If you think your business might be REACH-liable, are unsure about what you should pre-register, or why you should pre-register, our REACH self-help group’s workshop on Getting Ready for REACH Pre-Registration may be able to help you.

Pre-registration is the key to REACH – if you, or your suppliers, don’t have chemicals or REACH-liable substances pre-registered between 1st June and 30th November 2008, they will have to be withdrawn from market, or immediately go through the registration process.

Pre-registered substances can legally be used in the EU in a 2 to 10 year window (depending on type and amount of substance) before registration is required, and if you pre-register, there is no obligation to actually register – in effect, pre-registration buys you time to carry on business now, and decide what you are going to register later.

The workshop will include practical advice on:

► Deciding what to pre-register
► Reducing your REACH obligations – legally
► Calculating your REACH-liable amounts
► Dealing with information requests up and down the supply chain
REACH, like many environmental regulations, has many business aspects, and the workshop will cover some of those business implications.

The workshop will be held on Thursday 3rd April, from 10am to 1pm, at Briar Court Hotel, Huddersfield (Briar Court Hotel, Halifax Road, Birchencliffe, Huddersfield, HD3 3NT, www.briarcourthotel.co.uk, tel 01484 519902).

To pre-book your place, please email janet@ttenvironmental.co.uk. There will be a small charge of £25 to cover hire of the room and lunch (please bring cash or cheque on the day, made payable to Albion Dyestuffs Ltd).

The REACH Self-Help group is currently made up of Albion Dyestuffs Ltd, Stephenson Group Ltd, and TT Environmental Ltd, and we have been meeting regularly to try and work out what REACH will really mean for our own businesses, and for everyone in the chemical supply chain*.

Our workshop won’t be covering the nuts and bolts of how to pre-register, but this will be discussed at Yorkshire Chemical Focus’s REACH network meeting on 29th April 2008, and we recommend that everyone thinking of attending our workshop (and all our REACH-liable contacts) attends this YCF meeting. For details on booking the YCF REACH network meeting, contact Tim Hird on tim@ycf.org.uk .

*(In TT Environmental Ltd’s case, all of our clients are directly involved in REACH as manufacturers or end-users, so it’s in our interests to make sure our clients and potential clients get through REACH safely).
News article 1st March 2008