Tin stabilizers are essential for producing durable, high-quality rigid vinyl products—critical for applications such as clean drinking water delivery systems, construction materials, and other indispensable everyday uses. While flexible vinyl products – such as those typically used in medical applications – do not utilize tin stabilizer, rigid vinyl products vital to infrastructure and housing development depend on it.

The Environmental Performance Agreement for Tin Stabilizers (EPA) is a longstanding collaboration between the Vinyl Institute of Canada and Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC) that formalizes a set of procedures that minimize the risk of tin stabilizers entering the environment. ECCC and VIC have just entered into their fifth five-year agreement.

The EPA, as implemented, ensures worker safety and community well-being while ensuring its principal objective, which is to protect the environment. By reducing the potential for contamination at every stage, participating facilities actively preserve ecosystems while maintaining high operational standards.

Our commitment is clear: to uphold the EPA, protect the environment first, ensure safe handling practices, and enable the vinyl industry to continue providing vital products that support both people and the planet.

The four main documents that make up the framework of the EPA can be accessed below. These include the actual agreement, the Guideline that the agreement implements, the verification protocol used by ECCC and VIC to ensure facilities have executed the agreement, and a verification guidance document that helps to streamline the verification process.