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Keeping the Turow coal mine open for months past an EU court order may cost Poland €68.5 million, with the EU court rejecting a request to annul the fine. [Shutterstock/Peteri]
Warsaw will have to pay €68 million in EU fines over the continued operation of the Turow coal mine despite court orders to the contrary, the EU’s lower court ruled, Wednesday (29 May).
In 2021, the European Commission ordered Warsaw to close down the controversial Turow open-cast coal mine in the German-Czech-Polish border region, saying it was endangering Czech groundwater levels.
When the government failed to comply, the EU executive began levying fines of €500,000 per day – deducting it from EU funds earmarked for the country.
Though Warsaw and Prague settled the case in February 2022, Poland then sought to retroactively cancel the fine, as they had accumulated €68.5 million, by moving for annulment in the EU’s lower chamber court.
“The removal of the case from the register does not relieve Poland of the obligation to settle the amount payable,” the court stressed in a press release today.
Despite the Czechs withdrawing their lawsuit, fines accumulated before this, and could not be annulled – otherwise they would lose the deterrence effect, the court found.
The judgement was welcomed in Prague, with the Czech news agency CTK citing Petra Pinter, a lawyer who’d worked on the case, saying the court “has shown that European law applies equally to all states, and Poland must meet its obligation to pay the sanctions.”
Germany’s Anna Cavazzini, a green EU lawmaker hailing from the region, welcomed the decision, citing Turow’s lack of environmental impact assessment for continued coal mining, planned to run until 2024, she told public broadcaster mdr.
Poland may appeal the judgement, escalating the matter to the EU’s highest court of justice. Online platform Money.pl reports that Warsaw has taken that step.
[Edited by Donagh Cagney/Rajnish Singh]
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BERLIN, May 29 (Reuters) - Germany's cabinet approved on Wednesday a draft bill to allow carbon dioxide capture and storage for some industrial sectors as Europe's biggest economy aims to become carbon neutral by 2045 while keeping heavy industries, government sources said.
Carbon capture and storage, or CCS, removes from the atmosphere carbon dioxide produced by industrial processes or captures it at the point of emission and stores it underground.
In Germany, its use has been restricted, but as Europe's largest CO2 polluter is likely to miss its climate goals, Berlin has reconsidered, estimating the need to capture between 34 million and 73 million tons per year by 2045.
Carbon intensive industries which cannot be electrified, apart from coal-fired power plants, will be able to use the technology, according to the new bill, which will also create a legal framework to develop a CO2 pipeline infrastructure.
Companies will be allowed to store CO2 in the bed of the North Sea or inland if the federal states allow it on their territory. Geologically, Germany has around 1.5 billion to 8.3 billion tons of CO2 storage capacity under its part of the North Sea and could deposit up to 20 million tons annually.
Under the plans, CO2 exports will be allowed but Berlin will need to ratify a clause in the London Protocol international treaty on cross-border waste exports, which was amended in 2009, to allow the transport of CO2 for sub-seabed storage. (Reporting by Riham Alkousaa and Andreas Rinke Editing by Madeline Chambers)
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