Oceny oddziaływania na środowisko, jako przykład realizacji zasady prewencji we wspólnotowym prawie ochrony środowiska

Abstract

The Single European Act has raised the issues of environmental protection to the status of the Community policy, defining its aims and basic principles that have been as follows: the principle of caution, repair of a damage to the environment caused by a perpetrator, the subsidiary rule and prevention. The latter one presupposes the necessity to inhibit negative impact upon the environment at its origin rather than just to alleviate the damage already done. The rule of prevention provides for no particular action. Legal instruments of its application are stipulated for in normative acts: assessments, permits, systems of bans, plans and programmes. The rule of prevention is linked with the rule of caution applied when scientific assessment given no reason to believe there is any threat. The prevention principle has been introduced into secondary law by the Directive 85/337/EEC on the assessment of the effects of certain public and private projects on the environment, the Directive 2001/42/EC – “the strategic environment assessment” directive – on the assessment of the effects of certain plans and programmes on the environment. The “habitat” Directive 92/43/EEC provides for the procedure of approval of executed plans and undertakings influencing the Natura 2000 areas. The European Parliament, in a report on the inspection of implementation of the Community law in 2003 and 2004, published in 2006, concluded that in practice the implementation of the directives providing for the assessment of the environmental impact faced serious problems. The assessment the environmental impact is of vital importance in the context of preventive protection and proper promotion of the caution component is necessary to improve their range and effects.