The Big Butterfly Count, run by the charity Butterfly Conservation, aims to assess the health of the UK’s environment by using butterflies as biodiversity indicators. In the height of the summer heatwave, RPA employees ventured out to survey the abundant butterfly populations in the in the RPA grounds.

As part of its outreach efforts, the Aerospace and Defence Chromates Reauthorisation (ADCR) Consortium will be delivering webinars on 3 September and 11 September where the scope of the re-Authorisation work will be discussed, the key principles will be explained and the next steps will be laid out.

Chemical Watch published an article on the Aerospace & Defence Chromates Reauthorisation Consortium (on 8 August). The article points out that seven Aerospace & Defence companies have taken the initiative to address the issues faced by the sector when it comes to the authorisation of chromates under the EU’s REACH Regulation. The focus is on 8 chromates that have already gone through the REACH authorisation process, with sunset dates of September 2017 or January 2019.

As a follow up from RPA’s presentation to the Chemical Watch Biocides Symposium 2019 in Rome, Rebecca Johansen and Meg Postle provide an Expert Focus for Chemical Watch, examining the level of evidence required for a successful derogation under Article 5(2)(c) of the BPR.

ECHA’s Committees for Risk Assessment (RAC) and Socio-economic Analysis (SEAC) have recently published their final ‘combined’ opinion on the use of trichloroethylene (TCE) as an extraction solvent in the manufacture of caprolactam (a polymer precursor).