The European Community number (EC number) is a unique seven-digit identifier that was assigned to substances for regulatory purposes within the European Union by the European Commission. The EC Inventory comprises three individual inventories, EINECS, ELINCS and the NLP list. [1]
The EC number may be written in a general form as: NNN-NNN-R, [2] where the N represents digits and R is a check digit. The check digit is calculated using the ISBN method. According to this method, the check digit R is the following sum modulo 11:
If the remainder R is equal to 10, that combination of digits is not used for an EC number. To illustrate, the EC number of dexamethasone is 200-003-9. N1 is 2, N2 through N5 are 0, and N6 is 3.
The remainder is 9, which is the check digit.
There is a set of 181 ELINCS numbers (EC numbers starting with 4) for which the checksum by the above algorithm is 10 and the number has not been skipped but issued with a checksum of 1.
The EC Inventory includes the substances in the following inventories. The content of these inventories is fixed and official.
| Inventory | Scope | Format | Number of entries (if fixed number of entries) |
|---|---|---|---|
| European Inventory of Existing Commercial Chemical Substances (EINECS) | Substances, excluding polymers, that were recorded as being commercially available in the EU from 1 January 1971 to 18 September 1981. [3] These were considered registered under Article 8(1) of the Dangerous Substances Directive (67/548/EEC). They are considered phase-in substances under the REACH Regulation. | 2xx-xxx-x 3xx-xxx-x | 100,102 [3] |
| European List of Notified Chemical Substances (ELINCS) | Substances notified under the Dangerous Substances Directive Notification of New Substances (NONS) that became commercially available after 18 September 1981.[ citation needed ] | 4xx-xxx-x | 4,381 |
| No Longer Polymers (NLP) | The definition of polymers was changed in April, 1992 [4] with the result that substances previously considered to be polymers were no longer regarded as polymers. Consequently, a list, called the NLP-list (No Longer Polymer), was made of such substances that were not covered by the polymer definition but were placed on the market between after 18 September 1981 and 31 October 1993. [5] | 5xx-xxx-x | 703 |
European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) also applies the EC number format to what it calls "List number". [6] The number are assigned under the REACH Regulation without being legally recognised. Hence, they are not official because they have not been published in the Official Journal of the European Union. List numbers are administrative tools only and shall not be used for any official purposes.
| Scope | Format |
|---|---|
| Automatically assigned, e.g. to pre-registrations of substances with a CAS No. | 6xx-xxx-x |
| Assigned to substances after inquiries by the ECHA Substance ID Team | 7xx-xxx-x |
| Automatically assigned to substances identified only with a CAS No. (continuation of the 6xx-xxx-x series) | 8xx-xxx-x |
| Automatically assigned, e.g. to pre-registrations without a CAS No. or other numerical identifier (including reaction masses of more than one substance) | 9xx-xxx-x |
A CAS Registry Number is a unique identification number, assigned by the Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS) in the US to every chemical substance described in the open scientific literature, in order to index the substance in the CAS Registry. This registry includes all substances described since 1957, plus some substances from as far back as the early 1800s; it is a chemical database that includes organic and inorganic compounds, minerals, isotopes, alloys, mixtures, and nonstructurable materials. CAS RNs are generally serial numbers, so they do not contain any information about the structures themselves the way SMILES and InChI strings do.
A safety data sheet (SDS), material safety data sheet (MSDS), or product safety data sheet (PSDS) is a document that lists information relating to occupational safety and health for the use of various substances and products. SDSs are a widely used type of fact sheet used to catalogue information on chemical species including chemical compounds and chemical mixtures. SDS information may include instructions for the safe use and potential hazards associated with a particular material or product, along with spill-handling procedures. The older MSDS formats could vary from source to source within a country depending on national requirements; however, the newer SDS format is internationally standardized.
Hazard symbols are recognizable symbols designed to warn about hazardous or dangerous materials, locations, or objects, including electromagnetic fields, electric currents; harsh, toxic or unstable chemicals ; and radioactivity. The use of hazard symbols is often regulated by law and directed by standards organizations. Hazard symbols may appear with different colors, backgrounds, borders, and supplemental information in order to specify the type of hazard and the level of threat. Warning symbols are used in many places in place of or in addition to written warnings as they are quickly recognized and more universally understood, as the same symbol can be recognized as having the same meaning to speakers of different languages.
Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH) is a European Union regulation dating from 18 December 2006. REACH addresses the production and use of chemical substances, and their potential impacts on both human health and the environment. Its 849 pages took seven years to pass, and it has been described as the most complex legislation in the Union's history and the most important in 20 years. It is the strictest law to date regulating chemical substances and will affect industries throughout the world. REACH entered into force on 1 June 2007, with a phased implementation over the next decade. The regulation also established the European Chemicals Agency, which manages the technical, scientific and administrative aspects of REACH.
The Dangerous Substances Directive was one of the main European Union laws concerning chemical safety, until its full replacement by the new regulation CLP Regulation (2008), starting in 2016. It was made under Article 100 of the Treaty of Rome. By agreement, it is also applicable in the EEA, and compliance with the directive will ensure compliance with the relevant Swiss laws. The Directive ceased to be in force on 31 May 2015 and was repealed by Regulation (EC) No 1272/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 16 December 2008 on classification, labelling and packaging of substances and mixtures, amending and repealing Directives 67/548/EEC and 1999/45/EC, and amending Regulation (EC) No 1907/2006.
IUCLID is a software application to capture, store, maintain and exchange data on intrinsic and hazard properties of chemical substances. Distributed free of charge, the software is especially useful to chemical industry companies and to government authorities. It is the key tool for chemical industry to fulfill data submission obligations under REACH, the most important European Union legal document covering the production and use of chemical substances. The software is maintained by the European Chemicals Agency, ECHA. The latest version, version 6, was made available on 29 April 2016.
The European Chemicals Bureau (ECB) was the focal point for the data and assessment procedure on dangerous chemicals within the European Union (EU). The ECB was located in Ispra, Italy, within the Joint Research Centre (JRC) of the European Commission. In 2008 the ECB completed its mandate. Some of its activities were taken over by the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA); others remained within the Joint Research Centre. The history of the ECB has been published as a JRC technical report.
The CLP Regulation is a European Union regulation from 2008, which aligns the European Union system of classification, labelling and packaging of chemical substances and mixtures to the Globally Harmonised System (GHS). It is expected to facilitate global trade and the harmonised communication of hazard information of chemicals and to promote regulatory efficiency. It complements the 2006 Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH) Regulation and replaces an older system contained in the Dangerous Substances Directive (67/548/EEC) and the Dangerous Preparations Directive (1999/45/EC).
The Dangerous Preparations Directive was a European Union directive in the field of occupational safety and health and consumer protection that came into force in 30 July 1999. It complemented the Dangerous Substances Directive (67/548/EEC) and replaced a previous Dangerous Preparations Directive (88/379/EEC). The European Court of Justice had ruled in 1985 that Dangerous Substances Directive (67/548/EEC) applies only to pure substances, not preparations. It was repealed on 1 June 2015, as part of the European Union's adoption of Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labelling of Chemicals, as part of CLP Regulation.
Hazard statements form part of the Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labelling of Chemicals (GHS). They are intended to form a set of standardized phrases about the hazards of chemical substances and mixtures that can be translated into different languages. As such, they serve the same purpose as the well-known R-phrases, which they are intended to replace.
Hazard pictograms form part of the international Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labelling of Chemicals (GHS). Two sets of pictograms are included within the GHS: one for the labelling of containers and for workplace hazard warnings, and a second for use during the transport of dangerous goods. Either one or the other is chosen, depending on the target audience, but the two are not used together for the same hazard. The two sets of pictograms use the same symbols for the same hazards, although certain symbols are not required for transport pictograms. Transport pictograms come in wider variety of colors and may contain additional information such as a subcategory number.
Musk xylene is a synthetic musk fragrance which mimics natural musk. It has been used as a perfume fixative in a wide variety of consumer products, and is still used in some cosmetics and fragrances.
n-Hexyllithium, C6H13Li, sometimes abbreviated to HxLi or NHL, is an organolithium compound used in organic synthesis as a strong base or as a lithiation reagent. It is usually encountered as a colorless or pale yellow solution in hexanes. Such solutions are highly sensitive to air and can ignite when treated with water.
European hazard symbols for chemicals are pictograms defined by the European Union for labelling chemical packaging and containers. They are standardised currently by the CLP/GHS classification.
Epoxiconazole is a fungicide active ingredient from the class of azoles developed to protect crops. In particular, the substance inhibits the metabolism of fungi cells infesting useful plants, and thereby prevents the growth of the mycelia. Epoxiconazole also limits the production of conidia (mitospores). Epoxiconazole was introduced to the market by BASF SE in 1993 and can be found in many products and product mixtures targeting a large number of pathogens in various crops. Crops are, for example, cereals, soybeans, banana, rice, coffee, turnips, and red as well as sugar beets.
The Substitute It Now! List is a database developed by the International Chemical Secretariat (ChemSec) of chemicals the uses of which are likely to become legally restricted under EU REACH regulation. The list is being used by public interest groups as a campaign tool to advocate for increasing the pace of implementation of REACH and by commercial interests to identify substances for control in chemicals management programmes.
Technical Guidance WM2: Hazardous Waste: Interpretation of the definition and classification of hazardous waste is a guidance document developed and jointly published by the English Environment Agency, Natural Resources Wales, Scottish Environment Protection Agency and the Northern Ireland Environment Agency to provide guidance on the assessment and classification of hazardous waste based on the revised Waste Framework Directive definition of hazardous waste. Waste producers, consultants, contractors and waste management companies use the guidance to a) identify the correct waste code for their waste and b) determine whether the waste is hazardous or not based on its chemical composition.
A pesticide, also called Plant Protection Product (PPP), which is a term used in regulatory documents, consists of several different components. The active ingredient in a pesticide is called “active substance” and these active substances either consist of chemicals or micro-organisms. The aims of these active substances are to specifically take action against organisms that are harmful to plants. In other words, active substances are the active components against pests and plant diseases.
EC number (P232) (see uses )
