FAQs
To provide information on a technique that could be considered as candidate BAT or emerging technique, please send an email to EU-BRITE (JRC-B5-EUBRITE@ec.europa.eu) to request the standard template used to describe candidate techniques.
Please note that neither BREFs nor the underlying information exchange are places to advertise commercial products. Techniques need to be described in a neutral way, e.g. in terms of their technical features, costs, environmental performance, and applicability. In the BREFs, techniques are reported in general terms, for example, stating "Circulating Fluid Bed Scrubber" or "Low-NOx Burner" rather than referring to brands or trademarks.
EU-BRITE does not work as a certification or verification body. To get your technique evaluated further, please consider contacting the Environmental Technology Verification (ETV) team which coordinates a verification programme and carries out independent assessments on the performance and environmental benefits of technologies.
The Industrial Emissions Directive (IED) (2010/75/EU) lays down the rules on integrated prevention and control of pollution from industrial activities. The Directive aims to prevent or, where that is not practicable, reduce emissions and waste arising from large agro-industrial installations. In 2024 the IED was amended by Directive (EU) 2024/1785 . As a key provision, the IED requires EU Member States to set permit conditions for installations on the basis of Best Available Techniques (BAT) - to be determined through an exchange of information with stakeholders. For more information on the IED, please visit the website of DG Environment.
Best Available Techniques are defined in Article 3(10) of the Industrial Emissions Directive (2010/75/EU), as amended by Directive (EU) 2024/1785, as "the most effective and advanced stage in the development of activities and their methods of operation which indicates the practical suitability of particular techniques for providing the basis for emission limit values and other permit conditions designed to prevent and, where that is not practicable, to reduce emissions and the impact on the environment as a whole:
'techniques' include both the technologies used and the way in which they are designed, built, maintained, operated and decommissioned;
'available' means developed on a scale which allows implementation in the relevant industrial sector, under economically and technically viable conditions, taking into consideration the costs and advantages, whether or not the techniques are used or produced inside the Union, as long as they are reasonably accessible to the operator;
'best' means most effective in achieving a high general level of protection of the environment as a whole, including human health and climate protection".
A Best Available Techniques reference document (BREF) is defined in Article 3(11) of the Industrial Emissions Directive (IED) 2010/75/EU as "a document that results from the exchange of information organised pursuant to Article 13 [of the IED], drawn up for defined activities and describing, in particular, applied techniques, present emissions and consumption levels, techniques considered for the determination of best available techniques as well as BAT conclusions and any emerging techniques, giving special consideration to the criteria listed in Annex III" of the IED.
Best Available Technique (BAT) conclusions are defined in Article 3(12) of the Industrial Emissions Directive (IED) 2010/75/EU as amended by Directive (EU) 2024/1785 on industrial and livestock rearing emissions (integrated pollution prevention and control) as "a document containing the parts of a BAT reference document laying down the conclusions on best available techniques and emerging techniques, their description, information to assess their applicability, the emission levels associated with those techniques, the environmental performance levels associated with those techniques, the content of an environmental management system including benchmarks, associated monitoring, associated consumption levels and, where appropriate, relevant site remediation measures". BAT conclusions are adopted by a Comitology procedure and are subsequently published as a Commission Implementing Decision in the Official Journal of the European Union.
BAT reference documents (BREFs) and the related BAT conclusions are available on the EU-BRITE website under the tab 'Reference Documents'; older documents can be found in the section 'Archived reference documents'. Please note that BAT conclusions published before the Industrial Emissions Directive entered into force are not available as separate Commission Implementing Decisions but can be retrieved directly from the respective BREF.
To identify the relevant BREF/BAT conclusion, please select the respective sector or activity from the 'Reference Documents' tab. BAT conclusions published before the Industrial Emissions Directive entered into force are not available as separate Commission Implementing Decisions but can be retrieved directly from the respective BREF.
Each BREF contains a description of: 1) applied processes and techniques, including their associated emission and consumption levels, 2) techniques considered in the determination of BAT, and 3) emerging techniques that offer environmental benefits but that are not yet deployed on an industrial scale. Detailed technical information can be obtained by a text search for key words in the relevant BREF (see the 'Reference Documents' page).
EU-BRITE does not monitor the implementation of the Industrial Emissions (Directive 2010/75/EU) by EU Member States. To request relevant information, please contact DG Environment or the competent Member State authorities.
For information on the Industrial Emissions Directive 2010/75/EU and related European environmental legislation, please contact DG Environment.
The European Bureau for Research on Industrial Transformation and Emissions (EU-BRITE) cannot provide such information; please refer to the competent authority in the Member States.
Sustainable development is an overarching objective for the European Union, which is committed to a 'high level of protection and improvement of the quality of the environment' (Article 3 of the Treaty on European Union). To that end, a comprehensive environmental legislation is in places along with some of the world's highest environmental standards. For more information, please visit EUR-LEX and the website of DG Environment.
BAT conclusions adopted under the Industrial Emissions Directive 2010/75/EU are published as Commission Implementing Decisions and are available in all official European languages in the Official Journal of the European Union.
Translations of BREFs or parts thereof are available in French, German, and Spanish. For information on translations to other languages, please contact the respective Member State authorities.
Selected BAT conclusions have been translated into Arabic, Chinese, and Russian by the European Commission’s translation services (with no revision or guarantee on actual accuracy in relation to the original text in English).
Translations of Executive Summaries of BREFs published under the IPPC Directive 2008/1/EC are available on CIRCABC.
The European Bureau for Research on Industrial Transformation and Emissions cannot provide translation services. Several Member States have translated entire BREFs and made them available online (see previous question). BAT conclusions adopted under the Industrial Emissions (Directive 2010/75/EC) are published in the official European languages as Commission Implementing Decisions in the Official Journal of the European Union.
The European Union retains the copyright for each BAT reference document (BREF). Reproduction is authorised, except for commercial purposes, provided the source of the information is acknowledged and cited appropriately. Neither the European Commission nor any person acting on behalf of the Commission is responsible for the use that might be made of the information in the BREFs.
Given the large number of requests, the European Bureau for Research on Industrial Transformation and Emissions cannot send BREFs or BAT conclusions by e-mail. The documents can be downloaded from the EU-BRITE website under the tab 'Reference Documents'.