REACH First-Phase Registration: Chemical Manufacturer's Experience
Authors: Denney Dennis 
Published: February 2015

This article, written by Senior Technology Editor Dennis Denney, contains highlights of paper SPE 141019, ’A Chemical Manufacturer's Experience of REACH First-Phase Registration,’ by P.D. Henson, M.D. Pritchard, and R. Weare, SPE, Baker Hughes, prepared for the 2011 SPE European Health, Safety, and Environmental Conference in Oil and Gas Exploration and Production, Vienna, Austria, 22-24 February. The paper has not been peer reviewed.

Europe’s Registration, Evaluation, Authorization, and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH) Regulation is wide-ranging legislation applied to the chemical industry. Its effect is not confined to that industry because REACH is designed to control chemicals that may be manufactured elsewhere and imported into the European Union (EU) and to control where and how they may be used. Every item supplied to the oil and gas industry is composed of chemicals and, therefore, is governed by REACH. The focus of this paper is on specialty chemicals that are used in drilling and production operations.     

Introduction

The EU enacted REACH in December 2006, and a new entity, European Chemicals Agency (ECHA), was set up to administer it. While a register of chemicals in use in the EU already existed, a 1999 study of high-production-volume chemicals revealed that toxicology-data sets were considered adequate for only 14% of these materials, and that 21% had no toxicology data. While certain classes of chemicals, such as pharmaceuticals and biocides, were highly regulated, data for many substances were incomplete. This data gap and increasing public concern over chemical exposure led to calls for industry to submit a full environmental and health data set on every chemical substance manufactured in or imported into the EU in volumes greater than 1 t/a. Exceptions were made for materials already covered by existing legislation (e.g., biocides and waste) and those considered to be relatively benign (e.g., polymeric materials).

Since 1981, European suppliers of new chemicals have been obligated to present an environmental and health data set. Also, chemicals on the market in Europe before 1981 were listed in the European Inventory of Existing Commercial Chemical Substances (EINECS). Before REACH was enacted, supply of a chemical listed on the EINECS register was permitted without the need to acquire or complete an environmental and health data set on the substance.

In the REACH Regulation, chemicals that previously were on the EINECS list were termed “phase-in” substances. Registration for these substances was to be phased in during the subsequent 11 years, with deadlines in 2010, 2013, and 2018. These deadlines were determined by a combination of the volume of material manufactured/imported and the material’s hazardous properties. The more hazardous the material and/or the larger its volume, the earlier that registration was required.

The first-phase-registration deadline (1 December 2010) has passed. This paper describes work undertaken by an oilfield-service company to establish requirements to ensure compliance with REACH and to complete its first-phase registrations in advance of this deadline. The service company submitted approximately 250 preregistrations between 1 June and 1 December 2008. These pre-registrations related to 170 substances and included EU-manufactured materials and those imported into the EU. Significant challenges encountered in the project included substance identification and participation in data-sharing arrangements with other parties.