McCarthy

ORDER GRANTING DEFENDANTS’ MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT AND DENYING PLAINTIFFS’ MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT

INTRODUCTION

The Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act, under which the Environmental Protection Agency can regulate pesticides, requires that active ingredients be disclosed on pesticide labels. Inert ingredients are not subject to the same requirements. For a decade plaintiffs Center for' Environmental Health, Beyond Pesticides' and Physicians for Social Responsibility have urged defendants Environmental Protection Agency and its Administrator 1 , (collectively “EPA”), to require the disclosure of 371 inert • ingredients on the labels of pesticide products. They previously filed an initial rulemak- *1039 mg petition and two related lawsuits and now challenge the EPA’s May 2014 decision that effectively denied their petition. Both sides have moved for summary judgment.

The plaintiffs are understandably frustrated that the rulemaking process they initiated almost ten years ago has generated no concrete action. They may well be on the right side of the policy argument. But the EPA is not mandated to require disclosure of the inert ingredients at issue. Its…