>In response to growing concerns about PFAS, the EPA proposed a new SNUR in January 2015, “designating as a significant new use manufacturing . . . or processing of an identified subset of [PFAS] for any use that will not be ongoing after December 31, 2015, and all other [PFAS] for which there are currently no ongoing uses.” 80 Fed. Reg. 2885 (Jan. 21, 2015). Under the SNUR section entitled “Does this action apply to me?” the EPA included a non-exhaustive list of industries that might be affected by the SNUR. Id. at 2886. Those industries included fiber, yarn, and thread mills; carpet and rug mills; home furnishing merchant wholesalers; carpet and upholstery cleaning services; and chemical manufacturing and petroleum refineries. Id. Notably, the fluorination industry was missing from the list, as was any industry with the same North American Industry Classification Code4 as the fluorination industry. See id. The proposed rule also made clear that the SNUR would apply only to “any use not ongoing as of the date on which this proposed rule is published.” Id.
>In July 2020, the EPA promulgated the final SNUR. 85 Fed. Reg. 45109 (July 27, 2020). Like the proposed rule, it included a list of industries that might be affected by the SNUR. Id. at 45110. That list included other industries in addition to those already stated in the proposed rule, but it still did not include the fluorination industry. See id. The SNUR went into effect without any challenges.
So basically, the EPA specifically exempted ongoing uses as of and after 2015 which obviously includes Inhance's decades-old fluorination process. This is also consistent with the "new use" language of Section 5.
Not only that, the EPA did not include fluorination both in their 2015 and 2020 rulemaking for regulating.
>The EPA issued Inhance a Notice of Violation of the SNUR in March 2022 after confirming the presence of PFAS in a pesticide that had been stored in containers fluorinated by Inhance. Though Inhance did not stop fluorinating containers, it attempted to engage with the EPA through the SNUN process. Despite submitting SNUNs for its products, Inhance maintained that its fluorination process was not covered by the SNUR and that Inhance’s SNUNs were not “admission[s] of fact” or a concession that the SNUR was “legally applicable to the Company’s fluorination.”
>In December 2023, the EPA determined that three PFAS manufactured by Inhance presented an unreasonable risk of injury to human health and the environment and six additional PFAS manufactured by Inhance may do so. It therefore issued a Section 5(f) order for the first three PFAS, requiring Inhance to stop manufacturing and processing those PFAS. And it issued a Section 5(e) order for the remaining PFAS, requiring Inhance to stop manufacturing or processing the PFAS, “at least until Inhance completes further testing to address information gaps identified during the review.” Inhance timely petitioned this court for expedited review of the EPA’s orders.
The EPA then ordered Inhance to stop using its fluorination process in 2022 and 2023, citing PFAS, and citing regulations which exempted ongoing uses as of and after 2015 and which did not include fluorination.
Inhance for their part apparently tried to sort this out with the EPA, but appealed to the courts because that didn't work.
This is just damning. The government should not be able to "well akshually" and pull regulations out of thin air. The court is right to order the EPA to do their work properly.
Full ruling: https://www.ca5.uscourts.gov/opinions/pub/23/23-60620-CV0.pd...