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\n <\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\nSingle chemicals can undergo multiple safety assessments, initiated under various pieces of EU legislation, by different actors and at different points in time. Public authorities will use the common data platform to share and reuse information, making these assessment processes more transparent and saving authority and industry resources, the commission says.<\/p>\n
ECHA is tasked with taking the lead on implementing this ambition. It will establish and manage the data platform with help from other EU bodies, such as the European Environment Agency (EEA), European Food Safety Authority, European Medicines Agency, and European Agency for Safety and Health at Work.<\/p>\n
\u201cBy joining forces with our partner agencies and authorities, we will create a system that anticipates risks and brings together existing knowledge and supports innovation,\u201d Sharon McGuinness, ECHA\u2019s executive director, says in a press release.<\/p>\n
A first version of the platform is due to go live within 3 years, with a fully operational version scheduled for 10 years from now. In the meantime, the law allows ECHA to commission studies to fill knowledge gaps, such as a large-scale human biomonitoring study that is due to begin in 2030.<\/p>\n
Support for the data platform exists from all sides<\/p>\n
The data platform is popular, with industry seeing it as an opportunity to reduce administrative burden and environmental groups seeing a step toward better protection from chemical hazards.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe see it as a positive development,\u201d says Gabriele Collatina, secretary-general of the Life Science Manufacturers Association. \u201cBy establishing a one-stop shop for chemicals data, the framework has the potential to increase the predictability and transparency of regulatory processes,\u201d he says, but he cautions that it must \u201crigorously protect\u201d confidential business information and intellectual property.<\/p>\n
The European Chemical Industry Council agrees, adding in an email that the new obligation to add industry-commissioned studies to the data platform \u201cshould be proportionate, taking into account the very large number of studies, measurements and analyses generated by industry on a daily basis.\u201d A European trade association for small and midsize enterprises, SMEUnited, says the package can improve data- and cost-sharing for small companies. \u201cIt gives SMEs [small and medium-sized enterprises] a fair chance to stay on the market,\u201d Marko Su\u0161nik, who advises SMEUnited on chemicals policy, says in an email.<\/p>\n
The EEA in an email calls the package \u201can opportunity to improve chemical risk assessment and data sharing at EU-level, to protect the environment and health.\u201d The agency will cooperate with ECHA on the human biomonitoring study and help establish an early-warning system for emerging chemical risks, another task outlined in the one-substance, one-assessment framework.<\/p>\n
Collatina cautions that ECHA\u2019s ability to handle the wave of new tasks coming toward it \u201cdepends on the agency being adequately funded and staffed.\u201d The agency is also taking on a series of new responsibilities previously managed by other bodies, such as preparing restriction proposals under the hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment (RoHS) directive and setting and reviewing limit values for persistent organic pollutants in waste.<\/p>\n
ECHA already has multiple regulatory milestones to tackle this year, such as the mammoth assessment of the EU-wide per- and polyfluoroalkyl substance (PFAS) restriction. Meanwhile, a French ban on the persistent chemicals<\/a> was enacted on Jan. 1, making France the second EU country after Denmark to preempt EU-wide action.<\/p>\n\n Chemical & Engineering News<\/p>\n
ISSN 0009-2347<\/p>\n
Copyright \u00a9
\n 2026 American Chemical Society<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u00a0 The European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) has begun work on an open platform of information on chemicals that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":683400,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5174],"tags":[72485,92661,2814,2000,299,5187,207016,46,2443,3695],"class_list":{"0":"post-683399","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-eu","8":"tag-assessment","9":"tag-chemical","10":"tag-data","11":"tag-eu","12":"tag-europe","13":"tag-european","14":"tag-osoa","15":"tag-policy","16":"tag-regulation","17":"tag-sustainability"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115862435529619905","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/683399","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=683399"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/683399\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/683400"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=683399"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=683399"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=683399"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}