Public consultation on the EU Action Plan “Towards a Zero Pollution Ambition for air, water and soil”

This document provides IOGP’s response to the EU public consultation on the EU Action Plan “Towards a Zero Pollution Ambition for air, water and soil”.

The purpose of this open public consultation is to gather the perception and views of Europeans on a range of issues that the Action Plan may address.

IOGP supports the overall strategic direction enshrined in the EU Action Plan Towards a Zero Pollution Ambition for air, water and soil to reduce the environmental footprint of our societal activities while caring for European citizen’s well-being and restoring biodiversity.

It is understood that, in the “zero pollution” approach, “pollution” means actual harm to human health or the quality of the environment (e.g. as in Directive 2010/75/EU, Article 3 §2), and conversely “zero pollution” does not equate to an unrealistic “zero emission” objective.

To achieve further pollution reduction, IOGP would recommend as general principles to:

• Strengthen the implementation, enforcement, and harmonization among Member States of the existing EU legislation
• Conduct thorough impact assessments on all the legislative and non-legislative future proposals
• Ensure stable and predictable regulatory framework that is necessary for long-term investments

The questionnaire is structured as follows:

• Information about the stakeholder
• General awareness of pollution and related policies
• Views on the state of pollution and related policies
• Ways forward to address pollution
• Expert section – Towards an integrated zero pollution monitoring and outlook framework
• Digital solutions for zero pollution