ECHA (the European Chemicals Agency) has written to a number of REACH Lead registrants requesting confirmation that declared use of a registered chemical as “flame retardant” is non-confidential. ECHA states that it has received an application for access to documents under Regulation (EC) No1049/2001 on public access to documents (“ATD Regulation”) regarding substances possibly used as flame retardants and it would seem that the Agency is therefore building a list of all chemicals for which use as a flame retardant is declared, based on the REACH dossier.
This will provide a valuable – and by definition publicly available (on request?) – list of all flame retardant chemicals when completed. However, it should be noted that inclusion of the use “flame retardant” in REACH dossiers does not always correspond to reality: REACH Registrants may declare all possible uses, to ensure that every possible customer is covered, so this list may result in identifying as FRs chemicals which are not in fact used as such.