Plastic Additives Database: 435 Substances with CAS Numbers, Functions, Dosage and Regulatory Status

This plastic additives database lists 435 substances used as additives in plastics, each with its CAS number, its function, the polymers it is used in, a typical dosage and its status under EU, US and international chemical rules. Additive names are a minefield of trade names, synonyms and near-identical registry numbers, so where do you start? You start with the attribute you already hold: a number on a specification, a family name in a data sheet, a polymer, a restriction you have to clear, or a level in phr.

Every record is checked against primary sources; see our methodology and fact-checking process.

The same 435 records open five ways, and the five browse axes below follow that order: by family, by CAS number, by polymer, by regulatory status and by dosage. Each axis filters the one master table rather than splitting the data into separate lists, so a search for a plasticizer authorised for EU food contact at 20 wt% in flexible PVC is three filters on the same rows.

Each record carries eleven groups of fields, from identity through to commercial grades, and every value in it comes from a primary source that the record names. Where a value could not be confirmed against the authority for it, the record says so instead of carrying a number. All 435 rows are present from day one and the full profiles behind them publish in priority order. The directory grows with each regulatory change, and the manufacturers named in the records are listed with their brand lines further down this page. Families, functions and the difference between an additive and a polymer production aid are explained on the plastic additives reference.

Table 1. The plastic additives database at a glance, by field coverage.

Counts are generated from the published dataset. "Live today" rises as profiles publish; the table below always shows all 435 substances.

What Is in the Plastic Additives Database?#

A plastic additive substance is a chemical intentionally added to a plastic to achieve a physical or chemical effect during processing or in the final article, and intended to remain in it (Regulation (EU) No 10/2011, Article 3(7)). That legal test, not a marketing category, decides what earns a record here. The directory collects the named chemicals and grades that pass it: individual substances with a registry identity, a function inside a polymer and a documented level of use, rather than the classes those substances belong to.

The industry reference point for what is actually in commerce is the mapping exercise of the ECHA Plastic Additives Initiative, which parses to 418 rows of high-volume additives used in the EU, 127 of them pigments. This directory covers 435 substances across 31 of the 43 additive families in 7 functional groups. A family hub explains the class and its mechanism; a substance page carries the identity, the numbers and the legal status. How does a named chemical differ from the family it belongs to? The family is the answer to a formulation question, the substance is the answer to a specification question, and the 43 families and 7 functional groups are explained on plastic additives.

Which data fields every substance record carries#

Every record in the plastic additives database carries the same 11 field groups, in the same order, starting with identity: IUPAC name, abbreviation, CAS number, EC number, molecular formula, molecular weight and the synonyms and trade names the substance trades under. The eleven groups run in this fixed order:

1. Identity: IUPAC name, abbreviation, CAS number, EC number, molecular formula, molecular weight, synonyms and trade names.
2. Function and mechanism: what the substance does in a polymer and how it does it.
3. Physical and chemical properties: melting point, density, solubility, volatility.
4. Polymers and typical dosage: each host polymer with its own level in phr, wt% or ppm.
5. Applications: the parts and markets the substance is used in.
6. Performance data: measured results such as oxidation induction time or weathering hours.
7. Interactions: synergies and antagonisms with other additives.
8. Regulatory status matrix: nine jurisdictional fields, each dated.
9. Health and safety: the GHS classification and its notification source.
10. Alternatives: substances recorded as replacements for this one.
11. Commercial grades and manufacturers: trade names mapped to the producers that sell them.

Coverage is stated, not assumed: 427 of the 435 substances have a single CAS number, 410 carry an EC number, 392 a molecular formula and 373 a molecular weight, while 256 records give at least one dosage tied to a named polymer, 343 name alternatives and 245 carry a GHS summary. The 7 substances with no single CAS number are polymers, waxes or UVCB mixtures that no one registry number describes, and they are named in the footnote of the master table.

Which substances the directory includes and which it leaves out#

The directory covers substances used as additives in plastics: thermoplastics, thermosets used as plastics, compounds and masterbatch. A substance qualifies when it is intentionally added to the polymer, performs a physical or chemical function there and is intended to remain in the finished article. Grades count as separate records when the grade, not the chemistry, is what a formulator specifies, which is why reaction masses and commercial blends such as Joncryl ADR and Millad ClearX 9000 hold records of their own.

Four classes of chemical are excluded by the same legal test that admits the rest. Monomers, curing reactants, polymerization catalysts and impurities are not additives under Regulation (EU) No 10/2011, Article 3(8), and impurities and non-intentionally added substances are recorded as NIAS, not as additives. The topical border is narrower still: this reference covers additives for plastics only, so concrete admixtures, paints, coatings and inks, adhesives, fuel and lubricating-oil additives, food and feed additives, cosmetics, textile finishing chemicals, paper chemicals and pure rubber chemistry stay outside it. A chemical that is also a concrete admixture, a paint additive, a fuel additive or a food additive is recorded here only for what it does inside a plastic. That border has been applied case by case: 93 substances were examined and rejected as out of scope.

Are pigments, fillers and polymer production aids in the directory?#

Pigments and fillers are in the directory and polymerization catalysts are not: 68 of the 435 substances are colorants and 12 are fillers, while catalysts, emulsifiers and chain-transfer agents count as polymer production aids under EU law. Pigments belong in an additives list because ECHA's own mapping exercise counts them, with 127 of its 418 rows being pigments. Fillers earn records for the same reason: calcium carbonate at 20 to 40 wt% in polypropylene changes the material more than most stabilizers do. A catalyst residue, by contrast, is classed as a polymer production aid, not an additive, because Article 3(8) of Regulation (EU) No 10/2011 places it outside the definition.

The Complete List: All 435 Plastic Additive Substances#

The complete list below holds all 435 plastic additive substances with their abbreviation, CAS number, family, function, typical dosage, main host polymers and regulatory flags. Rows are sorted by functional group, then by family in canonical site order, then by substance name, and every value is read from the record itself.

Rows whose full profile is not published yet still carry the identity, the family and the regulatory flags; the substance name becomes a link on the day that profile goes live. Empty fields read "not recorded", which means the value has not been verified against a primary source, never that the substance is unregulated or unused at that level.

Footnote: 7 substances have no single CAS number because they are polymers, waxes or UVCB mixtures: acetylated monoglycerides, Fischer-Tropsch wax, Fusabond, Joncryl ADR, Millad ClearX 9000, Pelestat and polycarbodiimide. Verified coverage is 435 of 435: the Pigment Blue 36 profile was released on 25 September 2026, when an entry that had been filed under the wrong name, Pigment Green 26, was corrected to its real identity.

The same 435 rows can be filtered five ways: by family, by CAS number, by polymer, by regulatory status and by dosage.

Browse Plastic Additives by Family#

The 435 substances in the plastic additives database belong to 31 of the 43 additive families, and those families sit in the same 7 functional groups used across this site: property modifiers, fillers and reinforcements, flame retardants and other functional additives, stabilizers, colorants and masterbatch, processing modifiers, and surface and optical modifiers. The family filter is the fastest way in when the property gap is known but the chemistry is not, because it narrows 435 rows to between 1 and 68 in one click.

Twelve of the 43 families carry no substance profile yet: reinforcing fibres, masterbatch, mold release agents, dispersing agents, barrier additives, tracers, biodegradation additives, tribological additives, anti-scratch additives, matting agents, light diffusers and cling agents. Their hubs are published and explain the class, its mechanism and its typical level, but the substance layer beneath them is still being built, and the table below shows that gap rather than hiding it.

Table 3. The family index: every additive family with its group, substance count, example substances and typical level range.

Which additive families have the most substances#

Colorants are the largest family in the directory with 68 substances, followed by plasticizers and flame retardants with 56 each, UV stabilizers with 45 and antioxidants with 43. The six largest families, in substance count, are:

1. Colorants, 68 substances, including titanium dioxide, carbon black and Pigment Blue 15.
2. Plasticizers, 56 substances, including DEHP, DINP, DOTP and DINCH.
3. Flame retardants, 56 substances, including aluminum trihydrate, ammonium polyphosphate and antimony trioxide.
4. UV stabilizers, 45 substances, including Tinuvin 326, UV-328 and Chimassorb 944.
5. Antioxidants, 43 substances, including Irganox 1010, Irgafos 168 and BHT.
6. PVC heat stabilizers, 23 substances, including butyltin mercaptide and dibasic lead phosphite.

These five families dominate the count for one reason: they are the families in which the individual substance, not the class, is what a formulator writes on a specification and what a regulator restricts by name. A colour is specified as Pigment Blue 15, never as "a blue pigment", and Annex XVII of REACH names DEHP, DBP, BBP and DIBP individually rather than restricting phthalates as a group. Substance counts describe the depth of this directory, not market share: share of global additive consumption by weight is a different figure and belongs to the family and root guides.

Browse Plastic Additives by CAS Number#

A CAS Registry Number identifies one chemical substance unambiguously, and 427 of the 435 substances in this directory carry one; the remaining 7 are polymers, waxes or UVCB mixtures that no single registry number describes. The number, not the name, is the primary key of every record, because names travel badly between a supplier data sheet, a customs declaration and a regulatory annex while a registry number does not.

Where a substance trades under more than one registry number, the record gives the primary number first and the alternative with its reason, written as "primary; also X (reason)": DINCH is recorded as 166412-78-8 with 474919-59-0 for the US product on the TSCA inventory. The same convention keeps EC numbers, which 410 records carry, tied to the substance rather than to one of its salts or isomers.

Sorting the master table by the CAS column turns the directory into a registry-number index, and 427 rows resolve directly from a number on an incoming specification to a family, a function and a regulatory status. One number at a time can also be resolved in the plastic additive CAS number lookup, which returns the same record fields for a single query.

Why a CAS number lookup goes wrong: DOP, DOTP and dual CAS numbers#

Most wrong CAS numbers in additive specifications come from four identity traps: trade shorthand that means a different chemical, a name that implies the wrong chemical class, a substance registered under two numbers, and one substance sold under several trade names. Each trap produces a specific, repeatable error, and the four together account for the majority of identity mismatches between a purchase order and a compliance file.

The first trap is the costliest, because "DOP" and "dioctyl phthalate" in trade usage mean DEHP, CAS 117-81-7, and never DNOP, CAS 117-84-0, yet the two sit under different Annex XVII entries: DEHP under entry 51 and DNOP under entry 52. The second trap runs the other way. DOTP, also sold as DEHT, is a terephthalate at CAS 6422-86-2, so the ortho-phthalate restriction of entry 51 does not reach it, and calling it "a phthalate" in a compliance file invites a restriction that does not apply.

Dual registry numbers and multiple trade names are bookkeeping problems rather than chemical ones, but they break automated screening. Only the mappings recorded in the source data sheets are written into a record, never an equivalence inferred from similar performance claims, and equivalent grades across suppliers are resolved in the plastic additive trade name lookup.

Browse Plastic Additives by Polymer#

The polymer filter reads the per-polymer dosage field of each record, and 256 of the 435 substances carry at least one dosage tied to a named polymer. A record does not state one level for a substance; it states a level for each host polymer, because the same chemistry works at different concentrations in different matrices. Erucamide runs at 500 to 1,200 ppm in LDPE and LLDPE film, while a plasticizer occupies 5 to 65 wt% of a flexible PVC compound, a range two orders of magnitude apart.

Polymer strings in the records are free text, with 454 distinct values across the 435 substances, most of them qualified with a process or a jurisdiction. The filter therefore ships with the 8 polymers below and is extended as the polymer vocabulary is normalised, and each host polymer has a formulation guide under additives by polymer.

Counts in the second column are generated from the normalised polymer field at build time. Where a record names a polymer but no level, the dosage cell reads "not recorded", and no value is estimated from a related grade or a neighbouring polymer.

Browse Plastic Additives by Regulatory Status#

Every record carries 9 regulatory fields, each answered for that substance and dated: REACH registration, the SVHC Candidate List, REACH Annex XIV, REACH Annex XVII, EU 10/2011 food contact, FDA 21 CFR, California Proposition 65, the Stockholm Convention with the EU POPs Regulation, and TSCA. Coverage differs by field because the underlying registers differ in scope: 386 records carry an SVHC answer, 354 an EU food-contact status, 351 a REACH registration status, 203 a US food-contact status, 130 a POPs status, 122 an Annex XVII status, 113 a TSCA status, 112 an Annex XIV status and 61 a Proposition 65 status.

A blank field means "not recorded", never "not regulated". It marks a value that has not yet been verified against the primary register, and it is the one cell type that must not be read as a compliance conclusion. Every instrument behind these columns is summarised in plastic additive regulations.

Table 6. What each of the 9 regulatory status columns means, with its instrument and an example row.

EU food contact: FCM number and specific migration limit#

A substance may be used in EU food-contact plastics only if it is on the Union list of Regulation (EU) No 10/2011, where it carries an FCM number and, in most cases, a specific migration limit. Of the 354 records with an EU food-contact status, 193 cite an FCM number. Where no substance-specific limit applies, the generic specific migration limit of 60 mg/kg and the overall migration limit of 10 mg/dm2 govern, with the overall limit expressed as 60 mg/kg for food intended for infants and young children, and a functional barrier permits a non-listed substance only below 0.01 mg/kg. The Union list and its limits are explained on EU 10/2011.

The phthalate limits show how specific these values are. Since Regulation (EU) 2023/1442, in force on 1 August 2023, DEHP carries an SML of 0.6 mg/kg, DBP 0.12 mg/kg and BBP 6 mg/kg, while DINP and DIDP share group restriction 26 at 1.8 mg/kg and group 36 sets a combined limit of 0.6 mg/kg expressed as DEHP equivalents. Not every additive in wide use is listed at all: Tinuvin 770, UV-328 and Irganox 1135 are not on the Union list, and their records say so rather than leaving the field blank. The full table of specific migration limits (SML) lists every value in the annex.

US food contact: the 21 CFR sections#

In the United States a plastic additive is cleared for food contact by a section of 21 CFR, by a Food Contact Notification or under the Threshold of Regulation, and 184 records in this directory cite the exact section that applies. The Threshold of Regulation exempts a substance whose dietary concentration stays below 0.5 ppb, which is why a trace additive can be used without its own listing. No record states that a substance is approved by the FDA, because the agency authorises uses and does not approve products; a record reads "authorised under 21 CFR 178.2010" or "cleared by an FCN". The sections are mapped on FDA food contact rules.

Six sections recur across the 203 records with a US status: 21 CFR 178.2010 for antioxidants and stabilizers, 178.3740 for plasticizers, 178.3297 for colorants, 177.1520 for olefin polymers, 177.1580 for polycarbonate resins and 178.3010 for adjuvants used in foamed polymers. The per-polymer limits of 21 CFR 178.2010 apply to most stabilizers, capping them at 0.5 % of the polymer unless the section specifies otherwise. For plasticizers the US position narrowed sharply: the FDA final rule of 20 May 2022 left exactly 8 ortho-phthalates authorised for food-contact use.

Restricted and listed additives: SVHC, Annex XIV, Annex XVII, POPs, Prop 65 and TSCA#

34 of the 435 substances in this directory are on the REACH Candidate List of substances of very high concern, 6 are listed under the Stockholm Convention and 17 carry a California Proposition 65 listing. Each of the three counts is verified record by record against the primary list. Annex XIV and Annex XVII appear as per-row flags only, since an entry sometimes restricts an impurity or a related salt rather than the additive itself. All 34 are profiled on the SVHC Candidate List.

The 34 Candidate List entries fall into six additive groups:

• Plasticizers: DEHP, DBP, BBP, DIBP and DCHP.
• Flame retardants: TBBPA, DBDPE, decaBDE, Dechlorane Plus, SCCP, MCCP and HBCD.
• UV stabilizers: UV-320, UV-328, UV-329, UV-350, Tinuvin 326 and Tinuvin 327.
• Colorants: lead chromate and the cadmium pigments.
• Heat stabilizers: three lead salts and the organotin DOTE.
• Other functions: azodicarbonamide, dicumyl peroxide, TNPP, melamine, triphenyl phosphate, TCEP, BTBPE, TBPH, DBNPG and potassium PFBS.

Restriction entries 51, 52 and 63 are explained on REACH Annex XVII restrictions. Entry 51 caps DEHP, DBP, BBP and DIBP at 0.1 % by weight in all articles since 7 July 2020, entry 52 covers DINP, DIDP and DNOP in mouthable toys and childcare articles only, so DINP is not banned in the EU, and entry 63 limits lead in PVC to below 0.1 % from 29 November 2024, with recovered rigid PVC allowed up to 1.5 % until 28 May 2033. Sunset dates for the additives that reached the REACH Annex XIV authorisation list sit in the Annex XIV field of each record.

Six substances in the directory are listed under the Stockholm Convention, each with its annex and decision:

• HBCD, Annex A, decision SC-6/13, 2013.
• SCCP, 2017.
• decaBDE, decision SC-8/10, 2017.
• Dechlorane Plus, decision SC-11/10, 2023.
• UV-328, decision SC-11/11, 2023, the first non-halogenated plastic additive listed as a POP.
• MCCP, Annex A, COP-12, 2025.

For UV-328 the EU set unintentional-trace limits of 100 mg/kg from 4 August 2025, 10 mg/kg from 2027 and 1 mg/kg from 2029; for MCCP the EU delegated regulation C(2026) 6262 is adopted but not yet in force. The six listings are traced on POPs in plastics.

Seventeen substances carry a Proposition 65 listing, led by three with dated cancer entries:

• DEHP, cancer, 1 January 1988.
• Antimony trioxide, cancer, 1 October 1990.
• Carbon black and titanium dioxide, listed as airborne, unbound particles of respirable size.

The remainder are BBP, DBP, DINP, DIDP, the cadmium pigments, lead chromate, SCCP, MCCP, TBBPA, TCEP, TDCPP and molybdenum trioxide, while DIBP and DCHP are not listed, and DOTP, DINCH, TOTM, DINP and DIDP are not substances of very high concern. The listing dates and safe-harbour levels are on Proposition 65. In the United States the risk evaluations are on TSCA and plastic additives, where the final evaluations for BBP, DBP, DCHP, DEHP and DIBP published on 6 January 2026 (91 FR 373) are recorded per substance, and one substance can be checked against all of these registers with the additive regulatory status checker.

How Much of Each Additive Is Used? Dosage in the Directory#

Dosage in this directory is recorded in the unit the industry actually uses for that polymer: parts per hundred resin (phr) for PVC and rubber, weight percent for most thermoplastics, and parts per million for trace additives such as slip agents and reheat additives. The three units answer three different questions:

• phr states parts of additive per 100 parts of resin, so a PVC recipe adds up to more than 100 and each ingredient can be changed without recalculating the others.
• wt% states the share of the finished compound, which is how thermoplastic formulations, migration limits and cost-in-use are normally expressed.
• ppm states parts per million of the compound, the workable unit for additives dosed below 0.1 wt%, such as slip agents and PET reheat additives.

Converting between them is arithmetic, not judgement: wt% equals phr for that ingredient divided by the total phr of the formulation, multiplied by 100. The conversion rules are on PHR (parts per hundred resin).

Every dosage on this page is quoted with its unit and its host polymer, and no recorded value is converted into another unit in the prose. A flexible PVC compound carries 5 to 65 wt% plasticizer and 1 to 5 % stabilizer of the formulation; Irganox 1010 runs at 0.05 to 0.4 wt% and Irgafos 168 at 0.05 to 0.2 wt% in polyolefins; slip agents sit at 500 to 1,200 ppm in LDPE and LLDPE film; and HALS reach 0.05 to 1.0 wt% in thick sections. A recorded level can be converted for a specific formulation with the additive dosage and cost-in-use calculator.

Where Each Substance Profile Gets Its Values#

Every value in a substance profile carries the source it came from, and the source is named beside the value: the instrument or register for a regulatory status, a chemical registry for identity, a standard for a test criterion, and a named data sheet or study for a dosage range. Where two sources disagree, the primary text settles it, and where no primary text does, both values appear with their sources.

A value that could not be confirmed against the authority for it is labelled as unverified rather than printed as fact, so a reader can see which fields are settled and which are still open. No page on this site carries a named expert or a credential claim, because the work is editorial rather than personal: the byline is the PlasticAdditives.net Editorial Team, and independence, sourcing and corrections are set out in our editorial policy.

Which primary sources the records cite#

The records cite six classes of primary source: PubChem for identity and hazard notifications, ECHA for registration and Candidate List status, EUR-Lex for EU regulations, the eCFR for the US food-contact sections, OEHHA for Proposition 65 and the Stockholm Convention decisions for persistent organic pollutants. Each class answers a different field group:

• PubChem supplies the IUPAC name, formula, molecular weight and the GHS notification profile.
• ECHA CHEM supplies the registration status, tonnage band and Candidate List entry with its date.
• EUR-Lex supplies the consolidated texts of Regulation (EU) No 10/2011, REACH Annex XIV and Annex XVII and the POPs Regulation (EU) 2019/1021.
• The eCFR supplies the 21 CFR parts 177 and 178 sections and their concentration caps.
• OEHHA supplies the Proposition 65 listing, its endpoint and its date.
• Stockholm Convention decisions supply the annex, the decision number and the exemptions.

Manufacturer technical data sheets supply grade-level values that no register holds, such as a recommended level for one trade grade in one polymer. Outbound links to these sources sit in each record rather than in the running prose of this page.

How conflicts between sources are resolved#

When two sources disagree, the newer official source wins: an Official Journal text, an ECHA entry, the eCFR, the OEHHA list or a Stockholm Convention decision overrides anything secondary, and the record names the source the value came from. The precedence runs in one direction only, so a supplier data sheet never overrides a regulation, and nothing published here overrides a newer official text.

Identity conflicts are resolved by a different rule, because both sources are usually correct. A substance registered under two numbers is recorded as one substance with "primary; also X (reason)" rather than split into two records, which is how DINCH stays one substance with 166412-78-8 as the primary number and 474919-59-0 attached to the US product. Splitting it would produce two half-populated records and two different regulatory answers for the same chemical.

How unverified items are marked#

Anything that could not be confirmed against a primary source is marked as open rather than written as fact, and the affected field shows "not confirmed" with the reason. Those items stay listed as open, and a field stays open until a primary source resolves it, however plausible the secondary value looks.

Two open items affect this page directly. The total size of the REACH Candidate List is unconfirmed, so this page states how many of its own substances are listed and never the size of the list itself. About 30 specialty slugs carried a stale family label in an earlier export, so the family filter and the family index read the resolved records rather than that export.

How the Directory Grows: What Is Live Today#

All 435 substances appear in the table from the first day, and the full profile behind each row publishes in priority order, starting with the 58 most-searched substances. The row is the commitment; the profile is the expansion of it. Every row carries its identity, family and regulatory flags from day one, and 58 full profiles are live today, with the remainder publishing across the following months in descending search-value order.

Regulatory change, not a content calendar, sets the correction cycle. The SVHC Candidate List is updated in January and June, the Stockholm Convention adds POPs at each Conference of the Parties, the FDA and the EPA publish rules and risk evaluations, and the Official Journal publishes amendments to the food-contact and restriction annexes. Each change is reported in plastic additives news and written back into the affected records, so every page carrying the old value is corrected in the same pass rather than left to age.

Who Supplies the Substances in This Directory?#

The records name 205 manufacturers and 917 trade names, which is how a substance sold as Irganox 1010, ADK STAB AO-60 or SONGNOX 1010 resolves to one CAS number, 6683-19-8. Trade names are the working vocabulary of the industry and the main source of duplicate line items in a bill of materials, so each one is mapped to its substance record rather than treated as a product of its own. Company profiles sit in the directory of plastic additive manufacturers and suppliers.

The producers behind the largest brand lines are BASF (Irganox, Irgafos, Tinuvin, Chimassorb, Palatinol and Hexamoll DINCH), Clariant (Exolit, AddWorks, Hostavin and Licocene), Songwon (SONGNOX), SI Group (ETHANOX, WESTON, ANOX and POLYBOND), Adeka (ADK STAB), Syensqo (Cyasorb and Cyanox), Baerlocher (BAEROSTAB), Lanxess (DISFLAMOLL and MESAMOLL), ICL and Huber (Martinal and Magnifin). They are ranked by additive sales on largest plastic additive companies, and price guides for the traded substances are under plastic additive prices.

How Does This Directory Compare with the Other Plastic-Chemical Lists?#

This directory lists additives in commercial use in plastics, which is a much smaller set than the inventories of every chemical associated with plastics. The two kinds of list answer two different questions. An additives-in-commerce list, such as the ECHA mapping exercise with its 418 rows or the ICCA database built on it, answers which additives are actually used and at what function. A plastic-chemicals inventory answers which chemicals are associated with plastics at all, a far larger set that also holds monomers, polymer production aids, non-intentionally added substances and contaminants.

Neither list replaces the other. An inventory is the right instrument for a hazard screen across the whole material system, while an additives list is the right instrument for a formulation, a specification or a compliance file on one product. The health side of the same substances is covered on toxic plastic additives.

How many chemicals are used in plastics?#

More than 16,000 chemicals are associated with plastics and more than 4,200 of them are of concern, according to the PlastChem project led by Martin Wagner at NTNU (2024). The PlastChem report of 14 March 2024, whose count was published as 16,325 in Nature in 2025, also finds that only about 6 % of those chemicals are regulated internationally. UNEP, with the BRS Secretariat and the International Panel on Chemical Pollution, put the figure at more than 13,000 chemicals associated with plastics on 3 May 2023, of which more than 3,200 have hazardous properties of concern. Wiesinger, Wang and Hellweg at ETH Zürich counted more than 10,000 substances in Environmental Science and Technology in 2021, more than 2,400 of potential concern, with 901 approved for food-contact plastics somewhere in the world. Against those inventories, this directory holds 435 substances actually used as additives, a scale that matches the ECHA mapping exercise of over 400 high-volume additives in the EU.

Which plastic additive databases are public?#

Four public sources cover parts of the same ground: the ICCA Plastic Additives Database, the ECHA mapping exercise behind it, the PlastChem database and PubChem. The ICCA Plastic Additives Database, hosted at plasticscircularity.org, is searchable by CAS Registry Number, chemical name, InChIKey, function, sector and polymer type, covers additives in commerce over the past ten years, is open to registered users and carries no concentration ranges. The ECHA Plastic Additives Initiative mapping exercise is the underlying industry dataset and is mirrored by the EPA CompTox Chemicals Dashboard as the list "ECHAPLASTICS". The PlastChem database covers plastic chemicals with their hazard data rather than additives in commerce. PubChem holds identity and hazard notifications for individual substances and is the identity source cited by the records here. What this directory adds to those four is a page per substance, a dosage per host polymer and a status per jurisdiction in one record.

What is the most harmful chemical in plastic?#

No single chemical in plastics holds that title: the substances regulators have restricted most severely are the low-molecular-weight ortho-phthalates, lead stabilizers and pigments, and the six additives listed as persistent organic pollutants. The ortho-phthalates DEHP, DBP, BBP and DIBP fall under REACH Annex XVII entry 51, lead compounds in PVC under entry 63 with lead chromate on Annex XIV, and HBCD, decaBDE, SCCP, MCCP, Dechlorane Plus and UV-328 under the Stockholm Convention. Harm depends on the substance, the exposure route and the concentration, and each record states the classifications and listings that exist rather than a ranking.