The Nanotechnology Industries Association (NIA) has submitted detailed comments to the public consultation on Proposal for European Commission definition of the term 'nanomaterial'. In its NIA Comments on the recommended definition, the association strongly urges the European Commission to conduct an impact assessment for the recommended definition, before a final definition of the term 'nanomaterial' is set.
In general, the NIA welcomes the initiative of the European Commission in developing a definition of term 'nanomaterial', which is overarching and broadly applicable as a reference term for any communication performed and policy action taken by EU stakeholders, including EU Member States and EU agencies, and urges the Commission to also explicitly invite other stakeholders (e.g. NGOs, consumer groups), etc.) to use the recommended definition.
The NIA disagrees, however, with the recommended threshold of '1% of their number size distribution', because this threshold is neither based on current scientific knowledge, nor on technical capability, and is therefore not implementable.
Follow this link to download the full NIA Comments.
Registered NIA Members can also download the respective comments submitted by the CEN/TC 352 (European Committee for Standardisation (CEN) Technical Committee on Nanotechnologies).