European Union Implementation Regulations

In the United Kingdom this is covered by the Control of Major Accident Hazards Regulations 1999 (COMAH), set up by the HSE (Health and Safety Executive) to implement the Seveso II directive of the EC (European Union) see www.hse.gov.uk. The COMAH regulations supersede the previous CIMAH (1984) regulations, set up under Seveso I. 

The European Union and Japan have been leaders in formulating and then implementing e-waste regulations. The Swiss are credited with establishing the first comprehensive e-waste management system, covering collection to disposal. 

Most countries also have regulations analogous to the U.S. regulations. For example, the European Union issued the "Seveso II Directive in 1996 (replacing the original 1982 directive) which requires all member states to implement regulations for the control of major accident hazards. Also, in addition to the U.S. government requirements,... 

In the European Union the key instrument governing the prevention and control of pollution is the 1996 IPPC (Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control) Directive [10]. Member States were required to implement this Directive through national legislation and regulation by September 1999. 

The concept of a safety case comes from the requirements of the European Union/European Community (EU/EC) Seveso Directive (82/501/EC) and, in particular, regulations that the United Kingdom and other member states used to implement that directive. United Kingdom regulations (Control of Industrial Major Accident Hazards [CIMAH], 1984 replaced by Control of Major Accident Hazards Involving Dangerous Substances [COMAH] in 1999) require that major hazardous facilities produce a safety report or safety case.64 The requirement for a safety case is initiated by a list of chemicals and a class of flammables. Like the hazard analysis approach (Section 8.1.2), experts identify the reactive hazards of the process if analysis shows that the proposed process is safe, it may be excluded from additional regulatory requirements. 

The RoHS procedure has now combined with European Union Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and restriction of Chemicals (REACH), which is a new European Union Regulation (EC/2006/1907 of 18 December 2006). Four additional substances are listed that will be assessed as a priority, among these substances is hexabromocyclododecane, a brominated flame retardant widely used in expanded polystyrene for which no alternatives have been found so far. REACH addresses the production and use of chemical substances and their potential impacts on both human health and the environment it has been described as the most complex legislation in the Union s history and the most important in the last 20 years. It is the strictest law to date regulating chemical substances and will impact industries throughout the world. REACH entered into force in June 2007, with a phased implementation over the next decade. 

An economic and legal frame is, on the other hand, applied in much of the news coverage related to the European Union, in particular to the Reach legislation. In contrast to the relative silence about the new chemical regulation in the Swedish press (cf. Table 4.3), the Polish journalists at the two largest national newspapers seem to pay quite a lot of attention to the implementation stage. The mass media take on the EU in this context is one of scepticism, and the views of the Polish companies affected dominate the news material and are at the centre of the journalists writing. In one article the reporter addressed the readers directly ... 

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