The deputy permanent representatives of the Member States will be invited, on Wednesday 24 June, to approve their negotiating mandate with the European Parliament on the draft regulation on speeding-up environmental assessments, presented last December as part of 'omnibus 8’ (see EUROPE 13770/2).
The draft regulation is intended to make life easier for project developers to build clean technology infrastructure or industries intended to boost the EU’s competitiveness, by allowing them to benefit from simplified and accelerated procedures, including a single point of contact, digitalisation and shorter deadlines.
It also makes it possible to streamline certain stages, including judicial ones, and provides a framework for derogations from directives and environmental protection measures.
“In order to increase speed, effectiveness and cost-efficiency of environmental assessment procedures required under Union law, and to reduce administrative burden, environmental assessments should be combined to the furthest extent possible, taking into account the specific organisational characteristics of Member States. The fact that assessments are combined should not affect their content or quality”, states a draft mandate dated 19 June.
Combined assessments should be carried out in a manner that does not lead to a prolongation of the time limits set out in this regulation.
As regards deadlines, the text proposes that: - for projects subject to an environmental assessment, and where the project developer so requests, before submitting the application, an opinion from the competent authority on the scope and level of detail of the information to be included in the environmental assessment report be issued within a maximum period of 45 days from the date on which the developer submits the request for an opinion; - the period for public consultation on the environmental report be between 30 and 90 days.
Impacts on the environment should be taken into account at the earliest possible stage in all the technical planning and decision-making processes for plans, programmes and projects.
“In order to ensure a high level of environmental protection, legal certainty and administrative efficiency, Member States should have the option within their respective national systems to provide that arguments not raised during the administrative stage of the procedure leading to the authorisation of a plan, programme or project may be precluded at the stage of judicial review, thereby enabling competent authorities to address them during the decision-making and to avoid excessive delays in the permit granting process, without prejudice to the right of access to justice”, the text also proposes.
“Such procedural rules should apply only where the public concerned had a genuine opportunity to participate based on information that was accessible, understandable and made available in due time and should preserve effective judicial protection”.
Unintentional bird mortality. In addition, the construction, operation and decommissioning of projects can lead to residual killing or disturbance of bird species protected under Directive 2009/147/EC and of other species protected under Directive 92/43/EEC.
“The extent of killing or disturbance […] can vary depending on the type of project and its design, […] the ecological importance of the area for the species and their presence in the area concerned […]. Where appropriate and proportionate mitigation measures are adopted and such measures are designed to avoid significant adverse impacts on the population of the species concerned, such killing or disturbance should not be considered deliberate within the meaning of Article 5 of Directive 2009/147/EC”, the document further underlines.
More information: https://aeur.eu/f/mib (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)