EPA has issued an Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking that broadly re-opens the question whether
to authorize PCBs in caulk and under what conditions. EPA did not propose any new rules on the issue, but
sought comments on what to do. This balance of this post reviews EPA’s regulatory efforts on this issue
and the comments on the ANPRM, and then summarizes some options for building owners while the
agency ponders.
Last year EPA announced that in “recent years” it had learned that many 1950 to 1978 buildings
may contain caulking with PCB concentrations higher than 50 ppm, indeed often quite a bit higher. Linda
Bochert’s post of November 3, 2009 linked to the EPA’s PCBs-in-caulk website, which the agency
established to provide guidance for preventing exposures and conducting safe building renovations.
Please help us keep our resource pages current by reporting any broken links or outdated information by using the link below: Report Broken Links, Missing Pages, or Accessibility Issues Report form
