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Member of the European Parliament (EP), Maria Spyraki, Co-chair of the EP Intergroup on ‘Climate Change, Biodiversity and Sustainable Development’ is hosting a web conference on “Revisiting Odour Pollution in Europe” on October 28th.
This European Parliament Intergroup event, co-organized with MIO-ECSDE and the EU-funded D-NOSES project will bring together policy-makers, representatives from industries, communities and scientists to present their perspective on the issue, also based on the Green Paper on Odour Pollution developed by the D-NOSES project. The Green Paper outlines the main challenges of regulating odours and puts forth recommendations towards an improved policy framework for odour pollution, including a multi-level governance model.
This event is happening at a time when, driven by the European Green Deal, many EU policies and regulations that should adequately address odour emissions, are under development or revision.
You can register and keep updated about the event here.
The European Parliament Intergroup on “Climate Change, Biodiversity and Sustainable Development” brings together Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) from all political groups and Parliamentary Committees to find sustainable solutions to some of the greatest challenges of our time. It is supported by the European Bureau for Conservation and Development (EBCD).
For the past 3 years, MIO-ECSDE, the D-NOSES advocacy partner, was responsible for the non-negligible task of advocating at the European, Mediterranean and national levels for the introduction of odour pollution into policy agendas: an invisible environmental (and social) topic to most policymakers.
It was fascinating to learn, in the course of the project how complex the task of regulating odour pollution actually is. It is difficult to measure, and even more challenging to assess the impact of odours on those affected. Access to reliable data on odour nuisance is another challenge because it is usually the responsibility of the emitter (polluter) to collect the data. So perhaps it is no wonder that the matter has not been dealt with in a systematic manner. Odour regulations are still disparate in Europe, they differ significantly within countries and in many places, they are completely lacking.
D-NOSES and MIO-ECSDE are wrapping up their policy and advocacy work, in partnership with the EP Intergroup, with this event on the 28th of October. The recommendations of the Green Paper on Odour Pollution will be a guide for the next steps, in complementarity with other important tools such as:
The International Odour Observatory
The Odour Collect app
Read in French here