European Commission v.United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland

Abstract

The European Court of Justice has condemned the UK for failing to apply limitations of emissions of certain pollutants into the air as required under the 2001 Large Combustion Plants (LCP) Directive 2001/80/EC. The case concerns a coal-fired power plant in Lynemouth that supplies power to a major aluminum smelting work. Under the LCP directive, plants that make direct use of the products of combustion in the manufacturing process are exempted from the emission limits. Since 2006, the UK stopped applying emission limits to the Lyemouth power plant arguing that the energy that it generated was directly used for aluminum production and that it was therefore exempted from the application of the directive. In December 2009 the European Commission declared during a session of the Court that exempting the plant would result in an unjustified competitive advantage in respect of similar aluminum producers in the EU. This statement was backed by Advocate General Kokott who also stated that electricity is not a product of combustion and can therefore not be a product that is directly used in the manufacturing process. The ECJ backed both these statements and ruled that there are no environmental advantages which would justify exempting the power plant from emission limits under the LCP directive.

Full text

European Commission v.United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland 22-04-2010 english.pdf

Website

curia.europa.eu

References

Cites

Directive 2001/80/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council on the limitation of emissions of certain pollutants into the air from large combustion plants

Legislation | European Union | 2001

Keyword: Pollution control, Air quality/air pollution, Emissions, Environmental standards, Standards, Protection of environment

Source: FAO, FAOLEX