As the EPA implements new amendments to the Toxic Substances Control Act, Senator Barbara Boxer has encouraged the agency to pay special attention to asbestos danger.

The amendments were included in the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act, signed into law in June 2016.

The amendments delegate more authority to the EPA to regulate asbestos and other potentially harmful chemicals.

Part of the new mandate for the EPA in this legislation is that the agency must identify the 10 most dangerous chemicals in the U.S., evaluate the associated asbestos danger, and determine whether those chemicals present unreasonable risks that should subject them to new regulation.

In a letter to EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, Sen. Boxer said that the agency should “consider all forms of asbestos in this initial list of chemicals it acts on.” Sen. Boxer noted that this top 10 list will direct the agency’s policy agenda for the next several years, so it’s important that asbestos be included in the list.

Critics say that as originally written in 1989, the Toxic Substances Control Act, or TSCA, didn’t give the EPA the strength it needed to make any significant progress in the regulation of dangerous chemicals.

As Sen. Boxer notes in her letter, a 1989 rule by the EPA that banned some major uses of asbestos and scheduled other uses for phase-out was nullified by a federal appeals court.

Sen. Boxer says that single decision crippled the EPA’s ability to promulgate effective regulation under the TSCA.

The new amendments give the EPA authority to create a new risk-based safety standard and increase public transparency for information about regulated chemicals.

The legislation also provides funding the agency’s execution of its new responsibilities.

Asbestos Danger Continues, Despite Regulation

Asbestos is a known carcinogen, responsible for deadly respiratory diseases like mesothelioma and asbestos lung cancer.

Even after decades of regulatory efforts to curb asbestos danger, mesothelioma still takes the lives of an estimated 3,000 persons in the U.S. per year.

In her letter to Administrator McCarthy, Sen. Boxer says there are a total of 15,000 deaths annually in the U.S. that are linked to asbestos, with 11,000 of those related to asbestos lung cancer.

She quotes a statement from OSHA, saying that agency is “aware of no instance in which exposure to a toxic substance has more clearly demonstrated detrimental health effects on humans than has asbestos exposure.”

Despite the evidence of asbestos danger, the material continues to be used in the U.S.

Although domestic production of asbestos has ceased, Sen. Boxer says that between 2006 and 2014, the U.S. received over 8.2 million pounds of asbestos through 23 coastal ports.

A report by the U.S. Geological Service says that the chloralkali industry, which produces chlorine used to disinfect water, accounts for 88 percent of asbestos consumption today.

The rest of consumed asbestos goes into “coatings and compounds, plastics, roofing products, and unknown applications.”

Sen. Boxer notes that in 2006 the World Health Organization called for an end of uses of all types of asbestos.

Fifty-six countries, including heavily industrialized nations like Japan and developing countries in Africa, now ban asbestos or allow only limited exceptions on its use.