Categorization of Substances on the
Domestic Substances List
The first Canadian Environmental
Protection Act, enacted in 1988, provided for an in-depth analysis of
potential risks to human health and the environment posed by environmental
contaminants through the assessment of substances on the Priority
Substances List. Under this program, detailed health and
environmental assessments were conducted on a total of 69 entries listed on
the first (PSL1)
and second (PSL2)
Priority Substances Lists.
The revised Canadian Environmental
Protection Act, 1999 (CEPA 1999) contains new provisions that allow for the
faster assessment of a greater number of existing substances in
Canada. This new process involves the categorization of
the approximately 23 000 substances on the Domestic Substances List (DSL),
which will be used to identify substances that will then undergo a screening
assessment for potential risks to human health or the
environment.
Under Section 73 of CEPA 1999, the
Ministers of Health and of the Environment were to categorize the 23 000
substances on the DSL. Health Canada undertook to categorize substances on
the DSL to identify those that pose the greatest potential for exposure of
the general population in Canada (GPE) as well as those persistent or
bioaccumulative substances considered "inherently toxic" to
humans (IThuman). Environment
Canada undertook to categorize substances on the DSL to
identify those that are persistent or bioaccumulative and "inherently
toxic" to non-human organisms.
Presented here are the results of the
health-related categorization of the DSL under CEPA 1999 as well as associated
documentation including:
Help on accessing alternative formats, such as PDF, MP3 and WAV files, can be obtained in the alternate format help section.
The proposal (Categorization of the
Domestic Substances List (DSL) for Greatest Potential for Human Exposure) for
priority setting related to Health
Canada's mandate to categorize substances on the DSL for
greatest potential for human exposure (GPE) was previously made available
for public comment
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