On Wednesday 3 May, the European Commission adopted a regulation to restrict the presence of lead and its compounds in PVC (polyvinyl chloride) on the EU market and thus better protect health and the environment from this highly toxic heavy metal. This regulation amends Annex XVII of the REACH regulation (1907/2006) concerning the registration, evaluation, authorisation and restriction of chemical substances.
Under the REACH restriction, above a certain concentration, lead and its compounds will be banned in products placed on the EU market, whether manufactured in the EU or imported.
More specifically, the ban will concern the presence of this heavy metal at more than 0.1% by weight of the PVC material. The Commission justifies the setting of this concentration limit by the need to encourage clean recycling technologies for PVC, which can reduce the presence of lead and its compounds, but not eliminate it completely.
Articles containing recycled rigid PVC can still be sold and used, but will have to be fully coated with a lead-free layer.
According to the Commission, this regulation should avoid up to 8.4 tonnes of lead emissions per year and put EU-made PVC items, which have been lead-free since 2015, on an equal footing with imported articles.
Its proposal was supported by the Member States in the REACH Committee in December 2022. The European Parliament and the EU Council did not object at the end of their review period in March 2023.
See the regulation: https://aeur.eu/f/6nm
See the annex: https://aeur.eu/f/6nn (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)