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Compliance towards Berkeley's Nano Regulation

Wednesday, June 6, 2007

From the Berkeley Daily Planet:

By the June 1 reporting date the only business following the formal reporting procedure was Bayer Laboratories, according to Toxics Manager Nabil Al-Hadithy. The other two local users of the technology, UC Berkeley and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) responded, but did not include the specific data required by the ordinance.

“I am especially disappointed because LBLN has been engaged in the process [of writing the reporting procedures] for two years and has failed to implement it,” Al-Hadithy said.

The policy requires companies working with engineered nanoparticles—materials one of whose axes is 100 nanometers or less (a nanometer is one-trillionth of a meter)—to submit a report disclosing the toxicology of the nanoparticles used and “how the facility will safely handle, monitor, contain, dispose, track inventory, prevent releases and mitigate such materials,” says the city ordinance.

For my previous post on this issue and my discussion with N. Hadithy with regards to the content of the Berkely regulation, click here and here.