Chesar 2.0 to be released in June

ECHA/NA/12/13
News alert
Media enquiries: ECHA Press

After a successful first round of testing by industry, ECHA confirms that a new version of the Chemical Safety Assessment and Reporting Tool, Chesar, will be released by the end of June 2012.

Helsinki, 18 April 2012 –Chesar 2.0 will be released in three steps. The step-wise release of functionalities will support the stability of the tool with a view to the 2013 registration deadline and beyond. The timing and order of the releases aim to meet the needs of the registrants for the 2013 registration deadline.

Improvements to the previous version include, for example, more transparency in determining the scope of exposure assessment, an updated version of the Targeted Risk Assessment developed by ECETOC (TRA), simplified risk characterisation and an improved user interface. To enable the long-term maintenance of the application, the code itself has also been largely reworked. A first round of testing by external users has demonstrated the technical stability and user friendliness of the application.

Release schedule

Chesar 2.0 will be released at the end of June 2012. This release will include the functionalities for carrying out chemical safety assessments (CSAs) based on a IUCLID 5.4 dataset and to generate chapters 9 and 10 of the chemical safety report (CSR). This release will not yet contain a tool to estimate exposure for consumer uses. Also, the functionality for automatically generating exposure scenarios for communication will not be included.

Chesar 2.1 is planned for release in early autumn 2012. This release will include the exposure estimation tool for consumers developed by ECETOC (TRA). Depending on the progress made in CEFIC's EScom project, the standard phrases library to prepare for the generation of exposure scenarios for communication may also be included in the Chesar 2.1 release.

Finally, Chesar 2.2 will add the functionalities related to the generation of exposure scenarios for communication. This release is foreseen for late 2012 or for the beginning of 2013.

In parallel, the current CSR generator (IUCLID plug-in) will be updated to enable the export of information on uses from Chesar 2.0 to IUCLID 5.4 and the generation of the full CSR by combining information from IUCLID 5.4 and Chesar 2.0. This piece of updated software is planned for release in Q3 of 2012.

Perspective beyond 2013

ECHA will maintain and further develop Chesar in 2013 and beyond. Current ideas include further integration with IUCLID, broadening the assessment capacity in terms of substance types, building the links to a broader range of exposure tools and/or developing functionalities particularly useful for downstream user tasks.

What is Chesar?

ECHA's Chemical Safety Assessment and Reporting Tool, Chesar, enables registrants to carry out their safety assessments in a structured, harmonised and efficient way. This includes the importing of substance-related data directly from IUCLID, describing the uses of the substance, identifying risk management measures if needed, carrying out exposure estimates and demonstrating the control of risk. Based on this, Chesar generates the chemical safety report and the exposure scenarios for communication in electronic exchange format and as a text document. Chesar was released for the first time in May 2010 and is available at present in its 1.2 version, released in August 2011.