Government department lead

HSE

Background

The Dangerous Substances Directive (67/548/EEC) identifies the hazardous properties (classifies) around 7000 substances. These harmonised classifications cover safety (eg explosivity, flammability), health (eg acute and chronic toxicity, carcinogenicity) and environment (eg toxicity to the aquatic environment), and are extended and revised periodically by Commission Directives agreed by a comitology procedure.

Main provisions

The 30th and 31st Adaptations to Technical Progress detail several hundred new entries and amend several hundred existing entries in the list of substances and their harmonised classifications. Harmonised classifications help industry by avoiding the need for self-classification and by creating a level playing field for manufacturers, suppliers and importers.

Member States agreed the 30th Adaptation to Technical Progress (ATP) on 16 February 2007 and it was published in the Official Journal on 15th September 2008.  The 31st Adaptation was agreed on 19th November 2008 and was published in the Official Journal on 15 January 2009.  Originally, both were given the same implementation date of 1 June 2009.

However, Member States no longer have an obligation to implement the 30th ATP and 31st ATPs to the related Dangerous Substances Directive (DSD), as Article 55(11) of the CLP Regulation deletes Annex 1 of the DSD. The deletion of Annex 1 of the DSD became effective on 20 January 2009, i.e. 20 days after publication of the CLP Regulation.

Annex 1 of the DSD is now incorporated into Annex VI of the CLP Regulation, up to the 29th ATP. The EC published a proposal for a 1st Adaptation of CLP Regulation comprising the 30th and 31st ATPs on 9 March 2009 with a proposal that these amendments come into direct effect on 1 December 2010.  This would align with both the CLP and the REACH Regulations. Member States voted on and agreed the proposal on 25th March 2009.

Consequently, the updated list of harmonised classifications appearing in the 1st ATP will have direct legal force in all Member States and will not need transposition into their national legislation

Next steps

• Publication of the 1st ATP to the CLP Regulation in the Official Journal in June 2009, entering into force in July 2009.  Duty holders can comply with the new classifications from this date although they are not obliged to do so.
• The mandatory compliance date will be 1 December 2010.

Links

• United Nations Globally Harmonised System of Classification and Labelling of Chemicals (GHS)
• CHIP – protection by information