Smithers Rapra, a subsidiary of U.S.-based independent testing, research and consulting organization, The Smithers Group, will host its fourth international conference on REACH January 20-22, 2008, in Houston.

Timed to coincide with the end of the pre-registration phase of the legislation and ECHA’s publication of a list of pre-registered substances, the high-profile event has been developed to enable importers, formulators, distributors and downstream users worldwide to take a proactive approach to the controversial ground-breaking REACH legislation, SRT officials said.

The three-day conference will feature an expert speaker panel with representation from world-class companies, such as BASF Corporation, Rolls-Royce plc, Sabic Innovative Plastics, American Chemistry Council, Evonik Degussa and Research Institute for Fragrance Materials to name a few.

The first day of the conference will be devoted to the Substance Information Exchange Forum (SIEF) and consortia planning, and will offer practical guidance on, amongst other things, managing multi-substance consortia; the implication of no data, no market; substance identification and naming in practice. The day will include case studies from the REACH Additives Technical Group as well as the Lower Olefins and Aromatics Temporary Association explaining the approaches that have been taken to implement REACH within these consortia.

The day concludes with an evening drinks reception where delegates can discuss the day’s proceedings and continue networking.

Day two of the conference will focus on the testing requirements under REACH with guidance on developing exposure scenarios for risk assessment and mitigation. Particular attention will be paid to the Only Representative scheme in practice and how to evaluate the toxicity of nanoparticles under REACH.

The third day of the conference will take a closer look at supply chain communication, with perspectives from chemical producers and downstream users as well as legal viewpoints on contractual clauses, trade and business impacts of REACH. There will be a paper from the International Chemical Secretariat giving the NGO stance on substitution requirements for toxic use reduction.

Each day of the conference may be booked separately so that companies may build their own bespoke event. To register for the conference and for more information visit: www.polymerconferences.com.

The U.S. exports more than $20 billion in chemical products and invests more than $4 billion in the EU chemical and related industry sectors annually, according to the Competitive Enterprise Institute. In addition, U.S. firms export more than $400 billion in products containing chemicals, some of which may fall under the scope of REACH regulations.

For more information on the REACH conference, contact Alix Reeves, areeves@rapra.net and view forthcoming conferences at www.rapra.net/conferences.