Know more about hazardous chemicals in products: SCIP data published
Around 6,000 companies across the European Union have successfully complied with their new duty to notify ECHA about products containing substances of very high concern, SVHCs. The SCIP database now displays more than four million article notifications.
Based on the information submitted so far, the most commonly notified product categories in the database are:
- machinery and their parts,
- measuring instruments and their parts,
- electronic equipment and their parts,
- vehicles and their parts,
- articles made of rubber,
The most common substances of very high concern in notifications are:
- lead (e.g. in ball bearings, batteries),
- lead monoxide (e.g. in lamps, vehicle parts),
- lead titanium trioxide (e.g. in electric cookers),
- silicid acid, lead salt (e.g. in lead crystalware, vehicle coatings),
- 1,6,7,8,9,14,15,16,17,17,18,18-Dodecachloropentacyclo[12.2.1.16,9.02,13.05,10]octadeca-7,15- diene, more commonly referred to as “Dechlorane PlusTM (e.g. in paints, glues).
You can search the data by article name or brand, product category, type of material or the chemical name. The data will help consumers make informed choices by checking whether a product contains hazardous chemicals and reading its safe use instructions. Waste operators can use the data to increase the re-use of articles and further develop recycling processes.
ECHA’s Executive Director, Bjorn Hansen says: “Today’s launch improves access to information on hazardous chemicals in articles on the EU market. It will help to track products containing substances of very high concern until they reach the waste stage, supporting the goals of a circular economy. We encourage everyone to get familiar with the database and use it.”
Virginijus Sinkevičius, EU Commissioner for Environment, Oceans and Fisheries, says:
“The launch of the database is a true milestone in bringing transparency about chemicals of concern in products. This wealth of information will be of great value to all, especially consumers, waste operators, and policy-makers. It will enhance the delivery of safe and clean products and secondary materials, fully in line with the priorities on re-use and recycling defined in the EU waste legislation. Thanks to all the companies that promptly submitted information, making the database work. This is a key step in implementing deliverables of the European Green Deal, notably our action plans on circular economy and zero pollution, and our Chemicals Strategy for Sustainability.”
All companies placing articles containing substances of very high concern on the EU market have to notify them to the database. To help companies with this duty, ECHA has developed several guidance documents and tools.
Background
Companies supplying articles that contain substances of very high concern, SVHCs, on the REACH Candidate List have to notify these to ECHA. The requirement concerns articles on the EU market that contain more than 0.1 % weight by weight of SVHCs. The obligation came into force on 5 January 2021 and is based on the EU Waste Framework Directive as revised in 2018.
The notifications are stored in the Substances of Concern in Products (SCIP) database, which ensures that the information is publicly available throughout the whole lifecycle of products and materials, including the waste stage.
SCIP provides all the technical data from companies allowing the safe use and improved re-use and recycling of the article. This includes: information to identify the article, instructions on how to use it safely, the substance of very high concern, its location, and the type of material in which it is contained.
At the moment, the database contains over four million article notifications. This number counts duplicate notifications for the same article that were made by several actors in the EU supply chains, as well as notifications made for more than one article. Therefore, ECHA does not have an estimation for the exact number of different articles in the database.
We asked some questions to Clara Rueda, Regulatory Officer at ECHA.
SCIP database allows to have information about the hazardous chemicals in products so that they can be safely recycled. In which sense can SCIP be a key for a better circular economy?
As our Executive Director, Bjorn Hansen, says: “Tracking harmful chemicals is the key for moving towards a more sustainable circular economy. All materials are made of chemicals and we need to make sure we know which products contain harmful chemicals before they are recycled. Our upcoming database will help us to make products safer.”
The primary goal of SCIP is waste prevention and substitution of hazardous substances. The database will increase the knowledge on which substances are being used in which articles. Consumers can then use this information in their purchasing decisions, pushing for substitution. And waste operators can use the information to further develop the re-use of articles, the recycling of materials and more circular production models.
Which are the tools to prepare and submit SCIP notifications?
ECHA has developed different IT tools to help duty holders to prepare and submit information to comply with the SCIP duty. Companies can prepare SCIP notifications online using IUCLID Cloud, or ‘offline’ in their company’s own IT infrastructure using the IUCLID 6 (Server & Desktop) version. Once a company has prepared a SCIP notification, it needs to be submitted via the ECHA Submission portal.
There is also an additional option to submit SCIP notifications. It allows companies to prepare the dossiers following our harmonized format in an automated way from their own systems and to submit them to the ECHA Submission Portal, using a system-to-system (S2S) service.
We have prepared many support documents to help users with these tools. I recommend you to look at the SCIP webpage tools (https://echa.europa.eu/tools) and support (https://echa.europa.eu/scip-support) sections.
The database has been developed in close cooperation with stakeholders and a dedicated IT user group of more than 60 members. How can producers, consumers and waste operators can use it in the right way?
I would like to congratulate all companies that have started to submit SCIP notifications. SCIP has already received almost 12 million notifications (+ ca. 5 million updates of already submitted notifications), which is an impressive work done by duty holders.
Now is time to start using the data. SCIP publishes all the technical data received from companies. This includes information to identify the article, instructions on how to use it safely, the substance of very high concern (SVHC), its location, and the type of material in which it is contained.
Consumers can use it to make informed purchasing choices. They can search information about the products they plan to buy in the database.
SCIP will also help waste or recyling operators to find out if products coming to them contain harmful chemicals; it could help them to improve waste treatment operations, including worker protection, and enable them to recycle materials without returning harmful SVHCs to the supply chain.
You can go now to look at SCIP and we would also like to invite you to the demonstration of the database that we will make during the ECHA Online Safer Chemicals conference on 6 October 2021, so you can see directly what information is available.
ECHA goes on calling on industry to start submitting the data and stands ready to support industry itself. In which sense?
ECHA has been working very closely with different actors involved in the data submission. We have engaged with them on how to develop the tools and their supporting material, as well as the different simplification strategies. We will continue this engagement.
ECHA has developed different IT tools, manuals and other support documentation. These help all companies to prepare and submit safe use information about the articles placed on the market containing substances of very high concern above 0.1% weight by weight. We encourage all of you to visit our SCIP website and follow our news and social media channels. ECHA also has a dedicated helpdesk for further support.
Based on industry feedback, the database includes also mechanisms that simplify the work for companies. Can you make an example?
ECHA, in close collaboration with industry and stakeholders, has defined different simplification strategies to fulfil the SCIP duty in an efficient way. ECHA encourages the use of simplification tools – these refer to previously submitted data to SCIP and work in a collaborative way between companies.
One of these tools is called “Simplified SCIP Notification (SSN); it has been mainly defined to be used by distributors that receive and supply an article without modifying it. They can refer to data that has previously been submitted to ECHA, for example, by their supplier, without the need to prepare a new SCIP notification dossier from scratch.
There is another simplification mechanism called ‘Referencing’ in a SCIP notification dossier. It supports assemblers of complex articles, such as a bike or a car, to build more simple dossiers. They can provide the information of the components of these complex objects by just referring to previously submitted data.
I would like also to mention the System-to-System (S2S) service. It supports companies who need to submit big volumes of data to prepare dossiers in their own systems and submit them to ECHA in an automated way.
You can access more details on these topics on our website and on the upcoming conference.
Can you make some example of substances that will change the behaviour of downstream users and waste operators?
It is still too early to identify specific substances. SCIP will provide transparency of where these substances of very high concern are and it will allow to push for substitution, to drive waste management decisions and provide more information to address regulatory actions, such as possible restrictions of the use of a substance in specific products.
What will be the future development of SCIP database in the next year? Why will a precious and essential to make the EU Green Deal work?
Next year, we don’t expect any major developments on the tools to prepare and submit SCIP notifications. Regarding how ECHA is publishing the information, we expect to receive in the coming months feedback from stakeholders on the usability and accessibility of the SCIP data. This will give us a basis for a better understanding of their actual needs and areas of potential developments.
Further information
Podcast: SCIP – transparency on hazardous chemicals in products
Video: How to search information in SCIP database
