Why the PINK Project Engages with the Advanced Materials Act
Our project operates at the forefront of research and innovation in advanced materials. As a publicly funded European initiative, PINK is embedded in the broader EU strategy to strengthen industrial competitiveness, technological sovereignty, and sustainability. These ambitions closely align with the objectives of the proposed Advanced Materials Act.
Advanced materials are central to Europe’s green and digital transitions. They underpin clean energy technologies, sustainable mobility, circular production systems, and resilient supply chains. At the same time, the development and deployment of such materials must respect high European standards for safety, environmental protection, and circularity. This dual imperative – innovation and responsibility – is precisely where research projects like PINK are positioned to contribute.
Given its expertise in research, modelling, digital tools, and sustainable design approaches, PINK is directly affected by, and can meaningfully contribute to, a regulatory framework that seeks to accelerate innovation without lowering standards. For this reason, the project participated in the “Have your say” consultation process, offering its perspective on how the Act can best translate its ambitions into actionable research and innovation priorities.
Content and Positions of the PINK Statement
In its submission, PINK welcomes the objectives of the Advanced Materials Act and supports the creation of a horizontal framework to enable the development and market introduction of innovative advanced materials. The project particularly endorses the combined goal of strengthening the innovativeness, competitiveness, and resilience of European industry, while upholding high standards of safety, sustainability, and circularity in line with the European Green Deal and the Clean Industrial Deal.
A key message of the statement is that reducing time to market should not come at the expense of regulatory safeguards. Rather than deregulation, PINK advocates for a holistic approach grounded in the “One Substance One Assessment” and “Safe and Sustainable by Design (SSbD)” principles. This integrated perspective is seen as the appropriate way to reconcile speed, innovation, and long-term protection of people and the environment.
To operationalise this vision, PINK outlines several research and innovation priorities. These include integrating advanced material design and manufacturing within the SSbD framework; establishing and scaling up sustainable production capacities and test beds; fostering digital knowledge exchange in line with FAIR data principles; and strengthening Europe’s leadership in materials modelling, high-performance computing, human-centric artificial intelligence, and ontologies.
The statement further emphasises the importance of securing supply chains by reducing dependencies on critical raw materials, establishing circular value chains and closed-loop production systems, and improving materials recovery and recycling. At the same time, PINK calls for financial incentives and follow-up funding to help European SMEs bring EU-funded pre-competitive research results to market, alongside efforts to streamline and accelerate regulatory procedures.
PINK acknowledges that achieving all these objectives simultaneously will be a significant challenge. Nevertheless, the project expresses its readiness to contribute actively to this effort as part of the European materials ecosystem.
Read the original text of the statement here. (7P9 as contributor on behalf of the PINK consortium)
