NRDC V. USEPA, No. 15-72308 (9th Cir. 2017)
Annotate this CasePetitioners sought review of the EPA's conditional registration of the pesticide NSPW-L30SS, an antimicrobial materials preservative that uses nanosilver as its active ingredient. The Ninth Circuit held that the EPA failed to support the public-interest finding with substantial evidence under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act, 7 U.S.C. 136a(c)(7)(C). The panel explained that the EPA's finding that current users of conventional-silver pesticides will switch to NSPW and/or that NSPW will not be incorporated into new products relied on unsubstantiated assumptions. Accordingly, the panel vacated the EPA's conditional registration of NSPW.
Court Description: Pesticides / EPA. The panel vacated the United States Environmental Protection Agency’s (“EPA”) conditional registration of the pesticide NSPW-L30SWS – an antimicrobial materials preservative that uses nanosilver as its active ingredient – because the EPA failed to support its requisite finding that NSPW was in the public interest under 7 U.S.C. § 136a(c)(7)(C). NRDC V. USEPA 3 The Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act governs the sale, use, and distribution of pesticides, and the Act requires that pesticides generally must be registered with the EPA before being sold or distributed. The EPA may grant a temporary, conditional registration if it first determines that use of a pesticide was in the public interest. The panel held that substantial evidence supported the EPA’s findings that NPSW has lower application and mobility rates than conventional-silver pesticides. The panel held, however, that substantial evidence did not support the EPA’s finding that use of NPSW was in the public interest because it had the “potential” to reduce the amount of silver released into the environment. The panel held that the EPA’s finding was based on two unsubstantiated assumptions: first, that current users of conventional-silver pesticides would replace those pesticides with NSPW; and second, that NSPW would not be incorporated into new products to the extent that such incorporation would actually increase the amount of silver released into the environment. The panel concluded that without evidence in the record to support the assumptions, it could not find that the EPA’s public-interest finding was supported by substantial evidence as required by the Act.
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.