Update on aprotic solvents

NMP (1-methyl-2-pyrrolidone) producers agreed to  rule out professional uses in their REACH registration dossier in order to address the European Commission’s concerns that professional users (as opposed to industrial users) cannot sufficiently protect workers against exposure.

It shows the industry’s commitment to ensure that adequate risk management measures are put in place to protect workers and consumers against NMP exposure. The initiative also intends to prevent the European Commission from putting NMP, which is already on the REACH restriction list, on the REACH authorisation list. Industry favours the restriction approach versus the authorisation one, which could threaten a broad range of important industry value chains within the EU given the fact that there are no products of substitution available.

The European Commission is finalizing a Risk Management Option Analysis (RMOA) on the three aprotic solvents (DMF, DMAC and NMP).  The goal is to ensure the same legislative approach for the three aprotic solvents. The selected option should be restriction coupled with a derived no-effect level (DNEL), but there is no confirmation yet.