CELEX: C2007/199/34
Language: en
Date: 2007-08-25 00:00:00
Title: Case C-283/07: Action brought on 12 June 2007 — Commission of the European Communities v Italian Republic

25.8.2007   
            
            
               EN
            
            
               Official Journal of the European Union
            
            
               C 199/22
            
         Action brought on 12 June 2007 — Commission of the European Communities v Italian Republic
   (Case C-283/07)
   (2007/C 199/34)
   Language of the case: Italian
   Parties
   
      Applicant: Commission of the European Communities (represented by: C. Zadra and J.-B. Laignelot, acting as Agents)
   
      Defendant: Italian Republic
   Form of order sought
   
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               declare that, by adopting and maintaining in force provisions such as
               
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                           Article 1(25) to (27) and (29)(a) of Law No 308 of 15 December 2004, and
                        
                     
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                           Article 1(29)(b) of Law No 308 of 15 December 2004 and Articles 183(1)(s) and 229 of Legislative Decree No 152 of 3 April 2006,
                        
                     in accordance with which scrap intended for use in iron and steel and metallurgical activities and high-quality refuse derived fuel (RDF-Q) respectively are immediately removed from the scope of the Italian legislation on waste transposing Council Directive 75/442/EEC of 15 July 1975 on waste (1), as amended by Council Directive 91/156/EEC of 18 March 1991, (2) the Italian Republic has failed to fulfil its obligations under Article 1(a) of that directive;
            
         
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               order the Italian Republic to pay the costs.
            
         Pleas in law and main arguments
   The Commission pleads, in the light of the case-law of the Court, that the provisions laid down in Article 1(25) to (27) and (29) of Law No 308 and Articles 183(1)(s) and 229 of Legislative Decree No 152, in accordance with which scrap intended for use in iron and steel activities and high-quality refuse derived fuel (RDF-Q) are systematically and without more excluded from the definition of waste, have the effect of unduly restricting the definition of waste provided for in Directive 75/442 and consequently the scope of that directive, necessarily detrimental to its practical effect. Such provisions are therefore contrary to the directive itself, from which a provision of national law cannot derogate, and which does not provide for any exclusion from its scope for those objects and substances.
   The exclusion from the definition of waste of scrap intended for use in iron and steel activities and of RDF-Q is laid down by the Italian legislature though the unrebuttable presumption that such objects and substances, as defined in the provisions in question, must always be categorised as raw materials. Such provision unavoidably restricts the dynamic and functional definition provided for by the directive. It precludes the existence of ‘waste’ within the meaning of Directive 75/442 from being ‘determined in the light of all of the circumstances’ which ought, case by case, to establish whether there is waste within the meaning of the directive.
   The systematic exclusion of such residual materials from the scope of the directive is not only detrimental to the practical effect of the directive and, in particular, of the system for monitoring waste management introduced by it to protect the environment, but results in precluding those residual materials from the application of all the environmental legislation the scope of which is specifically defined by reference to the definition of waste laid down in the directive. The potential detrimental effects to the environment of such an exclusion therefore go well beyond those deriving from the non-application of the directive alone.
   
      (1)  OJ L 194 of 25.7.1975, p. 47.
   
      (2)  OJ L 78 of 26.3.1991, p. 32.