California Introduces Proposal to Strengthen its Metal-Containing Jewelry Law

California has introduced a bill to revise its Metal-Containing Jewelry law. Published in February 2019, SB 647 will make a number of important changes if accepted. These include:

Adopting federal standards for lead content in children’s jewelry
New definition of age limit for children’s jewelry to be similar (but not identical) to the Canadian Children’s Jewelry Regulations (SOR/2018-82)
Establishing soluble cadmium for surface coatings on children’s jewelry
Strengthening the lead content limit for certain materials to align with those under entry 63 to Annex XVII of Registration, Evaluation, Authorization and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH) in the European Union



Requirements include:

Children’s jewelry (15 years and younger):
≤ 90 ppm lead (surface coatings)
≤ 100 ppm lead (accessible components)
≤ 75 ppm soluble cadmium (surface coatings)
≤ 300 ppm cadmium (components)
Body piercing jewelry – materials to be used:
A dense low-porosity plastic, including, but not limited to, Tygon, polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE), if the plastic contains no intentionally added lead
Niobium (Nb)
Solid 14 karat or higher white or yellow nickel-free gold
Solid platinum
Surgical implant grade of titanium
All other jewelry – materials to be used:
Adhesive
Elastic, fabric, ribbon, or string with no intentionally added lead
Glass, ceramics, or crystal decorative components, including cat’s eyes, cubic zirconia, including cubic zirconium (CZ), and cloisonné
Gemstones that are cut and polished for ornamental purposes, excluding aragonite, bayldonite, boleite, cerussite, crocoite, ekanite, linarite, mimetite, phosgenite, samarskite, vanadinite and wulfenite
Karat gold
Natural decorative materials, including amber, bone, coral, feathers, fur, horn, shell or wood in their natural state and no treated with lead
Natural or cultured pearls
Platinum group metals (platinum, palladium, iridium, ruthenium, rhodium and osmium)
Stainless or surgical steels
Sterling silver
or
≤ 200 ppm lead (plastics or rubber, including acrylic, polystyrene, plastic beads and stones, and polyvinyl chloride (PVC))
≤ 500 ppm lead (electroplated metals, unplated metals unless otherwise listed, dyes or surface coatings, and other materials)



Originally enacted as the Lead-Containing Jewelry Law in 2006, it derives from a Proposition 65 (Prop 65) consent judgment involving several major retailers. The original law included, inter alia, a specific set of materials for body piercing jewelry and it created three categories of material – Classes 1, 2 and 3. These have been deleted in the law that has recently been introduced.



Since its original introduction the Lead-Containing Jewelry Law has undergone a number of changes, not least the change of name to reflect its much broader scope.



The bill is now in its third reading. Stakeholders should be aware the wording may change as it progresses.



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This release was published on openPR.