No L 109/18 Official Journal of the European Communities 22.4.82 COUNCIL DIRECTIVE of 31 March 1982 amending Directive 73/405/EEC on the approximation of the laws of the Member States relating to methods of testing the biodegradability of anionic surfactants (82/243/EEC) THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES, Having regard w0 the Treaty establishing the European Economic Community, and in particular Article 100 thereof, Having regard to the proposal from the Commis- sion ('), Having regard to the opinion of the European Par- liament (%), Having regard to the opinion of the Economic and Social Committee (*), - Whereas Council Directive 73/405/EEC (¥) must be adapted to take account of the latest developments in science and technology, thus necessitating: — the updating of the references relating to the methods listed in Article 2, — the addition to Article 2 of a further method of measurement which is in use in the United Kingdom, — the improvement of the ‘confirmatory test procedure’ provided for in the event of a dispute; Whereas, pursuant to Article 4 of Council Directive 73/404/EEC of 22 November 1973 on the approx- imation of the laws of the Member States relating to detergents (®), suitable tolerances for the measurement  of  biodegradability should be determined in order to take due account of the unre- liability of test methods which could result in rejection  decisions with important economic consequences; whereas a rejection decision may therefore only be taken where the results obtained with a test method specified in Article 2 of Directive 73/405/EEC reveal a biodegradability of less than 80 %; (") OJ No C.112, 14. 5. 1981, p. 4. () OJ No C 172, 13.7. 1981, p. 111. (*) OJ No C 310, 30. 11. 1981, p. 7. () OJ No L 347, 17. 12. 1973, p. 53. () OJ No L 347, 17. 12. 1973, p. 51. Whereas some confusion has arisen as to the scope of Directive 73/405/EEC and it is necessary to make quite clear that the Directive applies only to surfactants used in detergents; whereas it is also necessary to make quite clear that it is the level of biodegradability of the anionic surfactants contained in a detergent, and not the level of biodegradability of the detergent itself, which is dealt with in Article 2; Whereas the necessary amendment and amplification of the Annex to Directive 73/405/EEC will be carried out under the procedure provided for in Article 3a thereof, HAS ADOPTED THIS DIRECTIVE: Article 1 Direcuve 73/405/EEC is hereby amended as follows: 1. The following is added to Article 1: “present in detergents such as those referred to in Article 1 of Directive 73/404/EEC’. 2. Articles 2 and 3 are replaced by the following: Article 2 ‘ Pursuant to Article 4 of Directive 73/404/EEC relating to, detergents, Member States shall prohibit the placing on the market and use on their territory of a detergent if the biodegradability of the anionic surfactants contained therein is less than 80 % determined in accordance with one of the following methods: — the OECD method, published in the OECD technical report of 11 June 1976 on the “Proposed Method for the Determination of the Biodegradability of Surfactants used in Synthetic Detergents”, ’ — the method in use in Germany, established by the “Verordnung iber die Abbaubarkeit