s history and context provide important lessons on what it takes to bring such an effort to legislative fruition. In short, the bill creates a federal government-wide effort that could enable the United States to lead globally in the innovation, commercialization, and adoption of safer, more sustainable chemicals and materials in the future.Īlthough the act had bipartisan support and the noncontroversial goal of stimulating research, innovation, manufacturing, jobs, and education, it was passed only with the help of Congressional champions and after numerous iterations and years of advocacy by a broad group of scientific organizations, environmental advocates, and business associations. The other element is organizing coordinated support for federal efforts in sustainable chemistry, including research and development, technology transfer, commercialization, and education and training. This baseline will be used to measure the progress and effectiveness of activities envisioned under the act. One is the formation of an interagency committee to determine the baseline status of sustainable chemistry activities across the federal government and the US economy. In 2021, after nearly 17 years of effort, Congress enacted the Sustainable Chemistry Research and Development Act as part of the must-pass National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2021. Now that major sustainable chemistry legislation has been passed, advancing its transformative potential will require a bold, coordinated, and resourced whole-of-government approach.
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