A group of people of the ZUT University in the city of Szczecin in Poland have taken de decision to make aware to the European Parliament about a gap in the environmental legislation related to odour levels in ambient air. This group is calling on the Commission to prepare a draft legislation to regulate the presence of odours in the environment. The members of this group led by Mr Bogdan Ambrożek ask you to back this petition.

 You may be aware that there is no European Environmental Directive about odour levels in ambient air. This is a serious issue that affects not only to the European Citizens who have to deal with odour annoyance in their environment but also to the European Industry actors, who need a clear framework to develop their activities. That is why a  group of academics from a well-known odour laboratory of the Polish city of Szczecin has promoted this petition to the European Parliament and ask anyone interested in signing this petition. The more people that sign this petition, the better chances to start this important discussion in the European Parliament.

 At this stage, the European Environment Agency believes that the odours do not affect the air quality in Europe. But, why the reports are not considering this important issue? Well, one of the reasons is that the framework drawn by the Directive 2008/50/EC on ambient air quality and cleaner air for Europe did not leave room to set odour levels (or meters of set-back distance) in the environment.

  The right to petition the European Parliament is set out in Article 227 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union and Article 44 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union. It guarantees that any citizen of the European Union may at any time submit a petition to the European Parliament on a subject which comes within the European Union's fields of activity and which affects them directly.

  This group of academics has taken this Right and they have presented a petition calling on the Commission to prepare a draft legislation to regulate the presence of odours in the environment.

   In addition, the group calls on the European Parliament to ask the Commission to present such draft legislation. The petitioners point out that the levels of odorous substances can be measured (e.g. EN 13725:2003) and stress that odours can have an impact on the well-being of local communities. 

  You can support this initiative to help to boost this discussion in the European Parliament following these simple steps.

1. First read the petition in English or select any of the other 23 translations to official languages. It is a very small text, but the aim is clear.
2. If you decide to support this petition open an account on the European Parliament Petitions Portal.
3. Log in to the Petitions Portal, search the petition No. 0884/2016 and press the button - support petition. You are done!

   The petitioners urge the inclusion of odorants among the pollutants regulated by the Directive 2008/50/EC (the CAFE Directive).

   This petition will be open for 2 months so if you decide to support it, you better hurry up!

   If you find this article interesting, you might also be interested in these articles:

• Estimating Odour Nuisance From a Conventional Swine Farm
• The first draft of the BREF on Waste Treatment (WT) has been issued
• How a European Norm about odours was born in 1991
• Are we there yet? Achievements and challenges in management of environmental odours
• New EU odour standards for large poultry and pig farms