Knives are out for nanotechnology with the Canadian Financial Post bitterly proclaiming that nanotech is “fast heading for a crash-landing in the killing fields of junk science. The signs are everywhere: in journals, on the Internet, in the media and especially in the growing volume of precautionary waffle produced by important-sounding think-tanks and activist NGOs.”
The FP then goes on to misquote just about everybody. For example, the recent Swiss Re study concluding that we need to know more about nanotechnology in order to accurately asses the risks becomes A clump of reinsurance firms and brokers have issued reports warning of possible risks and threats.
The raft of studies across Europe becomes “The European Parliament, which did so much to undermine genetically modified food, is set to join the nanowar. It commissioned a report that said nanoparticles should not be released into the environment. The message: Humanity must be saved from the technology that could save humanity.”
What is actually happening, especially in Europe, is that organisations such as the European NanoBusiness Association have been actively working with NGOs for several years in order to understand the concerns of the environmental movement and avoid a repeat of the GMO fiasco.
Meanwhile, the European Commission has been snowed under with applications for funding of nanotoxicology and environmental studies, and committees and studies are popping up everywhere.
In fact, it is hard to remember the last business focussed nanotech conference where the environment was not on the agenda.