Bellona lawsuit reveals legislative holes that prevent environmental impact studies in St. Petersburg and Moscow
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Leningrad NPP
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Russian legal issues
Shown here on the map included in the General Plan of St. Petersburg are zones of possible radioactive contamination in the event of an accident at the Leningrad Nuclear Power Plant.
City Administration of St. Petersburg
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The Smolninsky District’s lawyer, Lidiya Grigoryeva, explained to the court that municipalities in general do not have the authority to register notices about environmental impact studies.
Truly, the process for registering public environmental studies for some reason is not included the list of responsibilities of the municipalities of Moscow or St. Petersburg. Municipal districts’ circle of responsibilities is defined by the federal law “On general principles of organizations of local government.” This law lists nine points, the last of which is called “other authority.”
It is precisely this point, as dictated by accepted practice, that relates to the registration of public environmental impact studies. . In two of Russia’s biggest cities, however, the situation looks different: municipalities are subject to specific local laws that do not make reference to any “other authorities,” and, as such, deprive the municipalities of the the possibility to register public environmental impact studies.
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| The spot for the new nuclear power plant is being prepared ear the existing Leningrad Nuclear Power Plant, which employs four fatally flawed Chernobyl-type RMBK 1000 reactors. |
| Rashid Alimov /Bellona |
This clear gap in Russian legislation has already existed for four years.
“In our practice, such situations (the refusal to register a public environmental impact study) happen constantly,” said Alexander Karpov of the EKOM Expert Centre for the St. Petersburg society of Naturalists.
“The bureaucrats refuse to register a study, motivated by the notion that it is not in their authority to do so. In fact, we depend each day on the good will of municipalities,” he said.
Nevertheless, the obligation of municipal organs to register public environmental studies is iterated in another federal law – “On environmental impact studies.” Because this law is an decree of direct application in relation to all that concerns conducting environmental impact studies, the Smolninsky Municipality did not have the right to ignore it.
“Otherwise it means that the law ‘On environmental impact studies’ does not apply on the territory of the Smolninsky Municipal structure, and, in general, in the territories of Moscow and St. Petersburg,” Bellona lawyer Olga Krivonos said in court Thursday.
Grigoriyeva, her opposing council, agreed: “Yes, it means it does not apply,” she said.
Apparently, the bureaucracies of various departments are at a loss as to how to answer the question – who is supposed to register notices of the conduction of environmental impact studies. In response to an inquiry by Bellona Web to the prosecutors of the natural preservation department of St. Petersburg, the department stated that “these issues do not relate to issues of the local significance of municipal formations.”
In short, the procuracy has deprived St. Petersburg’s public of he right to conduct independent environmental impact studies.
A decision on Bellona’s suit is expected in the Smolninsky court on October 23rd.
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| The engineered life span of the Leningrad Nuclear Power Plants first and second reactors were extended without conducting a state environmental impact study. |
| Rashid Alimov /Bellona |
Government secrecy
The original reason for refusing the registration of the impact study was that the object of the study was included in the list of those installations that are protected by government secrecy, in accord with Presidential Order 1203 of 1995, and late amended in 2008.
“They hide environmental information from us under the pretext of government secrecy. This is a violation of Russian as well as international legislation,” said Krivonos. She added that deciding whether or not something was a state secret is beyond the competence the Smolninsky municipality.
Article 24 of the Russian Constitution guarantees all citizens the right to accurate information on the condition of the environment. A corresponding article is contained in the federal laws “On Environmental Protection,” and “On Information, propagating information, and protection of information.”
“Closing information is all the more unallowable in the circumstances of installations like nuclear power plants, which, during and accident, can contaminate a wide territory and harm millions of people,” said Krivonos.
Environmentalists insist that environmental evaluations of projects and engineering documents must correspond with the highest international standards. A project must pass a public discussion, and non-governmental organisations must have the possibility of conducting independent risk evaluations of construction.
Having been refused at the Smolninsky Municipal District, Bellona submitted notice in the Sosnovy Bor Municipal District, where the environmental impact study notice was successfully registered. Nevertheless, the Bellona decided to achieve an unambiguous decision from the courts regarding the registration refusal it received from the Smolninsky Municipality.
“The refusal to register the impact study could become a dangerous precedent, it run contrary to more than 10-year practice of the law ‘On Environmental Impact Studies.” Said Krivonos.
Simulated openness
“We intend to further insist that construction of such dangerous installations as nuclear power plants do not take place under the stamp of state secrecy,” said Rashid Alimov, editor of Bellona Web’s Russian language pages.
“It is necessary that such projects are at the maximum level of public participation and are open for the participation of the public,” he said.
In the current legislative climate in Russia, it has become nearly impossible to guarantee a high level of public participation and environmental evaluations. In 2007, government environmental impact studies were abolished - and along with them, public hearings.
The hearings on the Leningrad Nuclear Power Plant 2, which took place in February last year, were little more than a cosmetic event that had no legal status.
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| Residents of Sosnovy Bor are complaining that dirt from the site of the new nuclear power plant is being dumped illegally, including into water sources. |
| Rashid Alimov /Bellona |
Despite the insistence of environmentalists, the hearings were conducted only in Sosnovy Bor – the home to the prospective Leningrad Nuclear Power Plant 2 and the current Leningrad Nuclear Power Plant – which is 80 kilometres west of St. Petersburg.
There, it would have been possible to examine the engineering documents of the project. One extra copy of this document was provided for St. Petersburgers’ view at the local Rosatom centre at the edge of town. Visitors were not allowed to Xerox it, though, they were allowed to photograph it. Despite the fact that a city of 5 million people would fall directly in the path of any radiation from the nuclear power plant in the event of an accident, the city’s residents were stripped of the opportunity to even acquaint themselves with the projects documentation.
Sosnovy Bor already has environmental problems of its own: residents say that dirt from the construction site of the Leningrad Power Plant 2 is being illegally dumped in various places, including water sources.
According to Natalya Malevannaya, head of the ecological committee with the Sosnovy Bor administration, nipping violations committed by the nuclear industry in the bud is extremely difficult. In documentation furnished by Rosatom at the hearings, a section on dealing with waste generated by the construction of the plant was entirely absent. And is unknown if the plan is to be found among those documents that were not furnished.
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| The Leningrad Nuclear Power Plant’s third and fourth reactor blocks. |
| Rashid Alimov /Bellona |
The Espoo convention – European standards
One of the mot important documents on the international level regulating environmental evaluation procedures and public hearings is the Espoo Convention on Environmental Impact Assessment in a Trans-boundary Context of 1991. The convention was ratified by 42 countries, which include - beyond Europe – many former Soviet Republics, namely Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia. Each of these counties signed the convention almost immediately, but ratification has not yet come. Environmentalists say ratification is necessary.
“Ratification of the Espoo Convention could lay a beginning to internal changes in Russian legislation: after ratification Russia will be required to provide a mechanism for fulfilling the demands o the convention,” said Krivonos.
The Convention lays out procedures whereby ecological evaluations beginning from various stages of planning, to the adopting of a final decision on the situating and construction of an installation. In accord with the Convention, states are obliged to conduct international consultations and to provide information on all large-scale projects that could have a trans-border effect on the environment. Such projects include, first of all, electrical station, chemical plants, mining facilities, oil and gas pipelines, highways, ports and others.
A country planning to build such an installation on its territory would have to inform its neighbors and provide them with project documentation. Conversely, any nation would have the right to request of its neighbour’s documents relative to such projects, and to participate in public consultations.
As an example, Lithuanian officials – as per the Espoo Convention -- invited six countries to the town of Visaginas, where Vilnius plans to build a nuclear power plant. The invitation list included Russia, Belarus, Estonia, Latvia, Finland and Sweden. Material on the environmental evaluation of the project was also made public on the Internet such that Lithuanians and foreigners alike could learn about the project.
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