A much-anticipated report from the Environmental Protection Agency found that formaldehyde poses an unreasonable risk to human health. But the report, released Thursday, downplays the threat the chemical poses to people living near industrial facilities that release large amounts of the carcinogen into the air.
The health risk assessment was released weeks after a ProPublica investigation found that formaldehyde, one of the most widely used chemicals in commerce, causes more cases of cancer than any other chemical in the air and triggers asthma, miscarriages and fertility problems.
OUR analysis of EPA’s own data showed that in every census block in the United States, the lifetime risk of contracting cancer from exposure to formaldehyde in outdoor air is higher than the agency’s target. set for air pollutants. THE the risk is even greater insidewhere formaldehyde escapes from furniture and other products long after they enter our homes.
In its report, the EPA evaluated 63 situations in which consumers and workers encounter formaldehyde and found that 58 of them contribute to the chemical’s unreasonable health risk – a designation that requires the agency to mitigate it. Among the products that can emit dangerous levels of formaldehyde in these scenarios, according to the report, are car care products like car waxes, as well as craft supplies, ink and toner, supplies and photographic fabrics, building materials, textiles and leather goods.
While a note accompanying EPA report said workers are most exposed to the chemical, the agency’s risk assessment adopted lower standards for protecting workers from formaldehyde than those proposed in a previous draft. The move was criticized by some environmentalists, including one who said it would affect hundreds of thousands of people whose jobs require them to come into contact with the chemical.
By law, the EPA should now begin the next step in rulemaking: developing restrictions to mitigate the risks it has identified. But even before the agency released the report, House Republicans urged the administration to invalidate it. And one a chemical industry group immediately attacked the report as flawed, accusing the EPA of “pursuing irresponsible lame duck actions that threaten the U.S. economy and key sectors that support health, safety, and national security.”
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How — and if — to control formaldehyde risks promises to be one of the EPA’s first tests under a second Trump administration. This relatively inexpensive chemical is ubiquitous, used for everything from preserving corpses to making plastics and semiconductors. During his election campaign, President-elect Donald Trump repeatedly said he supports clean air. But he’s also pledged to repeal regulations he views as anti-business — and the industry has rallied around formaldehyde for decades.
When Trump first took office in 2017, the agency was preparing to release a report on the chemical’s toxicity. But one of the EPA appointees, given a high-ranking role in the agency’s office of research and development, was a chemical engineer who had worked to push back against formaldehyde regulation as an employee of Koch Industries, whose subsidiary manufactured formaldehyde and formaldehyde. many products that emit them. The report was not released until August 2024, well after Trump’s appointee left the agency.
According to ProPublica’s analysis of EPA’s 2020 AirToxScreen data, some 320 million people live in areas of the United States where the lifetime risk of cancer from outdoor exposure to formaldehyde is 10 times higher than the average. ideal of the agency. ProPublica has released a search tool that allows anyone in the country to understand the external risk of formaldehyde.
Still, the EPA decided in its finalized assessment that these health risks are not unreasonable, echoing a draft released by the agency in March. At the time, to determine whether formaldehyde posed an unreasonable risk of harm, the EPA compared levels in outdoor air to the highest concentrations measured by monitors over a six-year period. ProPublica’s investigation found that the measurement the draft report used as a benchmark was a fluke and did not meet the quality control standards of the local air monitoring agency that recorded it.
This explanation was missing from the final version released this week. Instead, he proposed several new justifications, including that some formaldehydes degrade in the air and that levels vary over people’s lifetimes, but he came to the same conclusion as the project: that formaldehyde present in outdoor air is not a threat that needs to be taken into account. addressed.
The move leaves people living near industrial facilities — known as fence zones — with little hope of protection, according to Katherine O’Brien, senior attorney at Earthjustice, who has closely followed the efforts of the EPA to regulate formaldehyde.
“Despite calculating very high cancer risks for people living in their homes and also for residents of fence-line communities, the EPA has completely negated these risks and set the stage for no regulations to address these risks,” O’Brien said. “This is deeply disappointing and very difficult to understand.”
Compared to the draft released in March, which was heavily criticized by the industry, the final version contained weaker worker protection standards. The acceptable levels of exposure to formaldehyde in the workplace set in the final version of the assessment were significantly higher than the levels indicated in the previous version of the report.
Maria Doa, senior director of chemicals policy at the Environmental Defense Fund, expressed concern over the decision. “This is a less protective standard that would put workers at risk,” said Doa, a chemist who worked at the EPA for 30 years. She noted that the report’s figures show that around 450,000 workers could be vulnerable to the effects of formaldehyde.
The EPA’s press office did not immediately respond to questions about its determination regarding outdoor air or the change in the value set to protect workers.
It’s unclear exactly what parts, if any, of the new report will be retained.
Last month, Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Texas, urged the new administration to make reviewing Biden’s EPA work on formaldehyde “a top priority for 2025.” In a letter to Lee ZeldinTrump’s pick to lead the agency, Sessions derided this week’s report as “based on unscientific data that was used by irresponsible EPA officials to tie the hands of the new administration and hinder growth.” economic “. (The letter was first reported by Inside the EPA.)
Sessions, who is co-chair of the new Caucus on Exceptional Government Efficiency and a staunch Trump ally, recommended abandoning the EPA’s assessments of formaldehyde and rolling back “Biden’s broader policies” on the chemicals.