Printer Ready Version

Overview

Assurance of
Our Compliance

Click to View
Testing Results

As of February 2009, the United States federal government adopted a series of regulations under the Consumer Products Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA). These national standards now limit the lead content in "children's metal jewelry". In addition, various other states, most notably California, also have enacted limits on lead content in jewelry for the general public.

A discussion of TierraCast's compliance with the various state and federal standards, including links to lead content test results, is available below.

Federal

The CPSIA was developed, in part, to protect children from lead in jewelry products marketed directly to young children. This law went into effect in February 2009 and currently limits the lead content in "children's jewelry" to 300 ppm lead. This standard became effective August 2009 and is scheduled to remain until August 2011 when the standard drops to 100 ppm lead (if determined feasible).

CPSIA also specifically prohibits consideration of plating or painting as a means of preventing access to high levels of lead in a product. "Children" are defined as 12 years of age or younger.

California

Beginning in 1986, the State of California led the nation in adopting legislation to protect the public from toxic chemicals and materials in consumer products. Proposition 65 established the basis upon which the State Attorney General's Office successfully sued major retailers for failure to properly label potentially hazardous jewelry items marketed to children. Building on this precedent, the State of California passed legislation that became CA Health & Safety Code Section 25214.1. The State of California has established a web page, "Lead in Jewelry", that provides details of the law and commentary about testing and compliance imposing legal limits on lead content in jewelry marketed to children as well as to the general public. As of September 1, 2007, those limits are currently in force for "children's jewelry" and came into effect for lead content in jewelry to the general public as of March 1, 2008.

As a state law, this legislation only covers products manufactured, shipped to or sold in California, yet it has set the tone for other states to consider, and usually pass, substantially similar legislation, often using the same limits for lead content. The California law currently sets the most stringent limits in the nation by phasing in requirements that sets maximum lead content levels at .06% (600 ppm) for "children's jewelry" and between 1.5% and 10% for all other types. The new CPSIA standard of 300 ppm lead content for children's jewelry now supersedes the California regulations but the other limits are notable in their application to "adult" jewelry.

While the new California law regulates lead content in a variety of materials, the aspects relating to cast pewter jewelry components can be summarized as follows:

  • As of September 1, 2007, the lead content allowed in "children's jewelry" is limited to no greater than .06% (600 ppm).
  • As of March 1, 2008, any electroplated metal jewelry component may not exceed a lead level of 10% (100,000 ppm).
  • As of March 1, 2008, any unplated metal jewelry component may not exceed a lead level of 1.5% (15,000 ppm).
  • As of September 1, 2009, any electroplated metal jewelry component may not exceed a lead level of 6% (60,000 ppm).

This legislation also addresses the limit placed on the use of crystal decorative components like those manufactured by Swarovski. These limits are addressed in the initial FAQ section of the Lead in Jewelry info available through the State of California.

States other than California

As mentioned in the Introduction, other states have either passed or are currently considering legislation limiting lead content in jewelry, most notably in jewelry marketed to children. Most of these states appear to be using the limit of 600 ppm lead, adopted by the State of California. The most notable exception to this trend is Vermont, where legislation has been introduced, though not passed, that would limit lead to less than 10 ppm. The recent passage of the CPSIA has created a federal standard that should supersede state regulations. This expectation has been seriously challenged by the State of Illinois that has passed labeling standards for "children’s jewelry" that now requires any item with more than 40 ppm lead to carry a warning label. More information on this development can be found in this article by National Jeweler.

TierraCast is unable to provide conclusive summaries of these various state efforts and can only offer links to some of the primary sources of information for your own research.

(If you are unfamiliar with the measurement system used in the expression of lead content please see Measuring Metal Content.)

TierraCast Compliance

Since the introduction of the cast components product line in 1991, TierraCast has used Britannia, a pewter alloy formulated to contain no more than .05% (500 ppm) lead. In fact, even before the current CPSIA regulations were imposed, we insisted on receiving shipments from the various suppliers of metal destined for our manufacturing processes that fall well below the 500 ppm level. TierraCast continues to move toward compliance with the August 300 ppm level and is currently requiring its metal suppliers to provide metal below 100 ppm lead in a movement toward early compliance with the proposed 100 ppm lead limits set to take effect in August 2011. Each of these lots is accompanied by a certification of the alloy content. A table of those shipments is available for your review.

In support we offer the results from two independent test facilities. These reports, available as .pdf files, confirm that the alloy TierraCast uses in the manufacturing of its cast pewter components tests well below the 600 ppm limit for "children's jewelry", set by the recent California legislation and proposed under the developing US Federal standard.