August 29, 2016
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has revised the reporting requirements of the Community Right to Know Survey (CRTK) to align with the terminology and chemical hazard categories of the Globally Harmonized System (GHS) Hazard Communication Standard (Hazcom). The final rule was released in the June 13, 2016 Federal Register: https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2016- 06-13/pdf/2016-13582.pdf. Companies required to complete the annual CRTK Survey (also known as Tier II)will see some changes to the reporting forms as a result of the new rule.
What will change?
1. GHS has replaced “Material Safety Data Sheet (MSDS)” with the term “Safety Data Sheet (SDS)”.
Instructions and reporting forms for the CRTK Survey will use both terms and their acronyms.
2. Changes to the “Hazard Category” section in Part 2 of the CRTK Survey.
Since its implementation in 1987, the CRTK Survey form has had five (5) hazard category
options. These categories included fire, sudden release of pressure, reactive, acute health
hazard, and chronic health hazard.
The new rule replaces the 5 hazard categories with two (2) hazard categories. The newly defined
hazard categories include:
The June 13, 2016 final rule had inadvertently omitted the hazard ‘‘serious eye damage or eye irritation’’under the definition of ‘‘health hazard’’. Therefore, EPA released a correction in the July 21, 2016 Federal Register: https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2016- 07-21/pdf/2016- 17277.pdf adding “serious eye damage or eye irritation” to the definition of “health hazard”.
