The European Commission is urging Ireland to bring its national legislation on assessing the effects of projects on the environment into line with EU rules. Despite considerable interaction with the Commission, legislation on environmental impact assessments in Ireland still contains shortcomings.

A fundamental objective of the Environmental Impact Assessment Directive (EIA Directive) is to ensure that projects likely, by virtue of their nature, size or location, to have significant effects on the environment are subject to an impact assessment. Despite an earlier referral to the Court and a subsequent Court ruling in March 2011 Ireland has not yet ensured the full transposition of the EIA Directive into national law.

Concerns remain regarding the complete transposition of Article 3 of the Directive, avoiding any negative consequences of split decision making between Irish planning authorities and the Irish Environment Protection Agency, and the exclusion of demolition works. Ireland generally accepts the Court’s findings and stated its intention to adopt all the necessary legislation to implement the Court’s judgment by the end of May 2012. However the necessary legislation has not yet been adopted, so the Commission is referring the case back to the Court.

The European Commission is launching a €34.8 million call for eco-innovation projects. Businesses and entrepreneurs from across Europe can apply for funding to help bring novel environmental projects to the market. The call is open to eco-innovative products, techniques, services and processes that aim to prevent or reduce environmental impacts, or which contribute to the optimal use of resources. The call for applications is open until 6 September 2012, and around 50 projects will be selected for funding.

This year’s call has five main priority areas:

* materials recycling

* water

* sustainable building products

* green business

* the food and drink sector.

The call is targeted particularly at SMEs that have developed an innovative green product, process or service, which is struggling to find its place in the market. The call offers co-funding to cover up to 50 % of the project cost, and is likely to support around 50 new projects this year.

Some 50 projects are now set to launch from last year’s call, and over 140 projects are already underway. Examples of current schemes include converting old discarded TVs into tiles, new waste sorting mechanisms, innovative eco- packaging for milk, and a new technique for recycling textiles.

Eco-Innovation is funded via the Competitiveness and Innovation Programme (CIP) and has a budget of approximately €200 million for 2008 to 2013. It supports technologically-proven products which help make better use of Europe’s natural resources. Eco-Innovation is a green strand of the CIP and contributes to the Eco-Innovation Action Plan (EcoAP). The programme is managed by the Executive Agency for Competitiveness and Innovation (EACI).

Galway-based greentech company, Cellulac, has been approved for a record €2.8 million grant from the European Commission to commercialise its biorefining technology that converts agricultural waste into lactic acid. Cellulac is a high-potential start up client of Enterprise Ireland which supported the company in its bid for this significant grant.

Lactic acid is used in food and beverages, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, biodegradable plastics and other industrial sectors. It is a growing €4 billion pa market and is expanding at a rate of 19% per year.

The EU grant approval, which will anchor a consortium of funding from State, institutional and private investors, will be used to prove mass production capability.  Possible locations for the demonstration plant – where lactic acid will be produced at an industrial level with the goal of licensing the technology world wide – are currently being scouted in Ireland and the EU.

Cellulac will create 14 high quality jobs and will be recruiting graduates from the life sciences and engineering sectors to grow its research base in Ireland.

Fin Murray, chief executive of Cellulac, comments: “This win and our confidence that Cellulac will be filling key R&D roles locally is a testament to the investment poured into the development of the life sciences and green tech sectors over the last number of years. GMIT, NUI Galway and the Technology Centre for Biorefining and Bioenergy supported by Enterprise Ireland and IDA Ireland, will prove to be key supports for greentech companies like ours.”

He continues: “We are actively fundraising at the moment and are interested in hearing from potential investors with domain knowledge or potential partners that have a stake in this exciting new industry.”

Enterprise Ireland’s CIP Eco-innovation National Contact Point Mark Sweeney says: “The 2012 call is open soon and we are actively looking for companies with innovative products and processes that reduce environmental impacts.” Any interested companies should contact mark.sweeney@enterprise-ireland.com.

CAPTION:

Fin Murray, chief executive of Cellulac, and Sean Sherlock TD, Minister for Research & Innovation. (Picture by Gary O’Neill Photography).

Top performing EU Member States have recycling rates of up to 70 % and bury virtually nothing, whilst others still landfill more than three-quarters of their waste. A new report from the European Commission explains that by combining economic instruments the best performers have turned waste from a problem into a resource.

A mix of landfilling and incineration taxes and bans, producer responsibility schemes and pay-as-you-throw prove to be the most effective tools in shifting waste streams to more sustainable paths. If the EU is to meet the objectives set out in the Resource Efficiency Roadmap – zero landfilling, maximising recycling and reuse, and limiting energy recovery to non recyclable waste – these economic instruments will need to be introduced more widely across all Member States.

Experience in the Member States shows that a combination of the following instruments is the best way to improve waste management:

* Landfill and incineration taxes and/or bans – the results of the study are unequivocal: landfilling and incineration rates have decreased in countries where bans or taxes have driven up costs for landfilling and incineration.

* ‘Pay-as-you-throw’ schemes have proved very efficient in preventing waste generation and encouraging citizens to participate in separate waste collection.

* Producer responsibility schemes have allowed several Member States to gather and redistribute the funds necessary to improve separate collection and recycling. But cost-efficiency and transparency vary greatly between Member States and between waste streams, so these schemes need careful planning and monitoring.

There are significant differences in waste management between Member States. According to a Report published by Eurostat, the most advanced six Member States – Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Austria, Sweden and The Netherlands – landfill less than 3 % of their municipal waste. At the other extreme, nine Member States are still landfilling more than 75 % of their municipal waste. Recent statistics published by Eurostat show continuous progress in some new Member States, where recycling rates are increasing rapidly. Municipal waste generation has also decreased in several Member States probably due to the economic downturn.

Replicating these instruments in all Member States will be necessary if the EU is to meet the targets set out in its waste legislation and its targets for resource efficiency. This is why the possibility of making their use legally binding in some cases will be assessed in a 2014 review of EU waste targets. The Commission is also including sound waste management in conditions for receiving certain European funds.

Meanwhile the Commission is encouraging Member States to implement existing waste legislation more effectively. Waste management and recycling industries in the EU had a turnover of Eur145 billion in 2008, representing around 2 million jobs. Full compliance with EU waste policy could create an additional 400,000 jobs within the EU and an extra annual turnover of Eur42 billion. Improved waste management would contribute to achieving several objectives and targets of the Europe 2020 Strategy for smart sustainable and inclusive growth.

Soil sealing – the covering of the ground by an impermeable material – is one of the main causes of soil degradation in the EU. Soil sealing often affects fertile agricultural land, puts biodiversity at risk, increases the risk of flooding and water scarcity and contributes to global warming. New guidelines on best practice to limit, mitigate and compensate soil sealing recently published by the European Commission collect examples of policies, legislation, funding schemes, local planning tools, information campaigns and many other best practices implemented throughout the EU. The guidelines call for smarter spatial planning and using more permeable materials to preserve our soil.

Europe is the world’s most urbanised continent. An additional 1,000 km² (an area larger than the city of Berlin) is claimed every year for human use, a high share of which ends up being sealed. If this trend continues at the same speed, in 100 years we would convert an area comparable to the territory of France and Spain combined.

Soil formation is a very slow process (it takes centuries to build up a centimetre), so soil sealing causes significant damage to soil and often results in permanent loss. This is why, while infrastructure development must be supported in order to fuel economic growth, there is a need for more efficient and responsible land management.

Soil sealing can be limited through smart spatial planning and limiting urban sprawl. Development potential inside urban areas can be used instead, through the regeneration of abandoned industrial areas (brownfields), for example. Mitigating measures include using permeable materials instead of cement or asphalt, supporting ‘green infrastructure’, and making wider use of natural water harvesting systems. Where on-site mitigation measures are insufficient, compensation measures that enhance soil functions elsewhere may be considered.

The Commission guidelines underline the importance of an integrated approach to spatial planning. Taking specific regional approaches and mobilising unused resources at local level has also proven efficient.

Existing funding policies for infrastructure development are currently being carefully reviewed in order to reduce subsidies that may act as drivers for unsustainable land take and soil sealing. Reducing the share of urbanisation fees in municipal budgets can also support long term planning.

The Guidelines will be presented and discussed at the Conference on soil remediation and soil sealing hosted by the Commission on 10 and 11 May 2012 in Brussels. They will be made available in a number of languages in the course of the year. The guidelines are aimed at competent authorities at national, regional and local levels as well as professionals dealing with land planning and soil management. Furthermore, they are meant to raise awareness in the broad public on continuous soil degradation.

Bristol, Copenhagen and Frankfurt have been chosen as the three finalists in the competition to find Europe’s Green Capital for 2014. They have been selected from the 18 cities that applied for the 2014 award. The finalists were proposed by an independent panel of experts.

Four cities have been awarded the title of European Green Capital since its inception in 2010. Stockholm won the inaugural title, followed by Hamburg in 2011, the current holder Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain, and Nantes, who will hold the title in 2013.

Bristol, Copenhagen and Frankfurt will present their vision, action plans, communication strategy and their potential to act as a role model for other cities to the Jury on 8 June 2012 in Brussels. The Jury will deliver its verdict at an award ceremony in Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain on 29 June.

The European Green Capital Award is presented to a city in the vanguard of environmentally friendly urban living. A panel of experts evaluates the cities on the basis of 12 environmental indicators, judging them on their record of achieving high environmental standards, their commitment to ongoing and ambitious goals for further environmental improvement and sustainable development, and the extent to which they can act as a role model and promote best practice in other European cities.

The jury comprises representatives from the European Commission, the European Parliament, the Committee of the Regions, the European Environment Agency, ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability, the Covenant of Mayors Office and the European Environmental Bureau.

The European Commission has launched a public consultation to gather views on the 7th EU Environmental Action Programme (7th EAP), which will set out priority objectives to be pursued up until 2020. The consultation remains open until 1 June.

In recent months, the Commission has adopted a number of strategic initiatives on environment policy – the Resource Efficiency Roadmap, the 2020 Biodiversity Strategy and a Communication on improving the implementation of EU law. They aim at improving Europe’s competitiveness and enhancing its ecological resilience and are an integral part of the Europe 2020 Strategy for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth.

The 7th EAP should provide an overarching, coherent framework for these strategic initiatives, setting out priority objectives and showing clearly how environment policy can contribute to green growth and deliver better health and well-being. It should secure the commitment of all actors concerned – EU institutions, Member States, regional and local administrations, businesses and private sector stakeholders, NGOs and civil society – to a common agenda.

In particular, the 7th EAP should secure commitment to:

* improving the implementation and enforcement of EU environmental rules in order to deliver better environmental outcomes

* making sure that other EU policies also deliver on climate and environment objectives

* having access to sound evidence and the latest scientific knowledge as a basis for environmental policy-making and implementation

* filling significant policy gaps, where justified by the latest scientific information and in line with the precautionary approach.

The results of the public consultation, together with the views of the Council of the European Union, the European Parliament, the Committee of the Regions and the European Economic and Social Committee, will inform the further development of the Commission’s proposal for the 7th EAP, which it plans to present before the end of this year.

The consultation can be filled in at http://ec.europa.eu/environment/consultations/7eap_en.htm

In an attempt to help Member States’ authorities and developers manage the environmental consequences of construction projects more easily, the European Commission has brought together all existing EU legislation governing environmental impact assessments. The original Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) Directive and its three subsequent revisions have been combined to create a more compact, clearly translated and user-friendly version which has just come into force.

This ‘codification’ is part of an ongoing effort to simplify the EU’s regulatory environment. It means that the EIA Directive and all its subsequent amendments now form one single transparent and readable piece of legislation, without any change to its original provisions. Like the existing legislation, the codified version has been translated into all EU official languages. Translations of the new version have also been revised to eliminate any uncertainties caused by unclear wording or linguistic errors.

The European Parliament and the Council adopted the codified EIA Directive on 13 December 2011, and its text was published on 28 January 2012 as Directive 2011/92/EU.

Environmental assessment is a procedure that ensures that the environmental implications of construction projects – eg dams, motorways, airports, factories and energy projects – are assessed and taken into account before the relevant Member State authority makes a decision on project approval. The common principles for the environmental assessment of individual public and private projects were initially defined in the 1985 EIA Directive and amended in 1997, 2003 and 2009.

The EIA Directive review process will be concluded later in 2012, when the Commission will present its proposal for the revision of the codified Directive. Future changes will concentrate on the content of the Directive, rather than its format.

The European Commission has adopted a strategy to shift the European economy towards greater and more sustainable use of renewable resources. With the world population approaching 9 billion by 2050 and natural resources finite, Europe needs renewable biological resources for secure and healthy food and feed, as well as for materials, energy, and other products.

The Commission’s strategy and action plan, ‘Innovating for Sustainable Growth: a Bioeconomy for Europe’, outlines a coherent, cross-sectoral and inter-disciplinary approach to the issue. The goal is a more innovative and low-emissions economy, reconciling demands for sustainable agriculture and fisheries, food security, and the sustainable use of renewable biological resources for industrial purposes, while ensuring biodiversity and environmental protection. The plan focuses on three key aspects – developing new technologies and processes for the bioeconomy; developing markets and competitiveness in bioeconomy sectors; and pushing policymakers and stakeholders to work more closely together.

“Europe needs to make the transition to a post-petroleum economy. Greater use of renewable resources is no longer just an option, it is a necessity. We must drive the transition from a fossil-based to a bio-based society with research and innovation as the motor,” says Commissioner for Research, Innovation and Science Maire Geoghegan-Quinn.

The term ‘Bioeconomy’ means an economy using biological resources from the land and sea, as well as waste, as inputs to food and feed, industrial and energy production. It also covers the use of bio-based processes for sustainable industries. Bio-waste for example has considerable potential as an alternative to chemical fertilizers or for conversion into bio-energy, and can meet 2% of the EU renewable energy target.

The EU bioeconomy already has a turnover of nearly Eur2 trillion and employs more than 22 million people, 9% of total employment in the EU. It includes agriculture, forestry, fisheries, food and pulp and paper production, as well as parts of chemical, biotechnological and energy industries. Each euro invested in EU-funded bioeconomy research and innovation is estimated to trigger Eur10 of value added in bioeconomy sectors by 2025.

The strategy seeks synergies with other policy areas, instruments and funding sources which share and address the same objectives, such as the Cohesion Funds, the Common Agricultural and Fisheries Policies (CAP and CFP), the Integrated Maritime Policy (IMP), environmental, industrial, employment, energy and health policies. With Research and Innovation at the heart of the strategy, it will first be presented to EU Member States at the Competitiveness Council on 21 February 2012.

EU Member States including Denmark, Finland, Germany, Ireland and the Netherlands already have Bioeconomy Strategies in place. On the international stage, Canada, China, South Africa and the US either have or are planning their own ambitious strategies.

European Commission officials undertook unannounced inspections at the premises of companies active in managing power exchanges in several Member States on February 7th 2012. Power exchanges provide services that facilitate electricity trading at wholesale level. The Commission has concerns that the companies concerned may have violated European antitrust rules that prohibit cartels and restrictive business practices.

The Commission officials were accompanied by their counterparts from the relevant national competition authorities. Commission officials also participated in unannounced inspections carried out by the EFTA Surveillance Authority (ESA) in the same case. ESA is responsible for enforcing the EEA competition rules in Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway.

Unannounced inspections are a preliminary step into suspected anticompetitive practices. The fact that the Commission carries out such inspections does not mean that the companies are guilty of anti-competitive behaviour nor does it prejudge the outcome of the investigation itself.

There is no legal deadline to complete inquiries into anticompetitive conduct. Their duration depends on a number of factors, including the complexity of each case, the extent to which the undertakings concerned co-operate with the Commission and the exercise of the rights of defence.

The European Commission considers that Ireland and the United Kingdom are not fully in line with EU gas market rules and has decided to refer these countries to the Court of Justice of the European Union. The best way for ensuring security of supply and affordable energy prices is to have a competitive internal EU energy market. An efficient and properly functioning internal market in natural gas will give consumers the choice between different companies across national borders. EU legislation aims at facilitating cross-border gas trade and increasing the capacity on gas markets.

According to EU gas rules, the maximum interconnection capacity between Member States and between different gas transmission systems must be offered to the market so that consumers can fully benefit from competition on the market. Only when interruptible reverse flow capacity and short-term services (short term contracts to book gas capacity) are offered, can pipelines be used to their maximum capacity. This means that more gas can be transported and new companies can enter the market. This will give consumers the possibility to choose between different companies and services.

The maximum interconnection capacity is not offered in the UK and Ireland as the pipeline connecting Northern Ireland and Ireland is not open to the market. This means that gas companies in Ireland cannot directly trade gas with Northern Ireland or vice versa. On the pipeline connecting Scotland to Northern Ireland short-term services are not available and neither is virtual reverse flow capacity based on netting off physical forward flow to make capacity available for commercial trade as required by EU longstanding legislation.

The Commission is aware that the UK and Irish governments intend to introduce Common Arrangements for Gas (CAG) between Ireland and Northern Ireland. While the Commission welcomes such steps to create cross-border market, this project has already been delayed. Therefore the Commission has decided to proceed with these infringement procedures in accordance with the EU law.

The European Commission is concerned that Ireland has incorrectly implemented the concept of water services as described in EU water legislation – leading to inappropriate water pricing. The Commission is sending Ireland a reasoned opinion to ask it to adjust its national legislation accordingly.

If Ireland fails to reply within two months, the Commission may refer the case to the European Court of Justice. The Water Framework Directive came into force in 2000, with Ireland’s agreement. Member States had until 2003 to implement its various provisions. The current problem arises from differing interpretations of the rules by Ireland (and five other Member States).

The case is not about domestic water charges. It is to do with the wider cost policy over all users, not just drinking water and sewage systems. The Water Framework Directive is Europe’s key tool for protecting its waters. It establishes a framework for action in the field of water policy. One of the measures to achieve its objectives is the obligation to adopt a cost recovery policy for water services that includes the environmental and resource costs of water use, taking into account the “polluter-pays” principle.

Ireland is of the opinion that cost recovery should apply only to the supply of drinking water and the disposal and treatment of wastewater. The Commission, however, sees water services as a wider notion that includes water abstraction for cooling industrial installations and agricultural irrigation, the impoundment or storage of surface waters for navigation purposes, flood protection or hydro power production, and well drilling for agricultural, industrial or private consumption. The exclusion of these activities from water services hinders the full and correct application of the Water Framework Directive, contributing to inefficient or wasteful use of water. The Directive is also intended to see equity between different water users.

Ireland has two months to comply with the requirements of the Directive, after which the Commission may refer the case to the European Court of Justice. The Commission has similar concerns regarding other Member States and has already issued reasoned opinions to Germany, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Sweden on their misinterpretation of water services.