Introduction

Section 16 of the Hazardous Products Act (HPA) states that when a supplier is exempt from disclosing the chemical identity of a controlled product or an ingredient in a controlled product under the HMIRA, “...the supplier shall disclose on the material safety data sheet or label the generic chemical identity of the controlled product or ingredient with as much precision as is consistent with the exemption”.

That is the extent of the guidance in the HPA and HMIRR on the concept of a GCI. Nevertheless, the Act clearly intends the meaning of a GCI to be a chemical name which is less specific than the chemical identity but no more general than is necessary to protect the supplier from disclosing the confidential business information (CBI).

From discussion with claimants and general observations, it is clear that there may be various reasons why a supplier chooses to submit a claim for exemption from disclosure of a chemical identity. The obvious one is to protect the formulation from competitors. Another reason is to avoid disclosing the precise ingredient(s) to a downstream user. This is particularly evident when the product is a single ingredient or a simple mixture. An employer, on the other hand, may have different reasons for not disclosing a chemical identity. The extent of masking required definitely depends on the nature of the CBI.

The acceptability of a GCI is determined by HMIRC as part of the review process of the claim for exemption. After more than 16 years of reviewing GCIs, HMIRC has gained considerable experience in the application of this concept. While there may be no single correct GCI for an ingredient—because of variations in the nature of the CBI and the approach used for masking—there are clearly acceptable and unacceptable approaches to developing a GCI. The objective of this Bulletin is, therefore, to discuss various approaches to developing a GCI and to provide examples of chemicals similar to those used on material safety data sheets (MSDS) currently in the workplace.

The usual approach is to mask some part of the actual chemical name—providing a degree of anonymity or ambiguity—while also retaining some part of the parent structure of the chemical and certain important radicals, to provide some link with the hazard information disclosed on the MSDS. In some cases, such as for surfactants (described in more detail below), it may be expedient to start from a generic name of a chemical class and proceed towards more specification of the chemical identity, until arriving at a GCI which is as precise as possible, while still maintaining the CBI. To a great extent, a supplier's level of comfort with a GCI depends on how many similar chemicals with the same GCI (and with similar properties which are required to be disclosed) are commercially available and could have been used in the product (at least in functional terms).

Date Modified: 2010-12-15

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