The law-decree “Environmental Protection”

Introduction

On 10 October 2024, the Council of Ministers approved Law-Decree No. 153/2024. It’s been in force since 18 October 2024. The decree is titled “Urgent provisions for the environmental protection of the Country, the streamlining of environmental assessment and authorization procedures, the promotion of the circular economy, and the implementation of measures concerning the remediation of contaminated sites and hydrogeological instability.” The wide and varied spectrum of environmental sectors that the decree affects is evident from its title. The conversion process of Law-Decree No. 153/2024 into law was entrusted to the 8th Permanent Commission (Environment, Ecological Transition, Energy, Public Works, Communications, Technological Innovation) on 29 October 2024.

Subsequently, the text of the Law-Decree, transmitted with amendments by the Commission on 4 December 2024, was then submitted to the Senate, which approved it with amendments on 5 December 2024.

Lastly, on 10 December 2024, the Chamber of Deputies, without making any changes to the Senate version, approved the final version of the Law-decree and converted it into law.

In this article we identify the aims that Decree No. 153/2024 proposes to pursue, as set out in its heading and preamble.

 

...the streamlining of environmental assessment and authorization procedures

The first part of the heading of Law-Decree No. 153/2024 encapsulates what's described in the preamble:

Simplify environmental assessment procedures for the promotion of investments in strategic sectors for the country's development and the timely realization of the aims of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR) and the National Integrated Energy and Climate Plan (PNIEC), also with a view to increasing the degree of independence in energy supplies.

The main instrument Law-Decree No. 153/2024 provides to achieve these aims is rationalizing the EIA and EIA screening procedures. This will promote a sort of “fast track” for priority projects based on the projects’ technical and economic sustainability criteria. Namely, those related to certain categories of renewable energy plants (e.g., wind- or solar-powered plants, high-power photovoltaic, agri-voltaic, onshore wind projects, hydroelectric storage facilities to increase the volumes of storable water, geological storage, capture and transport of CO2 as well as hydroelectric plants up to 10 MW), and to projects of pre-eminent national strategic interest, because of their economic value or because they have significant employment spin-offs.

Upon conversion, the Senate introduced an additional amendment requiring that the EIA application include a new self-declaration concerning the ownership structure of the applicant company, its parent company and the amount of its share capital.

In our previous publication, The novelties of the DL Ambiente, we looked at other procedural “complications” regarding the order of precedence of projects, the phase of documental integrations, and the duration and temporal effectiveness of the EIA and EIA-screening procedures. So here we're going to focus on the Ministry of Culture's renewed role.

For EIAs falling within the state’s jurisdiction, the Ministry of Culture issues its own approval before issuing the final measure. The Ministry of Culture can request further supplementary documents from the proponent. These documents have to be sent within 30 days, extendable for a further 30 days. After that, the EIA request is considered rejected if the supplementary documents are not sent or are still incomplete. This determination also fulfils the function of landscape authorization. That is if the landscape report permits a positive.

 

...promotion of the circular economy

In the preamble, promoting the circular economy – which the heading of the standard actually states as the second aim, but is only referred to in the preamble in fourth position – is related to the following purposes:

Adopt measures that cannot be postponed for the circular economy, with a view to fulfilling the commitments that the country has undertaken at European and international level, as well as aimed at ensuring the better management of materials and waste deriving from the construction of the Genoa breakwater and related works

From the standpoint of fulfilling international and European obligations, Law-Decree No. 153/2024 introduces the provision of greater care and maintenance of the landscape and public green spaces. It includes these activities in the list of those that produce urban waste pursuant to Annex L-quinquies of the Environmental Code, superseding the circulars of the Ministry of Ecological Transition that included these in the category of special waste.

The Senate approved the conversion of Law-Decree No. 153/2024 by adding to Article 224 of the Environmental Code a further provision, stipulating that data on packaging flows must also be acquired from non-consortium operators and including packaging flows taking place within the national territory, in addition to cross-border outbound and inbound flows.

In addition, a provision was added by the Senate that introduces amendments to Law No. 60 of 2022 (so-called Save the Sea Law), concerning the recovery of waste from the sea and inland waters and the promotion of the circular economy. Specifically, the new provision defines specific criteria and modalities to determine the end-of-waste (EoW) status for plastics and other materials accidentally caught or voluntarily collected. Concerning the management of materials and waste from the Genoa breakwater, as a tangible and localized aim, Law-Decree No. 153/2024 incentivizes waste recovery operations and reusing neighbouring materials from the construction of the sub-port tunnel and the Genoa breakwater. It also provides that the mayor, as extraordinary commissioner, should promptly adopt a management plan to reduce landfilling and promote sustainability .

The question arises as to whether, to meet international commitments on the circular economy, it’s sufficient to consider waste from landscape maintenance activities as urban waste – net of the changes that only concern the management of materials in the Genoa harbour area. And whether instead the changes introduced by Law-Decree No. 153/2024 might have been an opportunity to intervene in advance of the transposition of European directives on eco-design.

 

 

...the implementation of interventions in the field of contaminated site remediation and hydrogeological instability

The heading of the provision condenses two other aims inferable from the preamble of the Law-Decree into an extremely concise formulation, in particular the third (on hydrogeological instability) and the fifth (on land remediation):

Introduce provisions for soil and water sustainability aimed at preventing the occurrence of emergency events, including through the adoption of measures to ensure the provision of a systematic knowledge framework to oversee the implementation of soil protection and hydrogeological instability interventions.

Simplification of the clean-up procedures for polluted sites and the strengthening of administrative capacities, in order to enable the aims of the PNRR and the redevelopment of these sites to be achieved within the set deadlines.

With regard to the first of these two further aims, the Law-Decree provides for changes to the previous environmental discipline with reference to both managing water resources and soil protection. These two areas of environmental discipline reform are united by the cause that led the national legislator to take action: the prevention of “emergency events” linked to climate change. It's believed this includes both the water crisis and drought events, as well as extreme weather events (floods).

With regard to managing water resources, the Law-Decree introduces in the Environmental Code the definition of “refined waters.” They include urban, domestic and industrial wastewaters treated according to Annex 5 to Part Three of the Environmental Code and subjected to further treatment in refining plants. This is so the wastewaters comply with the microbiological and chemical limits established by the regulations that allow their reuse (e.g., irrigation, industrial uses).

Article 3 of the Law-Decree specifies that the competent authority, during a water crisis, can authorize the artificial recharging of aquifers (by recharging or artificially augmenting underground bodies). They can use water from surface or underground sources, including refined waters, to balance consumption and prevent the degradation or depletion of water resources, especially in the case of low natural recharging capacity of aquifers.

With reference to the prevention of hydrogeological instability, Law-Decree No. 153/2024 defines a sort of program of actions. The aim is to improve the interoperability between databases to favour sharing information between institutions. And it should also give the Presidents of the Regions greater decision-making powers, acting as commissioners for the optimal management of resources. But, in the absence of detailed implementing provisions, the applicability of these policy statements is left to the local operational level.

The fifth aim in the preamble of the Law-Decree relates to the remediation procedures of polluted sites to achieve the redevelopment aims in the PNRR. The Law-Decree focuses on regulating so-called orphan sites (i.e., contaminated areas for which there's no identifiable person responsible for the intervention or the owner of the site or any other interested party does not take action). In particular, the amendments concern:

• The characterization plan, which in orphan sites may be agreed with the competent ARPA, which will have 30 days to express its opinion. If no reply is received, ISPRA can approve the plan within 15 days from the proposer's transmission.
• The results of the characterization surveys, the site-specific environmental health risk analysis and the clean-up intervention project, all of which can be approved together.

Still on the topic of the remediation of polluted sites, with an ad hoc provision, the Law-Decree amends Law-Decree No. 145/2013 as converted by Law No. 9/2014. It establishes a support structure for the Extraordinary Commissioner for the Crotone-Cassano and Cerchiara Site of National Interest (SIN), with the aim of accelerating its remediation activities. The plan envisages the implementation of measures to solve environmental problems by 31 December 2029, facilitating the remediation of polluted areas.

Again, the provisions in the Decree only seem to partially meet the ambitious goals proclaimed in the preamble. Though with regard to water management, the introduction of the possibility of artificially recharging aquifers is a significant new element.

 

Purposes not mentioned under the heading

Two other purposes of the preamble aren't mentioned in the heading of the law-decree: the second and sixth.

Ensuring certainty in the regulatory framework for hydrocarbon exploration and production, so as to combine the requirements of environmental protection with those of energy supply security.

Ensuring the strengthening of the administrative capacities of public authorities working in the fields of environment and energy security.

With regard to the aim dedicated to the hydrocarbon exploration and production sector, Article 2 of the Law-Decree concerns “urgent provisions to combine environmental protection requirements with security of supply requirements.” It bans the possibility of awarding new concessions for the exploration and extraction of liquid hydrocarbons. The only permitted extractions are those allowed on the basis of concessions granted before 18 October 2024 or those which were to be granted before that date. The possibility exploiting the concessions is provided for the useful life of the reservoir. With regard to extensions, the authority has to take into account the available reserves and the mining potential still to be produced. A process of re-parameterization has been introduced for areas that are no longer essential, reducing the concession areas to only those that are still relevant for the planned activities.

With regard to the aim on strengthening the administrative capacities of the public authorities in charge of environmental protection and energy security, the Law-Decree dictates a series of “organizational” provisions. They include simplifying the identification of the Technical Waste Management Manager of small enterprises and strengthening the Register of Environmental Managers.