- The Commonwealth Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management Standard (ICEMS) Register lists three forms of PFAS as ‘Relevant industrial chemicals that are likely to cause serious or irreversible harm to the environment with no essential uses’.
- From 1 July 2025, restrictions on these specific PFAS chemicals must be complied with in order not to contravene the general environmental duty under the Environmental Protection Act 1994.
- The restrictions include prohibition on the import, export, manufacture and use of the PFAS chemicals and requirements relating to waste treatment and disposal.
- Consequences of contravention of the general environmental duty can be significant, with maximum penalties upwards of $3.7million and possible imprisonment.
The Commonwealth Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management (Register) Act 2021 (Cth) provides for chemicals to be categorised and scheduled on the Industrial Chemicals Environmental Management Standard (ICEMS) Register.
The intent of the Act and the Register is to ‘establish nationally consistent standards to minimise risks to the environment from industrial chemicals’ (section 3 ‘Objects of this Act’).
The Register lists specific PFAS chemicals in Schedule 7 of the Register and restrictions which take effect from 1 July 2025.
Schedule 7 deals with industrial chemicals of greatest concern, being ‘Relevant industrial chemicals that are likely to cause serious or irreversible harm to the environment with no essential uses’.
Schedule 7 of the Register lists the following specific PFAS chemicals only:
- Perfluorooctanoic Acid (PFOA)
- Perfluorohexanesulfonic Acid (PFHxS)
- Perfluorooctanesulfonic Acid (PFOS)
For each of these PFAS chemicals, Schedule 7 states that import, export, manufacture and use of the chemicals is prohibited except in identified circumstances, for example where it is present as ‘unintentional trace contamination’ at defined levels of concentration or in existing firefighting foam systems at defined levels of concentration.
There are also requirements for:
- preventing contamination of other waste with the listed PFAS chemicals
- treatment of waste containing the listed PFAS chemicals
- disposal of the PFAS chemicals
The listing in Schedule 7 of the Register is given effect in Queensland by the Environmental Protection Act 1994 (the EP Act).
Under section 319A of the EP Act, if a person is ‘carrying out an activity that involves a relevant industrial chemical’ (being a chemical identified in the Register), then ‘The person is taken not to comply with the general environmental duty unless the person complies with any risk management measures for the chemical’ under the ICEMS Register.
This means that a person or corporation in Queensland must act consistently with the requirements of the listing (ie not import, export, manufacture or use the specific PFAS chemicals in Schedule 7). If not, then this will be a contravention of the general environmental duty.
It is an offence to contravene the general environmental duty where the contravention is found to cause or be likely to cause serious or material environmental harm (section 319(2) of the EP Act). Consequences can be significant, with maximum penalties upwards of $3.7 million and possible imprisonment.
These changes follow amendments to the Environmental Protection Regulation 2019 in respect of the disposal of liquid and solid waste containing PFAS in different forms which we have summarised here – Amendments to PFAS thresholds for non-regulated waste under the Environmental Protection Regulation 2019
