Case C-534/13: Judgment of the Court (Third Chamber) of 4 March 2015 (request for a preliminary ruling from the Consiglio di Stato — Italy) — Ministero dell’Ambiente e della Tutela del Territorio e del Mare and Others v Fipa Group Srl, Tws Automation Srl, Ivan Srl (Reference for a preliminary ruling — Article 191(2) TFEU — Directive 2004/35/EC — Environmental liability — National legislation under which no provision is made for the administrative authorities to require owners of polluted land who have not contributed to that pollution to carry out preventive and remedial measures, and the sole obligation imposed concerns the reimbursement of the measures undertaken by those authorities — Whether compatible with the ‘polluter pays’ principle, the precautionary principle and the principles that preventive action should be taken and that environmental damage should be rectified at source as a matter of priority)
Date: 2015-03-04
Institutions: Court of Justice
Subjects: Italy, environmental liability, environmental monitoring, general legal principle, polluter pays principle, prevention of pollution








C_2015138EN.01001201.xml










27.4.2015   


EN


Official Journal of the European Union


C 138/12





Judgment of the Court (Third Chamber) of 4 March 2015 (request for a preliminary ruling from the Consiglio di Stato — Italy) — Ministero dell’Ambiente e della Tutela del Territorio e del Mare and Others v Fipa Group Srl, Tws Automation Srl, Ivan Srl
(Case C-534/13) (1)

((Reference for a preliminary ruling - Article 191(2) TFEU - Directive 2004/35/EC - Environmental liability - National legislation under which no provision is made for the administrative authorities to require owners of polluted land who have not contributed to that pollution to carry out preventive and remedial measures, and the sole obligation imposed concerns the reimbursement of the measures undertaken by those authorities - Whether compatible with the ‘polluter pays’ principle, the precautionary principle and the principles that preventive action should be taken and that environmental damage should be rectified at source as a matter of priority))
(2015/C 138/14)
Language of the case: Italian

Referring court

Consiglio di Stato

Parties to the main proceedings


Appellants: Ministero dell’Ambiente e della Tutela del Territorio e del Mare, Ministero della Salute, Ispra — Istituto Superiore per la Protezione e la Ricerca Ambientale

Respondents: Fipa Group Srl, Tws Automation Srl, Ivan Srl

Intervening parties: Comune di Massa, Regione Toscana, Provincia di Massa Carrara, Comune di Carrara, Agenzia regionale per la protezione ambientale della Toscana (ARPAT), Ediltecnica Srl, Versalis SpA, Edison SpA

Operative part of the judgment

Directive 2004/35/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 21 April 2004 on environmental liability with regard to the prevention and remedying of environmental damage must be interpreted as not precluding national legislation such as that at issue in the main proceedings, which, in cases where it is impossible to identify the polluter of a plot of land or to have that person adopt remedial measures, does not permit the competent authority to require the owner of the land (who is not responsible for the pollution) to adopt preventive and remedial measures, that person being required merely to reimburse the costs relating to the measures undertaken by the competent authority within the limit of the market value of the site, determined after those measures have been carried out.


(1)  OJ C 359, 7.12.2013.