Negotiators from the European Parliament, the Spanish Presidency of the EU Council and the European Commission will still have their work cut out to reconcile their positions on the revision of the Industrial Emissions Directive (2010/75/EU, known as the ‘IED’ Directive), proposed in April 2022 to strengthen its scope (see EUROPE 12926/2, 13244/11).
The second round of inter-institutional negotiations (‘trilogue’), which took place on the evening of Tuesday 10 October, was laborious and inconclusive. The discussions focused on the following three points:
- the chapter on the enforcement of the future directive - including sanctions and compensation, mandatory fines in the event of infringement - and collective action for victims of pollution;
- the scope of industrial activities, mainly the inclusion of hydrogen production capacity and the extraction of industrial minerals, for which the EU Council is requesting certain exclusions from the scope (see EUROPE 13143/6);
- public information and participation.
There is still a lot of work to be done on the technical side to get it right.
The thorniest part of the dossier - the requirements for large-scale agricultural installations, which the Parliament struck out as far as cattle farming is concerned (see EUROPE 13220/4) - was not addressed and will be dealt with as part of an overall compromise package at the third trilogue, scheduled for 28 November, which the Spanish Presidency of the EU Council hopes will be conclusive. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)