California is preparing to narrow state controls on a specialized industrial chemical mixture used in semiconductor manufacturing, after Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 1306 on September 27.
The governor’s signed list identifies SB 1306 as the gamma-butyrolactone measure. The bill was chaptered as Chapter 694 of the Statutes of 2026 and is expected to take effect January 1, 2027. A California Senate process guide says most non-urgency bills take effect the following January; the Public Safety Committee’s bill analysis classified SB 1306 as non-urgent.
The new law adds Section 11112 to the Health and Safety Code. It exempts certain mixtures containing gamma-butyrolactone, commonly called GBL, from state requirements that can include permits, transaction reports, recordkeeping and advance notice to the Department of Justice.
Before the change, the committee analysis says suppliers could be required to verify a buyer’s authorization and identification, retain records, report imports or exports and notify the department 21 days before some deliveries. Separate permitting provisions covered people with direct access to the listed chemical.
The exemption is deliberately narrow. The chaptered text defines a covered mixture as two or more chemicals with GBL at 70% or less by weight or volume, plus at least one other substance that is not merely an inert carrier or impurity. A bill-of-sale requirement is also lifted only when it would apply solely because GBL is present.
That distinction matters because GBL has both legitimate industrial uses and diversion risk. The committee analysis describes it as an industrial solvent that can also be used to manufacture gamma-hydroxybutyric acid, or GHB, a central nervous system depressant. Federal regulations have exempted qualifying mixtures at the same concentration threshold since 2010, while California continued regulating GBL at any concentration.
For chipmaking, proponents told lawmakers that GBL helps keep materials dissolved in photoresist formulations used during photolithography. The analysis says suppliers had faced state permits, reporting duties and transaction holds that did not apply under the comparable federal exemption.
SB 1306 does not remove controls on pure GBL. It also does not create a grant, tax credit, workforce-training program or company-specific award. Eligibility follows the mixture’s composition and the transaction requirements affected by the new section; the statute does not name approved companies or establish a separate application timetable.
The bill’s inert-carrier language was added at the Justice Department’s request, according to the committee analysis, to reduce the risk that a nominal mixture could be used to evade controls. Mixtures above the threshold, or those that do not satisfy the statutory definition, do not receive the exemption.
Sen. Dave Cortese’s office announcement framed the measure as a competitiveness and supply-chain change for semiconductor research and manufacturing. The public record establishes the regulatory change, but it does not yet show how many California suppliers will qualify, how much compliance time or money they will save, or whether the law will produce new investment or jobs.
AI-generated conceptual illustration. It does not depict a specific facility, company, chemical product or government document.
