The Council and European Parliament has reached an agreement on the first wave revision of the Carcinogens and Mutagens Directive (CMD). Both Council and Parliament are now expected to adopt the text in September 2017.
The revised CMD introduces in its Annex I “work involving exposure to respirable crystalline silica dust generated by a work process” and sets a Binding Occupational Exposure Limit Value (BOELV) of 0.1 mg/m³ for respirable crystalline silica. Article 18a specifies that the European Commission will evaluate the need to modify this limit value as part of the next evaluation of the implementation of the Directive. The NEPSI Social Dialogue Agreement, which was signed in 2006, has been recognised in the revision as a valuable and necessary instrument to support implementation of the Directive. The NEPSI signatories have published a press release about the revision.