Case C-592/13: Order of the Court (Eighth Chamber) of 6 October 2015 (request for a preliminary ruling from the Consiglio di Stato — Italy) — Ministero dell’Ambiente e della Tutela del Territorio e del Mare, Ministero della Salute, Ministero dello Sviluppo economico v Ediltecnica SpA (Reference for a preliminary ruling — Article 99 of the Rules of Procedure of the Court — Article 191(2) TFEU — Directive 2004/35/EC — Environmental liability — National legislation which does not provide for the possibility for the administrator to require the owners of contaminated sites who are not responsible for the contamination to implement preventive and remedial measures and which provides only for the obligation to reimburse the measures carried out by the administration — Compatibility with the ‘polluter pays’ principle, the precautionary principle, the principle of preventive action and the principle that environmental damage should as a priority be rectified at source)
Date: 2015-10-06
Institutions: Court of Justice
Subjects: cost of pollution, decontamination, environmental liability, national law, polluter pays principle, prevention of pollution, soil pollution








C_2016038EN.01001201.xml










1.2.2016   


EN


Official Journal of the European Union


C 38/12





Order of the Court (Eighth Chamber) of 6 October 2015 (request for a preliminary ruling from the Consiglio di Stato — Italy) — Ministero dell’Ambiente e della Tutela del Territorio e del Mare, Ministero della Salute, Ministero dello Sviluppo economico v Ediltecnica SpA
(Case C-592/13) (1)

((Reference for a preliminary ruling - Article 99 of the Rules of Procedure of the Court - Article 191(2) TFEU - Directive 2004/35/EC - Environmental liability - National legislation which does not provide for the possibility for the administrator to require the owners of contaminated sites who are not responsible for the contamination to implement preventive and remedial measures and which provides only for the obligation to reimburse the measures carried out by the administration - Compatibility with the ‘polluter pays’ principle, the precautionary principle, the principle of preventive action and the principle that environmental damage should as a priority be rectified at source))
(2016/C 038/15)
Language of the case: Italian

Referring court

Consiglio di Stato

Parties to the main proceedings


Applicant: Ministero dell’Ambiente e della Tutela del Territorio e del Mare, Ministero della Salute, Ministero dello Sviluppo economico

Defendant: Ediltecnica SpA

Operative part of the order

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 circumstances in which it is impossible to identify the polluter of a site or to have that person adopt remedial measures, do not permit the competent authority to require the owner of that site (who is not responsible for the pollution) to implement preventive and remedial measures, the latter being held responsible only for the reimbursement of expenses related to decontamination measures carried out 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 52, 22.2.2014.