WRITTEN QUESTION E-2037/02

by Erik Meijer (GUE/NGL) to the Commission

(10 July 2002)

Subject: Major expansion of the airport of the Bulgarian capital Sofia near urban neighbourhoods and residential centres and failure to comply with environmental standards

1. Is the Commission aware that in plans for the building, extension and relocation of airports sites are now sought which are further away than in the past from

large towns and their highly urbanised surroundings, with the aim of preventing noise and air pollution for large groups of residents and reducing the chance of large numbers of victims in the event of an aircraft crashing?

2. Is the Commission also aware of the plans drawn up in 1996 by the British company Sir William Halcrow & Partners, with no regard for the objectives described in point 1, to extend the airport Aerogara Sofia, which is situated near the capital of the applicant country Bulgaria, with, inter alia, a second east-west runway situated parallel with, and north of, the current runway and planned to extend much further east, so that the Sofia districts of Vasil Levski and Hristo Botev in the north-east, the nearby town of Brazjdebna and the residential areas Nova Mahala and Dolni Bogrov to the east of the extended airport will be subject to nuisance and danger?

3. Does the Commission consider the way in which the environmental impact assessment was carried out in September 1996, with the arguments of local authorities and non-governmental organisations being ignored and the noise levels and other effects of a new runway and terminal being studied in isolation, with no consideration of the cumulative effects of these and of activities in the rest of the airport and without envisaging any solution to the existing environmental problems or taking any account of applications from alternative locations, to be compatible with the attitude that might be expected of a (future) EU Member State?

4. Does the Commission believe that the European Union would have reasons to express reservations as to its involvement in this project, given that the environmental impact assessment for the new runway, which was approved subject to twenty conditions in April 2001, states that the water purification system has shortcomings and that anti-freeze products would drain into the ground, surface water and subsoil, that no consideration has been given to the fact that the runway crosses the Via Aristotelis, a bird migration route, that the approach route will pass over the city, that night flights will be authorised between 11 p.m. and 6.30 a.m., that the noise pollution protection plan required by the Ministry of the Environment has been postponed until April 2003, that there is to be no political debate on this plan and that the condition laid down in approving the environmental impact assessment presentation of an action plan for public controls by 15 May 2001 has not been met?

Answer given by Mr Barnier on behalf of the Commission

(27 September 2002)

1. The Commission is aware of the different considerations cited by the Honourable Member with regard to the siting of airports. In all such developments a balance has to be struck between the need to improve airport infrastructures, and thus improve mobility and encourage economic development, and the potential effects on the local environment and population.

2. The original master plan to develop Sofia airport and more recent detailed designs are known to the Commission and include the proposed construction of a new terminal and related infrastructure as well as a new runway.

3. Projects submitted for ISPA assistance must be subject to an assessment of environmental impact similar to that provided for in Council Directive 85/337/EEC of 27 June 1985, as amended by Council Directive 97/11/EC of 3 March 1997 on the assessment of the effects of certain private and public projects on the environment(1).

The request for ISPA co-financing for the Sofia airport project was based on an EIA carried out for the airport master plan in 1996. Although the Commission considered that the main elements had been covered and that the necessary documentation had been submitted in order to satisfy the requirements of the ISPA Regulation(2) it insisted that new environmental impact assessments be carried out, in view of the time that had elapsed since the initial EIA, for all aspects of the project covering the new runway, new terminal and related infrastructure.

The Commission is satisfied that these new EIAs conform with the requirements of the EIA Directive, including the requirements for public consultation.

4. Concerns about the potential environmental impact of this project have already been addressed by the Bulgarian authorities, and points raised during the public consultations have been incorporated into the development consent procedure. The Commission will monitor the implementation of the commitments made by the Bulgarian authorities in the course of the normal procedures for the follow-up of projects assisted under ISPA.

(1) OJ L 73, 14.3.1997.

(2) Council Regulation (EC) 1267/1999 of 21 June 1999 establishing an Instrument for Structural Policies for Pre-accession, OJ L 161, 26.6.1999.