No. 2, June 1998

Main articles in brief

EU ozone strategy
A strategy for lowering the concentrations of ground-level ozone is being developed by the European Commission, and a study has now been presented of the way emissions and the degree of exposure would be affected under various scenarios.

Forests
The German environmentalist organization Robin Wood claims that thinning of the crowns gives a far too favourable impression of the trees' actual condition, asserting that the damage is much greater than is generally assumed.

Aircraft
Despite a prospect of greatly increased traffic, it should be possible, according to a Dutch study, by applying uniform taxation to make aviation pay for its cost to the environment.

Integrated control
A fundamental change in EU pollution policy is signalled by the directive on integrated pollution prevention and control. But what the changeover will involve, and how important it will be, remains uncertain as revealed in a penetrating examination of the strengths and weaknesses of the directive.

NOx trading
To help protect public health from air pollution in the eastern United States, the EPA has proposed a trading scheme for the emissions of nitrogen oxides a key component in the formation of ozone.

Found to pay
In a recently presented study, the costs of reducing emissions of nitrogen compounds and VOCs have been weighted against the resulting improvements to health and the environment. Even though the costs tend to be overestimated, and the benefits underestimated, the benefits were still found to exceed the costs.

Admitting the public
The draft has been adopted of a convention guaranteeing access to information and public participation in environmental matters. By empowering the public to act as watchdogs, it could bring benefits throughout the range of environmental issues.

Biogas gains
Gas obtained from slaughterhouse waste and animal manure is being used to run the buses of a municipal transport system in Sweden. Compared with buses running on diesel fuel, this brings great reductions in the emissions of nitrogen oxides and carbon dioxide.

Not guilty
An OECD study of the effects of environmental policies on employment concludes: Environment-related job losses look almost irrelevant in comparison with those resulting from corporate decisions and government policies. Jobs are more likely to be at risk where environmental standards are low.

EDITORIAL

Will it bite?

About a year from now, the EU directive on integrated pollution prevention and control (IPPC) must have become part of the member countries legislation. After October 30, 1999, before coming into operation all new plants covered by the directive must have obtained a permit signifying application of the best available techniques (BATs) as will existing plants eight years later, in 2007.

The crucial question is of course what the effect will be on the environment: how the directive will result in a more efficient use of energy, reduced consumption of raw materials, and a further decrease in the emissions of pollutants. As appears however from the article in this issue, the question is almost impossible to answer.

For one thing the definition of BATs is wide open to interpretation, making it highly probable that national and local authorities in the member countries will draw different conclusions. The very fact of BATs being in the plural shows the possibilities, and suggests that this was intentional.

Furthermore it will take years for the Commission to work out standards for the different types of installation, and even then, these so-called reference notes will not be intended to serve as absolute requirements, but merely to inform and recommend. Naturally, too, the definitions and interpretations of BATs will change as industrial techniques develop and societys ideas of what is most important for the environment themselves change.

But despite these and other doubts, this directive should not be dismissed as of little use. One of its basic principles is the well-founded one of preventing pollution. If the directive really hastens the carrying out of that principle in practice, much will have been won for the environment.

It could also bring increased access to information, such as by making it mandatory for the member countries to arrange for applications for IPPC permits to be publicly available for review and comment. The member countries should also be obliged to inform their neighbours and others, and enter into consultation, if any action might affect them adversely. Although by its wording the directive allows much leeway for interpretation in such cases too, it does nevertheless represent an improvement over the present situation.

An indirect, though far from unimportant disadvantage of the IPPC directive is that it gives many interests, within both the Commission and the member countries, an excuse for not producing any new requirements for restricting emissions, or tighten up old ones, just now.

A recent example is the long-awaited revision of directive 88/609/EEC on emissions of air pollutants (SO₂, NOx, and particulates) from large combustion plants. A proposal had been expected for the summer, but referring to the IPPC directive, the Commission has already made known that it only intends to tighten the requirements (in the form of emission-limit values) for new plants. In other words, nothing will be done about existing ones. Since however by far the greater part of the emissions in 10-20 years will still be coming from now-existing installations, the effect of this move will be extremely limited. (Further reading: AN 1/98)

If the effects of air pollutants in the way of ill health, acidification of the environment, damage from ground-level ozone, and eutrophication are to be dealt with in any reasonable time, emissions from existing plants will have to be markedly reduced too. It is to be hoped that the IPPC directive will aid in this, but in view of the great allowance for interpretation, it can hardly be relied upon.

It is therefore highly important that the Council of Ministers (in other words, the member countries) and the Parliament should ensure that the revised LCP directive will also include binding requirements for existing plants to reduce emissions. Whether the requirements take the form of plant-by-plant emission-limit values, or of national emission ceilings, is of minor importance. Their result is what matters.

CHRISTER ÅGREN

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ENVIRONMENTAL SPACE

Making pollution personal

How much in the way of emissions of sulphur and nitrogen oxides should each one of us, figuratively, be allowed to cause if the critical loads for these pollutants are not to be exceeded? That is, if everyone in Europe were to toe the line. An answer to this question has just been worked out by a consultant* as regards Sweden, Spain, Poland, and Great Britain chosen for their differing patterns of energy, transportation, and industrial structure.

To this end a new concept, called environmental space, has been linked together with the agreed critical loads for acid deposition and eutrophication. Environmental space is the term coined in 1992 by Friends of the Earth in the Netherlands (Vereniging Milieudefensie) to indicate how much each individual could, on an average, use up in the way of resources, or cause to be emitted in the form of pollutants yet without infringing on the possibilities for coming generations to meet their legitimate needs and without leading to a decline in biological diversity. As a matter of justice, the environmental space allowance should be equal for all, independently of where the individual happens to live.

As regards sulphur and nitrogen oxides, it should be noted that it will often be cost effective to reduce emissions more in some countries than in others, because of differences in the cost of making reductions. The damage caused by the emissions will also differ according to where they arise, although the amounts of the emissions may be the same. In the case of these two pollutants, cost effectiveness has however not been taken into account when defining environmental space.

The concept does on the other hand call for the need to control the use of several resources and the emissions of several pollutants simultaneously, so as to achieve a sustainable way of life. It will therefore be necessary to choose solutions that are at the same time cheapest and fulfill all environmental aims. For example, although it may be possible to reduce emissions of sulphur and nitrogen oxides by 90 per cent by flue-gas cleaning, it would be more cost-effective to reduce them at least in part by cutting back on the use of fossil fuels for the simple reason that the emissions of carbon dioxide will also have to be greatly reduced, and these come, just, from the burning of fossil fuels and there is no method for cleaning them.

In calculating each individuals allowance for emissions of sulphur and nitrogen oxides, it has been assumed that acid depositions and eutrophication can be kept within the bounds of critical loads if the emissions of both pollutants are reduced by 90 per cent between 1980 and 2010 and that the emissions of ammonia would be reduced by 75 per cent (see the following article). The environmental space for each European in 2010 would then be 7.8 kilograms of sulphur dioxide per year, and 3 kilograms of nitrogen oxides (calculated as NO₂).

Although it had done much better than any of the other three countries at reducing emissions of sulphur between 1980 and 1995 (see Table 1 below), even Sweden will have to reduce them still more. In most European countries it is mainly heating, power generating, and industrial processes that are responsible for the emissions of sulphur dioxide. The relative size of the emissions will depend primarily on the amounts of oil and coal that are burned, the sulphur content of the fuel, and the extent to which the flue gases are cleaned. In comparison with most other countries, Sweden lies well to the fore in all of these respects.

As can be seen from Table 2, concerning nitrogen oxides, all four countries are more or less level although with marked differences in the composition of the emission sources. While the emissions are smallest per head in Poland and Spain, this does not mean that these countries will escape the need to reduce emissions, overall, by 90 per cent or more. In the case of nitrogen oxides the total amounts will depend on how much fuel is used, since these pollutants are formed whenever anything is burnt, as well as on the relative use of cleaning equipment and the combustion processes themselves.

The emission sources are the same as for sulphur, but with one large addition: road traffic. The average motorist lets out more than his annual environmental allowance of 3 kilograms in all four countries. The worst sinners are in Britain and Sweden, where the average emissions of nitrogen oxides from private cars were respectively 13 and 11 kilograms per head of population in 1990. They were somewhat lower in Spain (7 kilograms), and still lower in Poland (4.5 kilograms). In the latter, private-car ownership is however rapidly on the increase.

The educational aim of the environmental space concept is to impress on people the extent of the changes that will be needed in order to attain environmental targets, and to indicate how much will be required of each individual. But as the consultant points out, there is little the individual can do about sulphur dioxide since the choice of fuel and cleaning equipment for heat and power generation and for industrial processes will almost always be made on a higher level. Individuals can of course cut down on their use of electricity and heat, for instance by using more energy-efficient appliances and lowering indoor temperatures. In Sweden they can, too, contract for a supply of electricity from non-polluting sources (see AN 3/97, pp.12-13).

When it comes to nitrogen oxides, on the other hand, the individual does have a fairly good opportunity for restricting his own emissions largely because transportation, and in particular the private car, accounts for so much of the total. There are however considerable differences in daily travel distances. A Swede will travel on an average 36 kilometres every day as against 29 kilometres for a Briton and 20 for a Pole. (There is no figure for Spain.) To hold back the emissions arising from travel, people can use cars that have a low fuel consumption and are equipped with a catalyzer. They can, further, refrain from using their cars so much by joining car pools, using public transportation, cycling, or going on foot. They can also contribute to environmental improvement by buying goods that are produced in the immediate vicinity, thus again cutting down on transportation.

Friends of the Earth have put the environmental space for carbon dioxide in 2050 at 1.7 tons per head per year (assuming a world population at that time of 7.2 billion). Reducing the use of fossil fuels to the extent that would be required in order to meet that figure would, incidentally, largely solve the problems of sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxides as well. Assuming that coal, oil, and natural gas would be reduced equally, Poland and Spain would then have to lower their emissions of sulphur by a further 15 per cent (as from 1990), and Great Britain by 6 per cent. Sweden would not have to make any additional reduction.

Since the conversion of energy systems will take a relatively long time, and increased use of biofuels will in itself lead to further emissions of nitrogen oxides, technical and structural changes will have to go on simultaneously.

MIKAEL JOHANNESSON

* Birgit Nielsen, Melica Miljökonsulter. An English version of this study, which was commissioned by the Swedish NGO Secretariat on Acid Rain, is available from the Secretariat: go to the page "Publications". More about the environmental space concept can be found in Towards a Sustainable Europe The Handbook and Towards a Sustainable Europe The Study, published in 1995 by Friends of the Earth Europe.

Table 1. Sulphur dioxide. Emissions and the reductions required to match individual environmental space in 2010.

Table 2. Nitrogen oxides. Emissions and amount of reduction required to match environmental space in 2010.

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ENVIRONMENTAL SPACE (CONT.)

Ammonia also enters the picture

Even if the emissions of sulphur and nitrogen oxides are cut down by 90 per cent, that will still not suffice to solve the problems of acidification and eutrophication in Europe. The emissions of ammonia will also have to be controlled. The question is, whether there will be any point in calculating for this pollutant the environmental space that would be available, as described for sulphur and nitrogen oxides in the preceding article.

Between 80 and 95 per cent of the emissions of ammonia in Europe are estimated to come from farming. Some 80 per cent of that total is traceable to animal manure, and 20 per cent to artificial fertilizer so it is hardly surprising that attention should have tended to focus on evaporation from the former. Assuming that the emissions need to be reduced by 75 per cent, it would be relatively easy to work out, on the basis of present emission and population figures, the individual environmental space and required overall reduction, country by country, as has been done for sulphur and nitrogen oxides.

But as Nielsen points out, such figures would be of little use to individuals wishing to mitigate their share of environmental damage. So in order to arrive at a more practical approach, the consultant has chosen to trace the entire nitrogen flow in agriculture.

Artificial fertilizer brought about a marked change in farming practice. Previously the number of animals and the amount of feedcrops the farm could produce would usually balance each other, and manure from the animals served to fertilize the fields. But artificial fertilizer made it possible either to farm without animals or raise more livestock than could be fed from the farms own fields relying for feed on crops grown elsewhere with the aid of artificial manure.

Animal manure consequently becomes a waste product on farms with intensive stock raising, while those concentrating on grain growing have to make up for a shortage of nutrient by using artificial fertilizer. Since so much of the feedstuff production is now dependent on the use of artificial fertilizer, it can be said, according to Nielsen, that the ammonia that now emanates from animal manure has in fact had its origin in the artificial kind.

The amount of ammonia evaporated will depend, by and large, on the number and kind of animals, and manure management. With a surplus of farmyard manure, resulting from the use of artificial fertilizer for growing animal feed, the farmer has no incentive to use care in handling it. Where farming operations are thus unbalanced, nitrogen is continually being added in the form of artificial fertilizer, and leaks out into air and water in great quantities.

Farming practices differ in the four countries studied, and so do the flows of nitrogen. Nielsen has compared the average inputs and outputs of nitrogen per hectare of agricultural land (ploughland and pasture) in 1990 in each of the countries. Inputs come from artificial fertilizer, airborne depositions, imports of feedstuffs, and microbiological fixation of nitrogen farmyard manure being an occurrence within the system. The outputs consist of the nitrogen content of the foodstuffs that are produced, the nitrogen that leaks out in the form of ammonia and nitrate, and losses from denitrification (a microbiological process).

In all cases the input of nitrogen proved to be very much greater than the eventual content in human foodstuffs and the animal feed produced from farming. The difference was least in Poland, where about half of the nitrogen turned up in the foodstuffs. In Sweden it was about a third, but only a fifth in Spain and Britain. See Table 1.

Great quantities of nitrogen are thus not being utilized. The outflow from evaporation of ammonia has been estimated, in a study of Swedish farming quoted by Nielsen, to be about as great as that from the leakage of nitrate, or about 20 kilograms per hectare of farmland per annum.

According to Eurostat, the EU statistical office, ammonia emissions per hectare of farmland are greatest in Poland and Great Britain (Table 2). But according to Nielsens estimates of flow (Table 1), the excess in Poland is considerably less than the British (26 as against 112 kilograms). Here is a discrepancy that will need looking into, because even if there should be some uncertainty in the flow estimates, it seems hardly likely that the ammonia emissions should be the same in both countries.

Individual farmers can do their part in reducing nitrogen leakage by ensuring suitable storage and spreading practices for animal manure, such as by rapidly ploughing it under. Consumers could help by eating less in the way of animal products since ammonia evaporates mostly from animal husbandry. But as Nielsen notes, evaporation is also due to the overuse of artificial fertilizer in conventional farming. Choosing food and other things produced without the aid of such fertilizer would therefore also be a way for the individual to help in attacking the ammonia problem.

MIKAEL JOHANNESSON

Table 1. Inflow and outflow of ammonia in an average hectare of farmland in 1990. Kilograms per hectare.

¹ Additions to the system in the form of artificial fertilizer, atmospheric depositions, imports of feedstuffs, and nitrogen fixation. Since it circulates within the system, farmyard manure is not included.
² Remaining in animal and vegetable foods.
³ Including nitrogen leakage in water runoff, evaporation of ammonia to the air, denitrification, and retention in soil and vegetation.

 Table 2. Emissions of ammonia, 1990. Source: Eurostat.

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Top ten emitters

The countries with the greatest per-capita emissions. Europe in the mid-nineties. Sources: OECD Environmental Data 1997 plus EMEP Report 1/97, for non-OECD countries.

Sulphur dioxide (kg SO₂ per head per year)

Nitrogen oxides (kg NO₂ per head per year)

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OZONE

Far-reaching work on a strategy

Every summer, over a large part of Europe, the concentrations of ozone are so great at ground level as to be damaging to vegetation and human health, and a strategy is now being developed within the European Union to come to grips with this ever more troublesome problem.

For more than a year the European Commission has been engaged in working out a strategy for lowering the concentrations of ground-level ozone. In doing so it is keeping experts from member countries, industry, and environmentalist organizations continuously informed, and inviting them in turn to provide information and views on the matter. At a gathering of such experts in March, the effects of various scenarios on emissions and ozone exposure were presented by the Commissions consultants, the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA).

The results have been published in the fourth1 of a series of interim reports, of which the first two dealt with acidification, and the third with ozone. The fifth, intended to be the final one concerned with ozone, was expected in May. This should provide valuable material for the Commissions ozone strategy, scheduled for September. It will be followed by a sixth report, analyzing the problems relating to acidification and ozone (and perhaps eutrophication as well). The results will be used in formulating the directive on national emission ceilings for acidifying and ozone-forming air pollutants (SO₂, NOx, NH₃, and VOCs), which is expected to be ready for presentation early in 1999.

Projections for 2010
In the fourth report, various ways have traced for selecting environmental-quality targets for the ozone strategy. Various scenarios have been developed for testing the implications: the necessary reduction of emissions, the cost of abatements, and the consequent ozone exposure. In the computer modelling, the same target year has been set as for the acidification strategy, namely 2010. A reference scenario (REF) was constructed, based on projections of energy use and business activity, backed up by data on the effects of existing and planned legislation. To show the expected levels of emissions in 2010, the effects of national and international legislation have been lumped together with those that will arise from commitments made under the Convention on Long Range Transboundary Air Pollution.

Another, the MFR scenario, illustrates the potential for emission reductions that would result from full application of the currently available control technologies. Here the turnover time for the capital stock is taken into account which, since it includes cars as well as such things as power plants, will mean that legislation concerning new cars, for example, will not be fully effective until all existing vehicles have been scrapped. Note, too, that only technical controls are considered. In other words, no types of structural change, such as fuel switching, more efficient use of energy, modal shifts in transportation, and so forth, are taken into account. Table 1 shows the levels of emissions in the base year, 1990, together with the projected emissions in the European Union in 2010 according to the REF and MFR scenarios.

Effects on health and vegetation
To get at the effects of the emission reductions that would result from the application of the scenarios, the estimated ozone concentrations in 2010 have been set against the degrees of exposure that are known to cause damage to health and vegetation. The formula used in each case is AOT (Accumulated exposure Over a Threshold concentration) in other words, the number of hours in which ozone concentrations exceed a certain threshold value, multiplied by the number of ppbs over that value. In the calculations the threshold value 60 ppb is used for health, and 40 ppb for vegetation. The AOT is usually expressed either as ppb-hours or ppm-hours.

Taking emission levels as they were in 1990, the highest AOT60 occurrences were in northern France, Belgium, and Germany. Assuming mean meteorological conditions, the highest levels of AOT60 would, under the reference scenario, have come down to 3 ppm-hours in 2010 a reduction of the excess exposure by about 50 per cent, as compared with the situation in 1990. Under the MFR scenario, the highest levels of AOT60 would have dropped to about 1.5 ppm-hours, or 70-80 per cent below the 1990 levels.

Also investigated has been the population exposure for AOT60, expressed as ppm-hours per person. The figures are obtained by using the average exposure per person multiplied by the population total. The IIASA emphasizes however that the resulting data is inadequate for making estimates of damage to health. The figures are therefore used in comparisons of the scenarios. The average excess population exposure in the European Union is expected to decline, according to the REF scenario, by 57 per cent, and by 84 per cent according to the MFR scenario.

The critical level for farm crops and natural vegetation (excluding forest trees) has been set for AOT40 at 3 ppm-hours for the three-month growing season. Taking the average meteorological conditions for a five-year period together with 1990 emissions, that critical level is now being exceeded in most of the EU countries, and most of all up to 12-16 ppm-hours in France, Italy, Germany, and Belgium. The reduction of emissions resulting from the REF scenario will produce a great decline in excess AOT40, but will not increase to any great extent the area where the critical levels are no longer being exceeded. Peak levels will come down to 10-12 ppm-hours. Under the MFR scenario they would drop to 5-7 ppm-hours.

Just as has been done for AOT60 (health) an index for vegetation exposure has been sought out. For vegetation, the average excess exposure could be expected, under the REF scenario, to fall by 36 per cent, or distinctly less than in the case of health. By MFR reckoning, on the other hand, there would be a 63-per-cent reduction in the average excess exposure for vegetation.

Setting targets
Various ways of closing the gap between the present levels of ozone and the targets set for human health (AOT60) and ecosystems (AOT40) are examined in the fourth report. Among them are:

• Making a general move towards the long-term target by applying measures aimed at improving the situation vis-á-vis the 1990 base year. In other words the regular gap-closure concept.
• Taking steps to improve the situation in areas where the problems of ozone are greatest that is, by establishing a uniform target value for exposure (a kind of ceiling) to be attained everywhere.
• Combining the gap-closure and ceiling approaches.

• An overall reduction of AOT60 (health-related target) by at least 60 per cent.
• A similar reduction of AOT40 (vegetation-related target) by 35 per cent.
• Ensuring improvement in areas that were suffering from the highest exposure to ozone at that particular time, by prescribing that the maximum AOT60 should be kept below 3 ppm-hours, and the maximum AOT40 below 10 ppm-hours.

• Interactions between the ozone and the acidification strategy.
• The effects of assuming a different energy scenario.
• The role of non-EU countries, and particularly of those ten now seeking admission.

Further, some of the basic input data, such as the country-by-country energy scenarios and abatement costs, are to be reviewed and updated during the spring.

All measures worthwhile
In connection with its ozone strategy, the Commission has asked AEA Technology to evaluate the economic benefits of reducing emissions. At the March meeting with the experts, a preliminary assessment was presented of an analysis based on some of the scenarios in IIASAs fourth interim report. The benefits for health were found to be outstanding, although the effects on crops and visibility would also be considerable. They would be negligible on the other hand for materials and forest growth. Damage to ecosystems and cultural objects was not assessed. The consultants preliminary evaluation shows in any case that the benefits would outweigh the costs in all the scenarios, the MFR as well. A detailed description of the methodology used for this evaluation, and also the results, will appear shortly in a report.

CHRISTER ÅGREN

¹ Fourth Interim Report to the European Commission: Cost-effective control of acidification and ground-level ozone. M. Amann et. al. 1998. International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Austria.

Table 1. Emissions of NOx and VOCs in the EU in 1990, and in 2010 according to the REF and MFR scenarios (ktons).

Table 2. Emissions and control costs for the reference scenario (REF) and the combined AOT40 and AOT60 scenario (D7). Changes in per cent from the base year 1990.

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IPPC DIRECTIVE

Integrated control imminent

Offering the prospect of a dramatic reshaping of industrial regulation in the European Union, the directive on integrated pollution prevention and control will soon have to be incorporated in the law of the member countries. The question is how important the transformation will be.

Directive 96/61/EC on Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control (IPPC)¹ is set to become a focal point for efforts to reconcile the goals of environmental protection and industrial development in the EU. Its main thrust is the establishment of an integrated approach for the licensing of installations in the major polluting industries. This is a fundamental change in EU pollution policy, compared to the more traditional route of applying separate controls for air pollution, water pollution, and waste management. Indeed, elements of the old legislation, such as Directive 84/360/EEC on emissions to air from industrial plants, will cease to apply as IPPC takes effect.

The IPPC directive applies to the larger industrial installations in five major sectors, covering energy, metals, minerals, chemicals, and waste management, and a group of other assorted sectors including pulp and paper production, textile treatment, tanning, food production, and the intensive rearing of poultry and pigs. Licensing of installations in accordance with the directive has not yet started in the member states, although the critical implementation period is nearly upon us. The deadline for transposition into national law is October 30, 1999. After this time all new installations covered by the directive must obtain a permit before they begin operating. A period of eight years is allowed to bring existing installations under control.

The directive therefore offers the prospect of a dramatic reshaping of industrial regulation in the EU, beginning next year and building towards complete application by 2007. But what exactly will this transformation involve, and how important will it be? These questions are considered below, by looking at the core philosophy of IPPC, the central requirements of the directive and its main strengths and weaknesses.

Core philosophy
The integrated approach of the IPPC directive is reflected in its stated purpose of achieving a high level of protection of the environment taken as a whole. The concept of integrated environmental protection is by no means unique to the directive, however. Indeed, it is widely applicable across the environmental policy arena. This was demonstrated by the OECD in 1991, when it adopted a Recommendation and guidance on IPPC² which went well beyond industrial licensing. The OECD recognized that substances can move among environmental media (air, water, soil and biota) as they travel along a pathway from a source to a receptor, and that controls over releases of a substance to one environmental medium can result in shifting the substance to another environmental medium. Accordingly, it was recommended that member countries practice integrated pollution prevention and control, taking into account the effects of activities and substances on the environment as a whole and the whole commercial and environmental life cycles of substances when assessing the risks they pose and when developing and implementing controls to limit their release.

The OECD also spelled out ways in which the philosophy of IPPC could be given effect. As well as industrial permitting, a number of other routes were suggested. They included linking environmental instruments with land-use planning, the wider application of environmental impact assessments including, for policy proposals, the establishment of integrated inspection and enforcement authorities, and the use of economic instruments.

Thus IPPC has a broad sense and a narrow sense. In the broad sense illustrated by the OECD, the philosophy and underlying rationale for integration are more important than any individual means of delivery. The EU directive, meanwhile, demonstrates the application of IPPC in a narrower sense, by defining one of several specific ways to put the theory into practice. The directive is therefore only a subset of the broader IPPC philosophy, and is by no means the last word in integrated environmental policy.

Principal requirements
Permitting Requirements and Best Available Techniques. When an installation first comes under IPPC it must obtain a permit allowing it to operate. Permits must include conditions to protect air, water and land, and these conditions should be fully coordinated ... to guarantee an effective integrated approach. The spirit of the directive therefore favours the determination of controls in an holistic manner, rather than use of conditions fixed separately for different media.

The key performance requirement of the IPPC directive is Best Available Techniques (BAT). BAT is defined in the directive, but its practical interpretation for industry sectors or installations is left for the member states. In simple terms, the selection of BAT involves balancing the desirability of environmental protection against the costs of achieving it. This is because, within BAT, available is defined as meaning economically and technically viable, taking into consideration costs and advantages. This leaves considerable room for interpretation. As a result BAT does not reflect a single, fixed level of performance, but rather offers scope to weigh various factors in determining the appropriate level of control for a particular circumstance. In this exercise, special consideration must be given to certain factors listed in the directive. These include the use of low-waste technology, the use of less hazardous substances, the furthering of recovery and recycling, the consumption of raw materials and water, and energy efficiency.

Reaching a judgment on BAT is a vital prerequisite to laying down individual permit conditions, and particularly emission limit values (or equivalent parameters or technical measures), which must be set for pollutants likely to be emitted in significant quantities. Such limits usually will be based on BAT, taking into account the technical characteristics of the installation concerned, its geographical location and the local environmental conditions. If attainment of an environmental quality standard would not be provided by BAT alone, then stricter conditions must be included in the permit. All permits must also contain conditions to minimize long-distance and transboundary pollution. An indicative list of the main pollutants for which emission limits may be required is set out in the directive (and includes the main acidifying substances), although this does not mean that limits should not be set for any substances excluded from the list.

The directive additionally specifies a number of general principles of which authorities must take account in determining permit conditions. Specifically, operators must take all appropriate preventive measures against pollution, ensure no significant pollution is caused, avoid waste production and recover or safely dispose of waste produced, use energy efficiently, take measures to prevent accidents, and clean up the site upon cessation of the industrial activity.

Fundamentally, the IPPC directive establishes a procedure and the principles to be applied in setting permit conditions, rather than laying down any explicit operating requirements itself. Considerable discretion is afforded to national authorities, both in determining BAT and in taking account of local factors when setting emission limits.

After initial authorisation under IPPC, any substantial modification to an installation will require further approval. Authorities also must reconsider permit conditions periodically, or immediately in certain cases, such as when excessive pollution occurs or technical developments allow significant emission reductions without excessive cost.

Exchange of Information and Emission Limit Values. The directive requires an exchange of information between member states and the Commission on national assessments of BAT and emission limits. The results of this process are to be published by the Commission. The directive states that this should happen every three years, with the first publication based on data due to be submitted by April 30, 2001. In practice, however, the Commission has already initiated the information exchange. In particular, an IPPC Bureau has been established to support the production of a series of so-called BAT Reference (BREF) notes, which are scheduled to cover all of the main IPPC industry sectors by 2002. Once published, the BREFs are to be taken into account by member states in their own determinations of BAT. The BREFs therefore provide an EU mechanism to inform and influence the consideration of BAT by member states and by extension the emission limits and other controls to be included in permits but without defining any specific levels of performance which must be met.

The exchange of information also may identify the need for action to set EU emission limit values for specific sectors or substances. This would involve the adoption of daughter directives to IPPC through the usual EU legislative procedure. It appears unlikely that any such daughter directives will be established in the foreseeable future, however, as a number of member states argue that they would conflict with the flexibility and site-specific approach embodied in the IPPC directive. In the meantime, the standards specified in various existing EU instruments such as Directive 88/609/EEC on large combustion plants are to serve as minimum emission limit values. This status as minimum requirements means that if an objective assessment of BAT were to determine a stricter obligation, this should be reflected in the IPPC permit.

Public Information and Transboundary Consultation. Member states are required to ensure that applications for IPPC permits are made available for public review and comment before a decision is reached. The decision, the permit, and the results of any monitoring of releases also must be publicly accessible. The requirements for public release of data are subject to the restrictions set out in Directive 90/313/EEC on access to environmental information. This means that material may be withheld from the public on grounds of commercial confidentiality or for certain other reasons.

The directive also addresses transboundary effects. A member state must provide copies of the permit application for an installation in its own territory to any other member state which may suffer a significant negative environmental effect. The member state receiving the application must then allow its own public to comment on the application. This provides a basis for consultation between the member states that are concerned.

The Polluting Emissions Register. An inventory of principal emissions and responsible sources under IPPC is to be published every three years, using data supplied by the member states. The format and particulars of this so-called Polluting Emissions Register have yet to be determined, so it is not presently clear exactly what data it will provide, or to whom.

Strengths and weaknesses
Key strengths and weaknesses of the IPPC directive are shown in the tables below. As noted in the comments columns, many of the points on either side may be tempered by other aspects of the directive or other items of EU legislation.

Summary and conclusions
In one fundamental way IPPC is a significant step forward in EU environmental policy. It marks a shift from medium-specific to multi-media control, by integrating the regulation of industrial emissions to air, water, and land. Moreover, it complements this integrated control of emissions by bringing other important factors, such as energy efficiency and waste minimization, into the frame of regulation. Applied properly, therefore, IPPC should help to promote the increased use of clean and efficient technologies, rather than end-of-pipe approaches which simply shift pollution between media, or prevent emissions at the cost of increased consumption of energy or raw materials.

In some other respects, however, IPPC is a double-edged sword. This is because some potential weaknesses stem directly from the flexibility and reliance on the discretion of national authorities which are central to the design of the directive. On the positive side, we have the latitude offered by IPPC to find the optimal balance of environmental, social, and economic costs, and the best way of applying controls in the light of site-specific factors. A thorough and empowered regulator should be able to make good use of this tool as part of a wider move towards sustainable development. On the negative side, the very same discretion, complemented by more than a touch of ambiguity, means that the end result of applying IPPC is uncertain and potentially open to abuse. An underresourced, under-qualified, incompetent or politically-misdirected regulator could apply the directive to much lesser effect. Safeguards such as environmental quality standards and the production of BREFs provide only limited defence against this, while truly effective EU mechanisms to address such problems are presently lacking.

Overall, the integrated approach of IPPC can be welcomed, together with some of the specific elements of control which the directive introduces. However, we must remember that the directive provides only a framework for industrial regulation, not a detailed prescription of every requirement and procedure to be followed. It does not negate the need for continued efforts in areas such as checking the application and enforcement of EU environmental law, or providing improved access to justice. Nor does it define every end-result to be achieved, so it is not an automatic solution to all of the environmental impacts associated with industry. This is particularly true for issues which have a strong EU or even international dimension, such as acidification or climate change.

It would be unwise simply to cross our fingers and hope that the independent application of IPPC alone by fifteen member states solves our common problems by serendipity. We have to be smarter than that.

NEIL EMMOTT

Research Fellow, Institute for European Environmental Policy, 52 Horseferry Road, London SW1P 2AG, England. Phone +44 171 799 2244. Fax +44 171 799 2600.

¹ OJ L257, 10.10.96.

² OECD Environment Monograph No 37, Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control, April 1991.

Table 1. Strengths

 Table 2. Weaknesses