Table of Contents
- What Is REACH SVHC Screening?
- When Should You Screen for REACH SVHCs?
- A new Candidate List update
- A new product or component
- A material or supplier change
- A customer or compliance review
- What Data Do You Need for SVHC Screening?
- How to Perform REACH SVHC Screening
- 1. Start with the Current Candidate List
- 2. Identify Substances in Your Products
- 3. Map the Substance to the Relevant Article
- 4. Assess the Relevant Concentration
- 5. Identify All Affected Products
- 6. Determine What Action Is Required
- What Happens When a New SVHC Is Added?
- Why Supplier Declarations Alone Are Not Enough
- How to Manage SVHC Screening Across a Large Product Portfolio
- What Evidence Should You Keep?
- REACH SVHC Screening Checklist
- How Regilient Supports REACH SVHC Screening
When a new substance is added to the REACH Candidate List, the first question for a manufacturer is not simply “Is this substance an SVHC?”
It is:
Which of our products, components and articles are affected, and what do we need to do about them?
That is the purpose of REACH SVHC screening.
A practical screening process connects Candidate List substances with material, component and product data so that compliance teams can identify affected articles, assess the relevant REACH obligations and maintain supporting evidence.
What Is REACH SVHC Screening?
REACH SVHC screening is the process of comparing substances present in products, materials, components or articles against the REACH Candidate List of Substances of Very High Concern (SVHCs).
Screening helps manufacturers determine:
- Whether a Candidate List substance is present
- Where it occurs
- Which articles or components contain it
- Which finished products are affected
- Whether further REACH obligations need to be assessed
It is particularly important when the Candidate List changes, because a substance added to the list can create new obligations for affected articles.
For the broader regulatory framework, see the Complete Guide to EU REACH Regulation.
When Should You Screen for REACH SVHCs?
SVHC screening should be triggered by regulatory and product changes.
A new Candidate List update
When ECHA adds a substance to the Candidate List, determine whether that substance exists in your products or materials.
You can follow the latest changes through Regilient's REACH Candidate List Updates.
A new product or component
New products, components and materials should be screened before they enter the compliance baseline.
A material or supplier change
A change in:
- Supplier
- Material
- Component
- Part revision
- Formulation
- Manufacturing process
can invalidate previous substance information.
A customer or compliance review
Customer requests and internal audits can also reveal gaps in existing SVHC assessments.
The important principle is:
Do not treat SVHC screening as a one-time exercise. Reassess when regulatory or product information changes.
What Data Do You Need for SVHC Screening?
Effective screening depends on being able to connect substance information to the actual article or component.
A useful data chain looks like this:
Product → Component → Article/Material → Substance → Concentration → Supplier Evidence
Relevant evidence may include:
- Full Material Declarations
- Supplier SVHC declarations
- Safety Data Sheets where applicable
- Material composition information
- Test reports
- IPC-1752A or other structured declarations
A statement such as “REACH compliant” is not necessarily enough to identify which substances were assessed or which product revisions the declaration covers.
For more on validating supplier information, see Why REACH SVHC Declarations from Suppliers Fail Compliance Checks and How to Validate Them.
How to Perform REACH SVHC Screening
1. Start with the Current Candidate List
Use the current ECHA Candidate List as the regulatory reference.
Record the version or date used for the screening so that the assessment remains traceable.
Do not rely on an old supplier spreadsheet or historical declaration as the regulatory baseline.
2. Identify Substances in Your Products
Next, identify the substances present in the materials and components used in your products.
For example:
Component A → Material X → Substance Y → CAS/EC identifier → Concentration
The substance information can then be compared against the Candidate List.
3. Map the Substance to the Relevant Article
Finding an SVHC somewhere in the supply chain is not enough.
You need to establish where the substance occurs.
For complex products, this means maintaining a relationship between:
Product → Component/Article → Material → Substance
This article-level mapping is important when determining whether specific REACH obligations apply.
4. Assess the Relevant Concentration
For applicable obligations concerning SVHCs in articles, the 0.1% w/w threshold is an important part of the assessment.
The screening process therefore needs to establish:
- Is the substance present?
- In which article?
- At what concentration?
- Is the concentration information reliable?
- Which products contain that article?
Finding a substance without understanding its concentration and article context does not provide a complete compliance assessment.
5. Identify All Affected Products
Once an SVHC is identified in a component or article, map that component to the products that contain it.
For example:
SVHC X
→ Component 123
→ Product A
→ Product B
→ Product C
This is where portfolio-level screening becomes particularly valuable.
Instead of asking teams to manually review every product after a regulatory change, the organisation can identify the affected product population first.
6. Determine What Action Is Required
An SVHC finding does not automatically mean that a product is banned.
The next step is to determine which obligations may apply.
Depending on the circumstances, this can include:
- Article 33 communication
- Article 7(2) notification assessment
- SCIP reporting assessment
- Supplier follow-up
- Customer communication
- Additional documentation or review
For example, Article 33 establishes communication requirements for relevant articles containing Candidate List substances above the applicable threshold.
For detailed information on the different REACH lists and their obligations, see REACH Lists: Candidate, Authorisation and Restriction Explained.
What Happens When a New SVHC Is Added?
A new Candidate List entry should trigger an impact assessment, not simply an announcement.
A practical workflow is:
New SVHC added
↓
Compare against substance/material data
↓
Identify affected components/articles
↓
Map affected products
↓
Assess concentration
↓
Determine applicable obligations
↓
Update compliance evidence
↓
Communicate where required
This turns a regulatory update into a product-level action plan.
Why Supplier Declarations Alone Are Not Enough
Supplier declarations are important evidence, but they should not be confused with the screening process itself.
A supplier declaration may tell you that a component complies with REACH, but your compliance team may still need to determine:
- Which Candidate List version was assessed
- Which substances were considered
- Which part number is covered
- Which product revision is covered
- Whether the declaration is current
- Whether the information applies to the relevant article
Think of it this way:
Supplier declaration = evidence
SVHC screening = assessment
A reliable compliance process needs both.
For the detailed supplier-validation problem, use the dedicated REACH SVHC Supplier Declaration Validation article rather than duplicating that topic here.
How to Manage SVHC Screening Across a Large Product Portfolio
Manual screening becomes difficult when a manufacturer manages hundreds or thousands of:
- Products
- Components
- Materials
- Suppliers
- BOMs
- Product revisions
The key requirement is traceability.
When a new SVHC is added, the compliance team should be able to move from:
Regulatory change
to:
Affected substance
to:
Affected component/article
to:
Affected products
to:
Required action
That is much more useful than simply maintaining a list of substances.
For electronics manufacturers, Regilient already covers the more specialised BOM-level use case in REACH Compliance for Electronics: BOM, Article 33, SCIP & FMD.
What Evidence Should You Keep?
For each screening assessment, retain enough information to explain the compliance decision.
Useful evidence includes:
- Candidate List version/date
- Screening date
- Product or part number
- Component/article
- Substance identifier
- Concentration information
- Supplier evidence
- Screening result
- Applicable obligation
- Follow-up action
The objective is a traceable chain:
Regulation → Substance → Article/Component → Product → Evidence → Decision
This makes future reassessment much easier when the Candidate List or product data changes.
REACH SVHC Screening Checklist
Before closing an SVHC screening assessment, ask:
If several answers are no, the problem may be less about obtaining another declaration and more about product-to-substance traceability.
How Regilient Supports REACH SVHC Screening
Regilient helps compliance teams connect regulatory requirements, product data and supplier information so they can identify affected products, investigate data gaps and maintain traceable compliance evidence.