At first glance, the planned EU restriction of chromium(VI) appears to be an objectively comprehensible measure in terms of health protection and also more constructive for industry than the authorization strategy pursued to date. However, a closer look reveals profound contradictions in the restriction proposal - in the methodology, in the consideration and in the proportionality. The proposal reveals arbitrariness dominated by a lack of knowledge.
In mid-June, the European Chemicals Agency ECHA submitted the proposal for the restriction regulation for comment, which is intended to regulate the use of chromium trioxide in industrial processes in future. Instead of relying on verifiable exposures or real disease data, the proposal includes blanket limit values - regardless of the size of the company. The associated break with established and tried-and-tested assessment criteria could set a momentous precedent.
When calculation units become a backdrop
Experts are particularly critical of the economic benefit assessment: in order to quantify the social benefits of a restriction, the ECHA uses "willingness-to-pay" models. This means that an arbitrary numerical value, determined in surveys and thus completely decoupled from real costs, is unrestrainedly compared with real investments. If such number games are used to justify more and more political decisions in future, there is a risk of a dangerous loss of factual logic and proportionality. The fact that metal coaters should be able to tolerate higher exposure levels in the workplace than plastic coaters is also not objectively justifiable and constitutes unjustifiable unequal treatment.
Emission quota independent of company size
Another problem is that the proposed emission limit values are formulated in absolute terms. A company that produces for more than one hour a day is assessed in the same way as a 24/7 operation with a hundred times the productivity. As a result, small companies can continue to produce with outdated technology without any problems, while high-throughput, state-of-the-art plants with minimal emissions per square meter of coated surface, i.e. high efficiency, have problems. In this way, the alleged goals of minimizing emissions in the industry are not achieved at all.
Trust as a location factor
All in all, the ECHA has once again managed to shake companies' confidence in Europe as a business location. Companies are not only confronted with high investments, but also with increasing political and regulatory arbitrariness and a profound loss of planning security. If regulatory threshold values are derived from unverifiable model assumptions, even the best available technology loses its guiding power.
A system on the test bench
Whether chromium trioxide, PFAS or other critical substances - the methodology with which the ECHA carries out its assessments will be in the spotlight more than ever in the future. The question is not just: What will be banned? But rather: How will it be evaluated and who will be heard?
A regulatory system that relies on model assumptions without real data, that organizes participation without a real say and that replaces technical facts with political considerations is not only offside in terms of content, but also democratically.
Reading tip
In the Septemberissue of mo 8-9 / 2025 and on oberflaeche.de, you can read a detailed interview with Dr. Malte Zimmer, the ZVO expert, with an assessment of the ECHA's published ChromVI restriction.