Business Backs Sustainability as 'Innovation Catalyst'

EurActiv (1/12) - Lack of consumer awareness of sustainability of goods and the absence of an [sic] hazard-based regulatory approach to new products are holding back opportunities for sustainable innovation…

Regulation, in particular, could speed up sustainable innovation, argued Rodney Townsend, chair of the EU technology platform on research and innovation in chemistry and biotechnology (SusChem), highlighting the "opportunities for sustainable innovation" provided by the bloc's new chemical legislation, REACH, and the forthcoming revision of pesticides law.

However, Townsend deplored that while the technology and products to build energy-smart homes that save up to 70% on energy consumption exist, they are too expensive to implement. He thus called for legislation to be adapted "to allow smart energy homes to boom" and to achieve a "negative carbon footprint" in the long term.

Legislation should, however, be kept flexible enough to provide opportunities for business innovation, according to Rini Claassens of Johnson Diversey, a cleaning company, who noted that hazard-based approaches to regulating cleaning products had resulted in "missed opportunities".