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BY KEITH NUTHALL

ENVIRONMENTAL health managers could be offered European Commission advice on how to help ensure European Union (EU) laws are implemented. The plan comes in a report from Brussels that admits EU environmental legislation is being widely flouted across Europe.…

By Alan Osborn

It lasted less than a day and it ended in apparent humiliation but believe it or not the launch of the European digital library Europeana has been hailed as a success story. The site collapsed on 20th November because the servers couldn’t cope with the torrent of demand but all being well it will be back before Christmas "bigger and better than ever" according to a spokesman for the European commission which is behind the idea.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Court of Justice (ECJ) has ignored European Commission calls for a legal precedent that waste-to-energy plants follow the same environmental impact assessment rules as simple waste incineration.

Brussels had called on judges to clarify the EU environmental impact assessment directive 85/37/EEC in a German case about authorising a wood gas firing combined heat-and-power plant.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Commission is to start assessing 10 product groups next year to see whether the environmental impact of their manufacture and use (including packaging) can be reduced. Under the 2005 European Union ecodesign directive, the Commission will assess whether the relevant industries are making efforts to reduce their environmental footprint, and if not, may table binding production and use standards.…

BY ALAN OSBORN

THE LONG-AWAITED European digital library Europeana was launched last Thursday (November 20) but you had to be quick off the mark to learn anything from it: within hours the site had to be closed after its on-line servers proved unable to cope with the volume of demand.…

BY MICHAEL ROSTON

ENVIRONMENTAL health policy has been a battleground during George W Bush’s eight years as US president, with advocates for a science-based approach to policymaking charging the White House with engineering policies that favored business interests at the expense of the American people.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A DRAMATIC fall in the proportion of the European Commission’s 35,000 officials who use private cars to travel from home to work has been noted in an environmental assessment.

The Commission’s eco-management and audit scheme (EMAS) concluded by this June, the proportion of staff commuting by private car had fallen to 29% (from 43% in 2004), while those using public transport ?…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE FAILURE of the European Union’s (EU) 2004 waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) directive to prevent environmental health problem has led the European Commission to propose revamping this legislation.

Brussels has admitted the existing system – aimed at forcing manufacturers to provide free disposal facilities – has proved complex to administer and included unrealistic targets.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Union scientific committee on health and environmental risks has eased possible lighter controls on the polymer precursor vinyl acetate. The committee stressed "there is no indication [it] can cause skin tumours." And although the committee agreed effects include "acute toxicity; skin, eye and respiratory tract irritation…" it said "there is no need for labelling…as a skin sensitiser."…

BY MARK ROWE

FOR the nuclear power plant industry, global economic crises can make for uncertain times. On the one hand, the long lead-in times associated with construction, along with copper-bottomed signed state contracts, should mean many projects continue as usual.…