U.S. regulators said that D4, a chemical used to make silicone goods from solar panels to cosmetics, may harm women’s fertility and damage aquatic and land animals.
The Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Sept. 17 draft risk evaluation concluded that D4—formally known as octamethylcyclotetrasiloxane—presents “unreasonable” risks to human health in almost two dozen uses and to the environment in seven cases. The agency found no such risk in 37 other applications.
