Toxic Exposures and Pollution Prevention
CEH harnesses policy and legal tools, as well as our expertise in science and testing capabilities, to uncover and eliminate toxic threats from the indoor and outdoor environments we inhabit and the products we use every day.
For over 27 years, CEH has deployed one of our strongest strategies—public interest litigation—to protect consumers by forcing companies to remove toxic chemicals in the products they make or sell. In 2023, we reached legal agreements with twenty-three companies, requiring them to reduce or eliminate toxic consumer and environmental exposures and change the way they do business to protect consumers across a wide range of industries including fashion, food, and health and beauty.
CEH also partners with environmental justice groups, anti-toxics organizations and coalitions and resident leaders in front- and fenceline communities to take action against industrial facilities that release hazardous emissions into our air, water, and soil. Through regulatory advocacy and collaborative partnerships, CEH plays a key role in advancing health-protective laws, preventing harmful legislation that would undermine our existing environmental laws, and compelling the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and other agencies to enforce existing laws and regulations at the federal, state, and local levels.
Toxic Accessories Gone at Urban Outfitters
In line with CEH’s expertise in testing clothing and fashion accessories, we tested eleven fashion accessory items from Urban Outfitter’s Urban Renewal line, which claimed the products were “upcycled” and were “repurposing and reinventing sustainably-sourced vintage pieces.” Our testing found that over half the products tested had stunningly high levels of toxic lead and cadmium: up to 64% lead and 52% cadmium. Reuse and sustainability should not expose people to toxic chemicals, especially when there are no safe levels of these heavy metals.
CEH quickly distributed a petition calling on Urban Outfitters to ensure that what it is selling is safe for our health before it reaches store shelves. With an overwhelming response from our supporters, Urban Outfitters removed lead and cadmium-tainted jewelry and fashion accessories from its website just a week after CEH’s announcement!
Urban Outfitters listened to the consumers that signed our petition demanding that the company prioritize people’s health over their profit. But the fight isn’t over: we are still waiting for Urban Outfitters to commit publicly and formally to basic product safety standards and testing to ensure that its products do not contain any lead or cadmium going forward.
“Two decades after CEH began widespread jewelry testing, we are proud to say that most jewelry on store shelves does not have the lead and cadmium issues that the Urban Renewal line [had].”
– Caitlin Moher, Research Manager at CEH
Legal and Policy Action on Plastics
CEH advanced a number of federal policy and legal actions to tackle the hazards of plastics and their contribution to the global waste crisis. Over the summer, CEH joined allies on Capitol Hill as part of the Break Free From Plastics Hill Week. Over several days, we met in person with dozens of federal lawmakers, led a virtual briefing, and hosted two Congressional convenings to advance legislative priorities such as The Break Free From Plastic Pollution Act (BFFPPA).
Among many other provisions, the BFFPPA would require plastics manufacturers to create, execute, and finance plans to reduce their plastic waste and phase out un-recyclable plastics by 2030. CEH and our coalition partners worked with Senator Merkley of Oregon to successfully re-introduce the Act in the 118th Congress, and we are committed to supporting its advancement during this session.
CEH and Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) also remain engaged in a legal battle to prevent Inhance Technologies USA from generating PFAS when fluorinating plastic containers. Inhance fluorinates hundreds of millions of containers each year that are used to package consumer, commercial, and industrial products found throughout the economy. Alarmingly, several studies have shown that PFAS leaches from the plastic containers into their contents. Americans unknowingly use numerous fluorinated containers in their daily lives.
CEH and PEER were successful in getting a group of twelve lawmakers in Congress to sign on to a bipartisan letter urging the EPA to comprehensively assess the risks and formation of PFAS created by the fluorination of plastics. By the end of 2023, EPA had ordered Inhance to stop fluorination, but at the time of publication, this order had been vacated by an appeals court. Despite this setback, CEH and PEER continue to consider all options available to us to halt Inhance’s harmful fluorination of plastics.