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Last changed: 20/01/11
The European Commission is currently preparing a legislative proposal to simplify the Construction Products Directive (CPD, 89/106/EEC). The goal of the revision is to make the CPD more simple and transparent, improve its effectiveness, and reduce the costs of its implementation. The revision is also a chance to support a sustainable construction sector in Europe, asserts a group of members of the Network of Heads of European Environmental Protection Agencies (EPA Network).
At the ninth meeting of the EPA Network, held 24/25 September 2007 in Zagreb (Croatia), a group of 17 members of the network endorsed a discussion paper on the revision of the CPD. These member agencies underline the importance of the European Union (EU) adequately addressing the environmental and health impacts of the construction sector. The discussion paper makes proposals to benefit the environment and the better regulation agenda of the European Commission as well as European enterprises in the construction sector.
The group of environment agencies is proposing better information on hazardous substances in CE marking to facilitate product choice and to make recycling easier. In addition to changes in the Construction Products Directive itself the paper encourages supporting legislative initiatives to establish minimum environmental and health requirements for construction products at European level. CE marking and free trade should be restricted to construction products verified as safe for health and the environment, the 17 EPAs demand.
The informal grouping of European environment protection agencies and institutions was founded in 2003 and represents currently institutions from 28 European countries. The European Environment Agency headquartered in Copenhagen is one of the members, and the European Commission sends a delegate to its meetings too. The network delegates from Germany come from the Federal Environment Agency (Umweltbundesamt – UBA).
The aim of the network is to achieve better exchange of views and experiences on issues of common interest to environment agencies. In addition to semi-annual meetings of the whole network, several interest groups also convene to focus on specific topic areas.
The position paper with a list of contributing agencies is available here PDF / 491 KB.