September 30 is the TSCA Chemical Data Reporting deadline and it is almost here. The EPA moved it from June 30 to accommodate COVID-19 disruptions, but that grace period is nearly gone. If you import chemical substances from China above the reporting thresholds, you need to be filing right now, not reading about this next week. The penalty structure for missing this date is not something you want to discover after the fact: $37,500 per day per violation under the TSCA Section 15 civil penalty schedule. That is the statutory maximum, and it applies from the day you are in breach.
You Are Treated as a Manufacturer Even If You Do Not Make Anything
The Chemical Data Reporting rule runs under TSCA Section 8(a). Most people in chemical manufacturing already know it. What catches importers off guard is that TSCA treats importers as manufacturers for CDR purposes. If you are a US company importing a chemical substance that appears on the TSCA Inventory, you are a manufacturer under the statute. The CDR obligation applies to you exactly the same way it applies to the company running a synthesis reactor in Texas.
CDR gives the EPA the production and import volume data it needs to assess chemical risk. The 2020 cycle covers reporting years 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019. More than 7,600 chemical substances are on the current active CDR reporting list, and that universe includes a significant slice of the organic and inorganic chemical intermediates that US companies import from China in commercial quantities. The odds that none of your imports are on that list are not good.
The submission portal is EPA’s CDX (Central Data Exchange), using the e-CDRweb reporting tool. If you have never set up a CDX account and you are sitting here with a September 30 deadline, start the account registration process today. EPA’s identity verification steps take time and they will not make an exception because you left it late.
How to Calculate Whether Your Volumes Trigger the Obligation
The standard reporting threshold is 25,000 pounds per chemical substance per site per year, which is approximately 11.3 metric tonnes. That is not 25,000 lbs across all your imported chemicals combined. It is 25,000 lbs of a single chemical substance at a single facility in a given reporting year.
| Import Volume | Metric Tonnes | Pounds | Above 25,000 lb Threshold? | CDR Obligation? |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Small volume | 5 MT | ~11,023 lbs | No | No |
| Near threshold | 9 MT | ~19,842 lbs | No | No |
| Just over | 12 MT | ~26,455 lbs | Yes | Yes |
| Typical commercial | 20 MT | ~44,092 lbs | Yes | Yes |
| High volume | 50 MT | ~110,231 lbs | Yes | Yes |
Work through a concrete example. Your manufacturing facility in Ohio imported 15 metric tonnes of a specific organic chemical intermediate from a supplier in Jiangsu in 2018, and another 14 metric tonnes of the same substance in 2019. In 2018, that converts to roughly 33,069 lbs, clearing the 25,000 lb threshold. You have a CDR obligation for that substance for 2018. In 2019, 14 metric tonnes is approximately 30,865 lbs, also above threshold. Both years require reporting.
The complication arises for certain high-concern substances. Chemicals subject to specific TSCA rules, including certain persistent, bioaccumulative, and toxic (PBT) chemicals, carry a lower threshold of 2,500 pounds per year per site. If any of your Chinese imports fall into that category, the threshold is ten times more sensitive.
One more thing on threshold calculation, and this one trips people up constantly: the quantity you count is the quantity you import into the United States at the point of import, not the quantity you use, sell, or consume in production. If you import a full 20-metric-tonne container but only use 8 tonnes yourself and sell the rest, you still count the full import volume for CDR purposes. That is the most common error importers make, and it can flip a non-reporting company into a violation overnight.
What You Need to Gather Before You Can File
CDR requires more than a volume number. The reporting structure covers several data categories, and gathering them takes time that most companies seriously underestimate.
Production and import volume is the foundation: the actual imported quantity for each reporting year from 2016 through 2019, for each chemical substance above the threshold. Pull your import records from your customs broker or freight forwarder first and confirm the correct CAS numbers for each substance. Misidentifying a chemical under the wrong CAS number is a compliance error even if the volumes are perfectly correct.
Manufacturing site information covers the US facility where the chemical is received. For importers, that is typically your receiving facility or primary distribution point. You will report the facility name, address, DUNS number, and EPA facility identifier.
Processing and use information gets more detailed: EPA wants to know how the chemical is used, whether it goes into industrial processing, a formulated product, as a reactant, or into commercial distribution. You select from a defined set of use codes.
Exposure-related information covers the number of workers potentially exposed to the substance and the consumer or commercial use context. For raw material importers whose chemicals go directly into closed industrial processes, this section is generally straightforward. But it cannot be skipped.
What the Penalty Structure Actually Looks Like in Practice
TSCA Section 15 violations carry civil penalties of up to $37,500 per day per violation under the 2020 penalty schedule. EPA has discretion in penalty calculation based on gravity, good faith, compliance history, and ability to pay. But it sets the scale of your exposure clearly.
A company that failed to file CDR for three chemical substances across four reporting years, and that failure ran 60 days past the deadline, is theoretically looking at penalty exposure in the millions before any mitigation factors are applied. EPA does not routinely pursue maximum penalties for first-time filers with no history of violations, but the agency increased its TSCA enforcement activity significantly after the 2016 TSCA reform legislation. Do not assume the environment is as relaxed as it was five years ago.
What actually triggers an audit? The EPA can identify non-filers by cross-referencing CBP import data with CDR submissions. If your company appears as an importer of a specific chemical substance in customs records but has no corresponding CDR filing, that discrepancy is visible to the agency. Tips also come in from competitors and industry groups. Assuming non-compliance is invisible because EPA has limited enforcement resources is not a compliance strategy.
If you realise today that you have an obligation you have not met, the practical path is to file before September 30 even if the filing is incomplete and needs amendment afterward. A late but good-faith submission is treated more favourably than a complete failure to file.
The Common Compliance Gaps That Keep Showing Up for China Importers
Not counting imported quantity toward the threshold is the most common mistake. Some companies calculate their CDR threshold based on what they consume internally, not what they import. The threshold applies to the imported volume. If you are a distributor importing and reselling, the full imported quantity counts even though you never use it yourself.
Misidentifying a chemical under the wrong CAS number is a real risk when you are importing substances described in Chinese trade documentation with transliterated names or IUPAC nomenclature variants. Always confirm the correct CAS number through your supplier’s safety data sheet, cross-reference against the TSCA Inventory, and document that verification.
Missing subsidiary or affiliate import streams is a structural problem for companies that import through multiple legal entities. The CDR obligation attaches to each legal entity that meets the threshold criteria independently. Two entities that each independently import above 25,000 lbs of the same substance each have their own independent CDR obligation. Do not let a corporate structure assumption become an unintentional violation.
The Broader TSCA Obligations That Do Not Go Away After September 30
TSCA CDR reporting is the immediate deadline, but it sits alongside ongoing obligations that importers of Chinese chemicals carry all year round.
TSCA Section 13 requires that chemical substances imported into the United States be certified at import as either subject to TSCA and in compliance with all applicable rules and orders, or not subject to TSCA. That certification runs through the import declaration process at CBP. The importer of record is responsible for it, and a false certification is a TSCA violation on its own.
New chemical substances not yet on the TSCA Inventory require a Pre-Manufacture Notice submitted to EPA before import. If you are sourcing a novel chemical intermediate from a Chinese supplier that has never been imported into the US before, it may not be on the Inventory. Importing an unlisted substance without a PMN is a significant violation.
September 30 is your immediate action item. If your chemical imports from China cleared the 25,000 lb threshold in any of the 2016 to 2019 reporting years, the CDX filing needs to be complete and submitted before that date. Once you have cleared this cycle, build threshold tracking and CAS number verification into your standard import documentation process so the 2024 CDR cycle does not catch you short again.