Citizens enjoy scientific guide to green policies

The European Commission is claiming success for a project to explain the science behind its proposals for environmental regulation.

The Commission introduced a news alert service, Science for Environment Policy, to report on complicated and controversial areas including climate change, biotechnology and chemicals.

Since the service was launched in January, it has published 156 articles online summarising new research on environmental topics, ranging from nanotechnology to the risk of genetically modified (GM) peas.

"So far it is going well; we have had almost no negative comments," said Irja Vounakis from the research, science and innovation unit of the Commission's environment department. "Those whose studies are used often say that soon after a news alert is published they get requests for a copy of the original article."

Environment policies have often been accused by both environmentalists and their critics of ignoring hard scientific facts.

For example, green groups say trace chemicals found in human blood prove that proposed EU chemicals legislation REACH should do more to protect the public from toxic substances. On the other hand, opponents claim science shows that, in the quantities found, the chemicals pose no threat to human health.

Vounakis, who has been involved with the Science for Environment Policy service since its launch, said the project was set up because the Commission was aware that the science underpinning complex environmental policies was often not fully understood.

The amount of research published makes it difficult to keep an eye on new findings and decide if and how they should be used by politicians and legislators, she said.

"Sometimes you'll read a very interesting article in the news but when you look at the source document it is a 20 or 30-page scientific article. We are all busy people; most of us would never find the time to go through all that."

Not all the results of environment research carried out in Europe are relevant to the laws and regulations being considered, according to Vounakis, "but when they are we need to make sure they're properly used".

Politicians and civil servants are not the only ones struggling to trawl through new findings, according to Vounakis. Even scientists are short of time to understand the political implications of new research and that in turn could be to the detriment of EU policy.

"It is very important that scientists also understand all the information out there if they want to target policymakers. We have to transcribe the research understandably," she said.

The London-based charitable trust Sense About Science welcomed the efforts of Science for Environment Policy but warned of the challenge involved in improving scientific understanding.

"The evidence on which policy is based can sometimes be very unclear," said Chris Tyler from Sense About Science. "We will be watching with keen interest to see whether this welcome initiative from DG Environment is something that can make a difference by improving access to the evidence."

The European Commission is claiming success for a project to explain the science behind its proposals for environmental regulation.