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For decades, the European Union has affected spatial planning in the member states through its environmental policies. To investigate the mechanism by which EU policy becomes joined up to spatial planning, we invoke the concept of 'coupling' from systems and organizational science. We show that coupling is established not only at the EU policymaking level (e.g. within a directive's text), but also during implementation and enforcement. Consequently, it is possible to actively 'manage' coupling either by enhancing its flexibility on paper or by limiting its activation in practice. Drawing on three case studies in the Netherlands, we show that various (de)coupling strategies can be applied, but none are completely satisfactory or risk-free. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article provides updates on various environmental issues and legislation, including Private Members' Bills in the UK Parliament addressing marine biodiversity conservation, heritage tree protection, and water quality monitoring. It also discusses the outcomes of COP28, highlighting fossil fuel emissions as a driver of climate change. The article mentions ongoing legal challenges related to the UK's National Adaptation Programme and the development of the Rosebank North Sea oilfield. It concludes with a summary of recent domestic case law related to environmental information disclosure. The article is concise, factually accurate, and respectful of diverse perspectives, making it suitable for library patrons conducting research on these specific topics. [Extracted from the article]

• Explored the impact of environmental policies on nuclear trade within the EU. • Uncovered connection between environmental policies and nuclear trade relationships. • Countries pursuing environmental policies rely less on nuclear-related imports. • Nuclear trade rises as EU environmental policies align. • Environmentally friendly exporting countries shape the nuclear trade network evolution. This study explores the impact of environmental policies on nuclear trade between European Union (EU) countries. The primary research question revolves around understanding the reasons behind and the mechanisms through which nuclear trade relationships evolve. Our analysis uncovers a compelling connection between the degree of alignment in environmental policies among EU states and the emergence of nuclear trade cooperation. Furthermore, it indicates that countries actively pursuing environmental policies tend to have a reduced dependency on imports of nuclear-related goods. Notably, as environmental policies across the EU converge and become more similar, there is a noticeable inclination to engage in nuclear trade activities. Additionally, our research highlights the significant role played by exporting countries that have strong commitments to environmentally friendly policies in shaping the evolution of the nuclear trade network over time. Moreover, we observe that economic factors have a positive impact on the development of this intricate trade network. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, the debate over the need to address ecological and social concerns has grown substantially. Phenomena such as the Gilets Jaunes in France or the ecological versus social disputes in industrial sites (such as, for example, the ILVA steel plant in Taranto) have constituted a trade-off in terms of potentially conflicting policies, making the understanding of the various underlying preferences very important. Furthermore, growing environmental concerns have challenged more traditional views anchored on the predominance of social and employment concerns. The article, in line with the research questions raised in the introduction of the Symposium, intends to contribute to the above-mentioned debate addressing the following questions: did the European Union take an 'eco-social' path? If so, how and why? The article illustrates the growing intertwining of social and environmental policies at the EU level and tries to explain its genesis by focusing on the role of the various actors involved. The main argument is that the European Commission, and in particular the President of the Commission, developed an eco-social agenda in order to obtain further institutional (i.e. internal) and socio-political (i.e. external) legitimation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Environmental sustainability has been a key policy goal of the European Union (EU), particularly under recent EU Cohesion Policy strategic frameworks. This paper contributes to the analysis of the relevance of EU Cohesion Policy-related environmental sustainability investments, by assessing the impacts of the Operational Programme for Sustainability and Use of Resources (POSEUR 2014–2020), in the Portuguese North NUTS II. In detail, the impact scores of the following five analytical dimensions related to this programme were obtained: (i) low-emissions economy, (ii) adaptation to climate change, (iii) risk prevention and management, (iv) environmental protection and (v) resource efficiency. The analysis was supported by a territorial impact assessment methodology (TARGET_TIA) which was complemented by an online analytic geographic information system (GIS) policy evaluation platform (Impact-WEB_GIS). The results showed that the POSEUR's regional implementation efficiency fell short of the stakeholders' expectations. This can be explained by factors such as the obstacles posed by the prior underdeveloped infrastructural conditions, coupled with the panorama created by the Covid-19 outbreak. Nonetheless, the risk prevention and management dimension had a solid positive impact score that reflected the efficacy of POSEUR in tackling environmental threats, mostly in rural ecosystems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Emissions trading schemes (ETS) have spread across the globe to tackle climate change. However, limited attention has been given to how ETS characteristics and designs differ and why. We use the concept of institutional complementarity to explore how the EU ETS and South Korea's ETS (K‐ETS) adapt to complement established political economy. The EU ETS is characterized as a market with stakeholder ownership, while the K‐ETS is more regulatory in nature with government leadership. The EU ETS complements a decentralized political system with liberalized energy market, and the K‐ETS became compatible with the centralized majoritarian politics and a regulated electricity market. The ETSs have evolved incrementally, and they are not likely to link in the foreseeable future due to divergence. We suggest a strong focus on "how to adapt" an ETS to its own institution rather than adopting the established blueprint model in countries with a strong regulatory style of governance. Related Articles: Caliskan, Cantay. 2020. "The Influence of Elite Networks on Green Policy Making." Politics & Policy 48(6): 1104–37. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12382. Tanaka, Yugo, Andrew Chapman, Tetsuo Tezuka, and Shigeki Sakurai. 2020. "Multiple Streams and Power Sector Policy Change: Evidence from the Feed‐In Tariff Policy Process in Japan." Politics & Policy 48(3): 464–89. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12357. von Malmborg, Fredrik. 2023. "Combining the Advocacy Coalition Framework and Argumentative Discourse Analysis: The Case of the 'Energy Efficiency First' Principle in EU Energy and Climate Policy." Politics & Policy 51(2): 222–41. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12525. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The given text provides a comprehensive list of ongoing consultations, legal cases, and reports related to various environmental issues in the UK. The consultations cover topics such as air and water quality, renewable energy, waste management, and fisheries management. The legal cases involve disputes over issues such as pollution, energy assessments, and bin-related offenses. The reports highlight concerns and recommendations on topics such as nuclear energy, decarbonization, and environmental regulations. [Extracted from the article]

The European Union is increasingly resorting to a decentralised enforcement strategy in which it relies less on the Commission-initiated infringement procedure, and more on domestic litigation by particularly NGOs. In order to better understand whether this is a suitable strategy to tackle the compliance deficit, we need more insight into NGOs as decentralised enforcers of EU law. What do NGOs do to stimulate domestic compliance, and is this a potentially effective alternative to the centralised enforcement strategies? Analysing the actions by the German NGO Deutsche Umwelthilfe in relation to the Ambient Air Quality Directive, reveals high potential for the role to be played by NGOs. This exploratory case illustrates that particularly the strategy of flooding the country with a wave of legal proceedings was effective in increasing the salience of the topic, thereby indirectly releasing those capacities that the authorities had still lacked to comply. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article assesses how environmental issues have been incorporated into the strategic association between the European Union and Latin America and the Caribbean. It analyses whether the 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals are reflected in the EU-CELAC declarations, and what bi-regional programmes and projects have been developed in relation to the environmental SDGs. The analysis shows how the environment has become a key priority in both the political dialogue and development cooperation pillars, although it has only recently been included in the trade pillar, and in an incipient way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is the European Union's main instrument for agricultural planning, with a new reform approved for 2023–2027. The CAP intends to align with the European Green Deal (EGD), a set of policy initiatives underpinning sustainable development and climate neutrality in the European Union (EU), but several flaws cast doubts about the compatibility of the objectives of these 2 policies. We reviewed recent literature on the potential of CAP environmental objectives for integration with the EGD: protection of biodiversity, climate change mitigation and adaptation, and sustainable management of natural resources. The CAP lacks appropriate planning measures, furthering instead risks to biodiversity and ecosystem services driven by landscape and biotic homogenization. Funding allocation mechanisms are not tailored to mitigate agricultural emissions, decreasing the efficiency of climate mitigation actions. The legislation subsidies farmers making extensive use of synthetic inputs without adequately supporting organic production, hindering the transition toward sustainable practices. We recommend proper control mechanisms be introduced in CAP Strategic Plans from each member state to ensure the EU is set on a sustainable production and consumption path. These include proportional assignment of funds to each CAP objective, quantitative targets to set goals and evidence‐based interventions, and relevant indicators to facilitate effective monitoring of environmental performance. Both the CAP and the EGD should maintain ambitious environmental commitments in the face of crisis to avoid further degradation of the natural resources on which production systems stand. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper draws on fieldwork in rural Ireland to argue that environmental data can reinforce knowledge systems that shield structural problems and blunt efforts to rethink the role of community engagement in environmental governance. It offers a cautionary reading of how data has been instrumentalised by the EU and Irish State by showing how data diffuses responsibility and depoliticises environmental activism in cycles of funding and data collection. Since the 2000 Water Framework Directive, water governance in the European Union has increasingly relied upon extensive scientific, evidence-based decision-making and community and stakeholder involvement. We explore how these changes shape efforts to document and remediate water pollution. We expand upon Shapiro et al.'s (2018)'s "data treadmill" to understand how data rescales responsibility for pollution and its effects. The "data treadmill" gives name to cycles of data and funding that propel logics and strategies of environmental governance. We show how the data treadmill operates by perpetuating a narrative that effective action requires more precise data and evidence and solves questions of responsibility through bespoke approaches to environmental pollution. The data treadmill constrains communities through prevailing logics that surround data and environmental governance: communities become tied into European funding programmes that require, on one hand, the expertise of various professionals and consultants, on the other, place-based knowledge and social relationships to deliver innovative responses to structural problems. We offer a critical analysis of current institutional and policy in the EU and Ireland to highlight perils and contradictions of data-centric environmental governance as practiced. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During recent years plastics became one of the focuses of EU policy. A harmonisation and comparability of microplastics monitoring results across Europe is needed. The complexity of microplastic data makes it necessary to develop a specific, tailor-made database rather than adapting and modifying one of the existing databases. To meet this demand, we present a publicly accessible, flexible, and extendable structured relational database for particle-based microplastic data. The developed relational database is adaptive and meets the specific demands of microplastics, e.g., a large variety of sampling, processing and analytical methods, many types of plastics, and a very wide size spectrum ranging from micrometres to millimetres. In this paper we discuss the development of the database, data entry specifics, sample analysis methods, microplastics data manipulation and quality assurance, and database integration and accessibility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Through specific legislation such as Regulation no. 2078/92 and policies like Agenda 2000, the European Union has directed financial support towards farms that are adapting their production processes to use less fertilisers and pesticides and which, consequently, have a lower impact on the environment. In this vein, European farmers are being incentivised to follow organic farming methods and participate in other agri-environmental policies aimed at reducing the use of chemicals in agriculture. In the literature, this concern with the use of pesticides is reflected by several studies that have used a quantitative approach to investigate the environmental effects of chemical inputs and the impact of agri-environmental subsidies on technical efficiency in farms. Nevertheless, there is a gap in knowledge in assessing the effect on technical efficiency in farms of completely eliminating the use of chemical products. The purpose of this research, then, was to analyse the effect on technical efficiency of a radical reduction in the use of pesticides in Italian farms, using sample data from the Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN) for the period 2004 to 2019, investigated in function of the different specialisation and economic size of the farms included in the data set. The level of technical efficiency in the farms included in the sample has been assessed through a non-parametric approach, using Data Envelopment Analysis in two stages, both with and then without the use of pesticides. The research findings have shown that a radical reduction in pesticides in Italian farms has had a direct impact on farms, reducing their level of technical efficiency. In particular, the results show that farms of a small economic size have suffered the greatest drop in technical efficiency. Meanwhile, the specialisation of the farm production has differently influenced the effect of a reduction in the use of chemical pesticides and fertilisers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This editorial discusses an alarming issue in the time of climate change: climate mobilities and, particularly, forced climate migration and the need for climate refuge and climate asylum. The focus is on the European Union (EU) where migration and asylum policies are being currently developed under the 'New Pact', yet with little intention to relate with climate mobilities of any kind. Neither does the EU's environmental and climate policy Green Deal give much attention to human mobility. At the same time, the EU has commenced many briefings on the topic, which shows that the subject matter itself is well known. The editorial hence asks, where is climate asylum if not in the EU, and when, if not at this juncture of creating new asylum policies? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the literature on the subject, it is argued that tax policy is one of the tools stimulating the transition toward sustainable economies. Public authorities can use two functions for this purpose: fiscal and non-fiscal functions. High emission rates and the rising rapid atmospheric changes that come with them are serious threats to the climate and sustainable development. Reducing greenhouse gas emissions is one of the goals towards which the world strives (including the EU), so as to keep a balance between people's expectations, economic aspects, and the needs of the environment. Therefore, it is necessary to explain whether, along with other factors, environmental policy and its component "green taxes" can act as a factor in limiting greenhouse gas emissions. The purpose of this article is to seek an answer to the question of whether "green taxes" as an instrument of tax policy are a significant factor influencing climate change by contributing to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. This article attempts to identify the determinants of greenhouse gas emissions (the dependent variable) using the method of linear regression analysis. Multiple linear regression models are used to predict the value of the dependent variable based on the values of the independent variables (identified from the literature). Trading of CO2 emissions was not included in the analysis due to lack of data. The regression analysis was carried out using specialized statistical software (SPSS). The authors negatively verified the hypothesis that environmental taxes are a significant determinant of greenhouse gas emission reductions compared to the analyzed determinants. "Population", "current and capital transfers for environmental protection", and "supply, transformation and consumption of solid fossil fuels" are the most important factors influencing greenhouse gas emissions. Changing consumer behavior (as an effect of the non-fiscal function of taxes) appears to be an extremely important factor in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Hence, the public authorities should promote behaviors conducive to their reduction by means of incentives, and not mainly taxation of negative behavior or fiscal incentives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A32022D1244&qid=1666536011124 Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2022/1203 of 12 July 2022 amending Implementing Regul... Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2016/1141 (2) establishes a list of invasive alien species of Union concern ("the Union list"), which is to be kept updated as appropriate, in accordance with Article 4(2) of Regulation (EU) No 1143/2014. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A32022R1203&qid=1666536011124 Commission Decision (EU) 2022/1229 of 11 July 2022 amending Decisions 2014/312/EU, 2014/391/E... Regulation (EC) No 66/2010 provides that the EU Ecolabel may be awarded to products with a reduced environmental impact during their entire life cycle. Keywords: Environmental law; Environmental policy; EU law; Environment; European Union EN Environmental law Environmental policy EU law Environment European Union 321 342 22 12/06/22 20221201 NES 221201 EDITORIAL Amidst what was a plethora of resignations and subsequent appointments (many times over) and a virtual rotating door of Prime Ministers it is surprising that any meaningful work was done in respect of the environment. Https://environment.yale.edu/news/article/architect-paris-agreement-discusses-nexus-law-and-climate-change "UK environment laws under threat in "deregulatory free-for-all"", The Guardian, 23 September... Hundreds of Britain's environmental laws covering water quality, sewage pollution, clean air, habitat protections and the use of pesticides are lined up for removal from UK law under a government bill. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/sep/23/uk-environment-laws-under-threat-in-deregulatory-free-for-all. [Extracted from the article]

While political environmentalism played an important role in social mobilization against communist regimes in Central and Eastern Europe before 1989, throughout the 1990s and early 2000s conservationism appeared to be in decline across the region, and external pressure from European institutions and Western donors influenced environmental policy. What explains the effectiveness of protest since the environmental movement emerged in the 1980s? We trace the emergence and evolution of Polish political environmentalism, looking at three levels of the environmental movement's legitimacy: the level of practices, societal support, and discourse. Each phase identified between 1980s and 2017 saw shifts on different levels of legitimacy, and each ended with a spectacular environmental protest or a decision, bearing implications for the following phase. Since 2010, we see a deep polarization of Polish politics, limiting the effectiveness of environmental protest despite the movement's regained triple legitimacy in large parts of the society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between the environment and climate change on one hand and the financial system, financial regulation and monetary policy on the other is growing in importance. This paper examines the possible impact of the European Central Bank's monetary policy of quantitative easing on the environmental policy of the European Union. Using data from Climate Bonds Initiative, the paper analyses the variation in the amount of "green labelled bonds" issued in the individual member countries of the Eurozone areas, as a function of liquidity inducing monetary policy variables. The paper finds a positive and significant relationship between the two measures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nowadays, increased urbanization is visible in most European Union countries. At the same time, it can be noticed that in the studied period (2000–2018), GDP per capita increased, and CO 2 emissions per capita and energy consumption per capita decreased. These trends should be assessed in an unequivocally positive way. Considering these trends, especially with regard to economic development, our research goal is to answer the following questions: is there a long-run relationship between urbanization, energy consumption, economic growth, and carbon dioxide emissions, and what roles do urbanization and energy consumption play in the concept of the environmental Kuznets curve? This study aims to contribute to this growing area of research by exploring the European Union countries in the period covering the accession of new member states from Central Europe that needs intensifying European environmental policy. In order to test cointegration, we used Pedroni and Westerlund's panel tests. To estimate the long-run coefficients, we employed the FMOLS, MG, CCEMG, and AMG tests. Our findings confirmed the long-run relationship between variables. We find that urbanization has a high negative impact on carbon dioxide emissions per capita. Interestingly, our studies' results differ from those in most of the previously published articles about European countries. For this reason, our results provide a new insight for policymakers in European Union institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As an overarching goal of the European Union's (EU) policies, sustainable development has become one of the trickiest challenges in the EU. Despite the burgeoning literature on sustainable development in EU member states, few studies have explored the relationship between green cooperation and sustainable development. From the resource orchestration perspective, we aim to investigate how EU green cooperation affects member states' pursuit of sustainable development. Empirically, we constructed a sample of well-documented EU joint green projects, and found that the participation of the higher education sector (HES), business sector (BUS), and government (GOV) in EU green cooperation contributes to achieving its member states' sustainable development goals in different ways. Specifically, the contributions of the HES and BUS, compared to those of the GOV, are more essential for EU green cooperation projects, because of their dominant roles in green knowledge generation and carbon emissions make them pivotal for the EU member states' sustainable development. Moreover, our findings suggest that green cooperation among the HES, BUS, and GOV has a more significant impact on EU member states' sustainable development when those states possess a stronger capacity for transnational knowledge spillovers and a higher national digital level. These findings have important implications for the design of green policies in pursuit of sustainability within the EU region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Green energy policies have spread globally, as a means to promote societal transition towards more sustainable pathways of growth. In this framework, the European Union posed as a key actor, identifying the promotion of green energy policies as a cornerstone of all its strategies for green transition. While the literature has generally recognised the ongoing harmonisation process, still scant attention has been paid to the assessment of differentials in the diffusion of policies promoting various typologies of renewable energy sources. Moreover, the role of domestic factors tends to be overlooked. Based on these premises, the present research has aimed to study the role played by both policy diffusion mechanisms and adopting countries' characteristics for explaining the emulation of renewable energy policies. Our main results show that coercion enhances the likelihood of policy emulation, while the other mechanisms differently influence the policymaking process, based on the typology of renewable and on the level of development of the country. These results set the stage for relevant policy implications for promoting coordination and abatement of normative barriers existing among EU Member States. These recommendations become even more relevant given the unprecedented investments planned by the EU through the REpowerEU plan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ongoing transformation of the Polish power sector have been shaped by a number of factors. In this article, both external conditions for the Polish energy market—such as the country's membership in the European Union—and internal ones—including domestic energy resources and demand for electricity, or the structure of the Polish economy—have been analysed. This study focuses specifically on the issue of development of clean generation technologies as these are fundamental to the energy-transition process. Its determinants have been examined empirically. To this end, econometric models have been developed using sectoral data from the Polish electric power industry. Improvements in technology have been measured as innovation inputs, that is, RD&D investments in environmental technologies. Explanatory variables encompass economic as well as institutional measures: energy price, environmental policy stringency, long-term interest rate, market concentration and protection of intellectual property rights. The findings obtained point to a positive impact of the variables named on the innovative activity in Poland, with the exception of market concentration, which was proven to be statistically insignificant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The constant rise in the consumption of resources puts the environment under pressure. Most resources are non-renewable in nature, which is why they must be utilized with great care. For this reason, the European Union devotes increasingly more attention to their efficient use. It deals with these aspects, making an effort to maintain the long-term competitiveness and to secure sustainable development in line with all of the related environmental impacts. In this context, several goals have been set out, to which the individual EU member states are bound. A method for monitoring resource efficiency was developed, consisting of indicators, the aim of which is to assess the efficiency of the use of soil, water, energy, with the most fundamental one being resource productivity. The results of the efficiency of use of the individual resources in the member states greatly differ, even without further investigating the links and correlations between the indicators. Research on the interrelationships of the individual indicators in terms of mutual influence has not yet been completed. The aim of our study was to define the correlation between the main indicator, resource productivity, and the other indicators at the level of the EU and its member states. For this purpose, we prepared a database with data which, for the sake of uniformity, were obtained from the publicly available Eurostat database. Subsequently, the data were analyzed and evaluated using the statistical software JMP 15 by a regression and correlation analysis. By using the multiple regression analysis, we created a model describing the significance of the impact of the observed variables on the resulting resource productivity of the EU member states. Generally, there is a positive correlation between the resource productivity and the Eco-Innovation index, as well as the utilization rate of recycled materials. For the sake of comparison, we developed a regression model at the level of the V4 countries, with the aim of evaluating the impact of the historical background of the countries on their contemporary ability to reach the goals set out by the environmental policy. The V4 countries are lagging far behind in meeting all of the environmental policy objectives, not only in tracking the main indicator (resource productivity) on which the multiple regression analysis is based. It was interesting to find that the multiple regression model at the V4 level does not include the indicators defined by the EU level model, the key ones, in this case, being water productivity, energy dependence, energy productivity, and environmental tax. This finding may also, after further analyses, be the key for other countries joining the EU in the future, in defining the weaknesses of the newly acceding states in terms of the EU's move towards a circular economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With its European Green Deal and the new European Climate Law, the EU has given itself a daunting challenge and a legal obligation to achieve a net 55% reduction of greenhouse gases by 2030 and full climate neutrality by 2050. In order to do this, it has to figure out not only how but also where such large reductions can be made. While the EU has a robust mechanism in its regulatory toolbox for achieving emissions reductions in the form of its Emissions Trading System, at the present moment the ETS does not cover the agricultural sector, which currently amounts to a full 10% of its total greenhouse gas emissions. To date, the EU has been troublingly unsuccessful at effectively reducing its agricultural emissions, though, and this will need to change in order for it to meet its goals by 2030 and 2050. Although the European Commission has not (yet) announced any formal intention to include agriculture into the ETS, it is worth evaluating the prospect of it doing so given the urgency of the present moment and the pressure on the EU to carefully consider any emissions reduction option that is available to it. This paper, therefore, contributes to this discussion by assessing the legal prospect of incorporating the EU's agricultural sector into its ETS. Its primary argument is that while doing so will require complex economic calculations along with some difficult political decision-making, from a legal perspective it would be very feasible and could even bring a number of regulatory and policy 'win-wins' in its wake. The EU's broader legal framework would be quite permissive of it if it does not upset the internal marketplace, and finding the right way to do it could bring the EU's emissions reduction, agricultural and environmental policy goals into closer alignment in ways that its current policy and regulatory frames do not. Furthermore, the ETS was intentionally designed to be a flexible mechanism and it has already demonstrated its ability to be re-tooled to address different economic sectors and new gases, and there is little indication that modifying it to apply to agricultural emissions would be beyond its capacity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper aimed to present the research results on some environmental challenges and priorities of climate resilience. The research work was carried out in 2021 and referred to the analysis of the transcendence character corresponding to the environmental policies according to the strategic guidelines of recovery and resilience for sustainable development and green transition. Although sustainable development of the Romanian water sector has been approached in the past, the present paper has new research related to the water security and its role in building the climate resilience of agriculture and rural development in the European Union and our country. From a methodological view, there are used accumulations and outcomes from the specialty literature, from previous researches, the own data processing in figures and tables to describe some conceptual relationships, comparative analyses of the developmental state and the climatic vulnerability of the Romanian water infrastructure sector. The conclusions and recommendations highlight backlogs, needs and opportunities in the context of implementing the European Green Deal and the National Recovery and Resilience Plan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The European Union's 2030 climate and energy package introduced fundamental changes compared to its 2020 predecessor. These changes included a stronger focus on the internal market and an increased emphasis on technology-neutral decarbonization while simultaneously de-emphasizing the renewables target. This article investigates whether changes in domestic policy strategies of leading member states in European climate policy preceded the observed changes in EU policy. Disaggregating strategic change into changes in different elements (goals, objectives, instrumental logic), allows us to go beyond analyzing the relative prioritization of different goals, and to analyze how policy requirements for reaching those goals were dynamically redefined over time. To this end, we introduce a new method, which based on insights from social network analysis, enables us to systematically trace those strategic chances. We find that shifts in national strategies of the investigated member states preceded the shift in EU policy. In particular, countries reframed their understanding of supply security, and pushed for the internal electricity market also as a security measure to balance fluctuating renewables. Hence, the increasing focus on markets and market integration in the European 2030 package echoed the increasingly central role of the internal market for electricity supply security in national strategies. These findings also highlight that countries dynamically redefined their goals relative to the different phases of the energy transition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Extractive activities constitute an essential strategic sector in the renewable transformation of the new energy model that the European Union is ambitiously promoting through numerous regulatory and strategic instruments in the last five years from the Paris Agreement until the recent approval of the proposed regulatory package "Fit for 55" and the European Climate Law, with the aim of achieving climate neutrality in 2050. To achieve this objective, the so-called critical mineral resources (CRM, critical raw materials) constitute a key element related to climate change and the development of renewable technologies of the new energy model, once again placing these activities at the center of the history of industrial and economic transformations, this time in the 21st century. Despite the impetus and attention from the European Union, through the EU Action Plan on minerals and raw materials essential for the development of strategic sectors and the promotion of their extraction, in Spain we continue in a regime of exceptionality and constitutional abnormality before the still pending Law of Bases of the Mining Regime (art. 149.1.25) that adapts the preconstitutional Law of 1973 to the organization and competences of the Autonomous State, and that dynamizes and promotes a new intelligent and environmentally climatic mining (Smart Mining) both with a current regulation in the granting of permits and concessions, as happens in the legislation of neighboring countries, as well as with the introduction of technologies that facilitate the search for resources with new prospecting methods and the resolution of mineral problems and improvement of the final products. However, maintaining a tradition of the Governments in Spain of the absence of regulatory predetermination and great discretion in their actions and decisions, paradoxically these activities have not received the slightest attention in the three pillars of our Strategic Framework for Energy and Climate, leaving a mere very punctual mention, and also in a prohibitive sense, in the recent Law on Climate Change and Energy Transition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Keywords: Environmental law; Environmental policy; EU law; Subject; Environment; Other related subjects; European Union EN Environmental law Environmental policy EU law Subject Environment Other related subjects European Union 52 81 30 03/22/22 20220301 NES 220301 EDITORIAL The government's beleaguered flagship I Environment Act 2021 i has finally received royal assent. Https://www.bailii.org/scot/cases/ScotCS/2021/2021 CSOH 112.html EU CASE LAW PlasticsEurope v European Chemicals Agency, Appeal C-876/19 P, Judgment of the Court (Ninth C... The European Court of Justice dismissed a final appeal by the trade association PlasticsEurope against EU regulators' decision to class bisphenol-A (BPA) as a "substance of very high concern" due to its endocrine disrupting properties. Https://curia.europa.eu/juris/liste.jsf?language=en&td=ALL&num=C-373/20 Biofa AG v Sikma D. Vertriebs GmbH und Co. KG, C-29/20, Judgment of the Court (First Chamber)... This request for a preliminary ruling concerned the interpretation of Articles 3(1)(a) and 9(1)(a) of Regulation (EU) No 528/2012 concerning the making available on the market and use of biocidal products. [Extracted from the article]

The ongoing invasion of Russia of Ukraine and energy crises have sparked concern about economic and geopolitical stability all over the world. In Europe, the war has destabilized and endangered the energy cooperation and transition between European countries within and outside of the EU. This emergency has shown once more the importance of energy resilience policies to offset the vulnerability of energy systems and energy insecurity at the national and regional levels. Consilience has been reached on the necessity of enhancing EU energy security as an adaptation strategy. This work contributes to the existing scholarship on renewable energy transition and citizens' perception, focusing on European Union member states. Key characteristics of the renewable energy transition in the EU prior to the energy crisis and the war in Ukraine are examined. To this end, we analyze selected economic, environmental, social, policy and political variables on energy sorting from the Eurobarometer studying European citizens' perceptions. The exercise makes use of spatially-clustered regression to explore spatial heterogeneity and to elicit determinant information on specific regional groups. We learn that southern Europeans attribute less importance to energy infrastructure to facilitate the renewable energy transition and repute the EU solidity not a requirement for energy security access. Conversely, northern European citizens tend not to associate the responsibility of the EU in guiding competitiveness and policy toward green energy sources transformation. Robustness tests confirm our hypothesis. Regardless of regional differences, the EU energy and ecological transition will thrive with industrial and political cohesion. This process will pass through increased trust in institutions and dedicated energy policy action which will smooth the risks and disruptions coming from current and future shocks. • Eurobarometer variables European citizens' perceptions of renewable energy transition are analyzed. • Spatial heterogeneity statistics builds regional clusters southern Europeans ex-ante analysis of the Ukraine war and energy crisis. • Southern Europeans attribute less importance to energy infrastructure for renewable energy transition • Southern Europeans repute EU solidity not a requirement for energy security access. • Northern European citizens do not associate EU competitiveness with green energy sources transformation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An analysis of European economic trade policy and its role in international diplomacy on climate change. This accounts for both the objective financial benefts and incentives of preferential trading agreements as well as the influence of these deals on wider foreign relations. The findings of this paper are that withholding trade agreements to encourage or coerce similar progressive causes such as demilitarisation are highly limited in their impact, and that many of the causes of this outcome apply equally to climate issues. A loose explanation of how trade agreements and the associated diplomatic relationships which accompany them could be utilised to promote better environmental practices is also provided, based on the economic conditions of countries and communities involved. Trade progression with a focus on achievable climate goals is found to be far more beneficial than an exclusionary approach by the EU. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Worldwide, great efforts are being made in order to establish sustainable development at all levels. European Union (EU) member states are obliged to meet the requirements in the area of environmental protection. In this paper, the authors conducted a comparative study of environmental attitudes among young people from both EU transition countries and EU candidate countries. The objective was to determine the differences in environmental attitudes, environmental awareness and self-efficacy of the youth from these two groups of countries and the EU environmental policy implementation level. Results indicated that the influence of EU membership exists when it comes to the environmental attitudes of youth from the analyzed countries. Average values showed the unsatisfactory situation regarding environmental awareness and self-efficacy of respondents. In order to define the relations among environmental attitudes, selfefficacy and environmental awareness, a structural model was created. This analysis showed that these three components work the same way in both groups of countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

European forest policymaking is shaped by progressing European integration, yet with notable ideological divisions and diverging interests among countries. This paper focuses on the coalitional politics of key environmental forest issues: biodiversity conservation, timber legality, and climate protection policy. Combining the Advocacy Coalition Framework and the Shifting Coalition Theory, and informed by more than 186 key informant interviews and 73 policy documents spanning a 20-year timeframe, we examine the evolution of coalitional forest politics in Europe. We find that the basic line-up has remained stable: an environmental coalition supporting EU environmental forest policy integration and a forest sector coalition mostly opposing it. Still, strategic alliances across these coalitions have occurred for specific policy issues which have resulted in a gradual establishment of an EU environmental forest policy. We conclude with discussion of our findings and provide suggestions for further research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Keywords: Environmental law; Environmental policy; EU law; Subject; Environment; Other related subjects; European Union EN Environmental law Environmental policy EU law Subject Environment Other related subjects European Union 350 366 17 12/14/21 20211201 NES 211201 EDITORIAL Over the summer period, a catalogue of changes have been put in motion. Https://op.europa.eu/en/publication-detail/-/publication/296b6d9a-092c-11ec-b5d3-01aa75ed71a1/language-en B I Commission Implementing Decision (EU) 2021/1384 of 13 August 2021 on the request for registration of the European citizens' initiative entitled 'ReturnthePlastics: A Citizen's Initiative to implement an EU-wide deposit-system to recycle plastic bottles' pursuant to Regulation (EU) 2019/788 of the European Parliament and of the Council (notified under document C(2021) 5953) i b This decision concerns a request for registration of a European citizens' initiative entitled 'ReturnthePlastics: A Citizen's Initiative to implement an EU-wide deposit-system to recycle plastic bottles', which was submitted to the Commission on 2 July 2021. Https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A32021D1211 B I Commission Regulation (EU) 2021/1199 of 20 July 2021 amending Annex XVII to Regulation (EC) No 1907/2006 of the European Parliament and of the Council as regards polycyclic-aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in granules or mulches used as infill material in synthetic turf pitches or in loose form on playgrounds or in sport applications i b This Regulation amends Annex XVII to Regulation (EC) No 1907/2006 in accordance with a new annex. [Extracted from the article]

Głównym celem przeprowadzonych badań była identyfikacja siły i tendencji wpływu prawa i polityki UE na planowanie przestrzenne i zarządzanie terytorialne państw członkowskich w zakresie wybranych kwestii środowiskowych oraz próba określenia występujących prawidłowości. Uszczegóławiając, pierwszy cel dotyczył wpływu ustawodawstwa, drugi -- znaczenia głównych dokumentów UE w odniesieniu do ekologicznych kwestii polityki przestrzennej, trzeci -- oceny siły i tendencji oddziaływania środowiskowych priorytetów UE w zakresie: (1) wzmacniania struktur ekologicznych i zasobów kulturowych jako wartości dodanej dla rozwoju, (2) zrównoważonego wzrostu w zakresie promowania bardziej zasobooszczędnej, zielonej (przyjaznej środowisku) i bardziej konkurencyjnej gospodarki. Najwięcej uwagi poświęcono odgórnemu wpływowi UE na planowanie przestrzenne i zarządzanie terytorialne. Podsumowując wyniki badań m.in. sformułowano rekomendacje dotyczące bardziej efektywnego powiązania polityki spójności z planowaniem przestrzennym i zarządzaniem terytorialnym w zakresie ochrony i wzmacniania dziedzictwa naturalnego i kulturowego, wynikające głównie z analizy studiów przypadku w tym zakresie. Stwierdzono, że odgórny wpływ nadal stanowi determinantę oddziaływania prawa i polityki ekologicznej UE na planowanie przestrzenne państw członkowskich w zakresie kwestii środowiskowych. Wpływ prawa zidentyfikowano jako silny, a polityki i dyskursu jako umiarkowany. Artykuł wykonano głównie na podstawie wyników uzyskanych w trakcie realizacji projektu ESPON COMPASS (Comparative Analysis of Territorial Governance and Spatial Planning Systems in Europe). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, the European Union has officially announced that its' objective in terms of environmental policy is to achieve climate neutrality, including long-term low greenhouse gas emission, by 2050. In light of this, the current study aims to offer a new and updated perspective on the effectiveness of environmental taxes in reducing air pollution in the European Union. Firstly, cluster analysis is used to group the member states of the European Union according to characteristics that will make the research results more robust. Secondly, panel data dynamic error correction models were estimated for each cluster to assess the effect of environmental taxes (and other explanatory variables) on emissions of carbon dioxide on the one hand, and greenhouse gases in general on the other hand. The research looks at both short-run and long-run effects on air pollution. The results show a statistically significant negative long-run relationship between environment taxes and atmospheric pollutants emissions. However, this effect would happen with a certain delay and it would be short lived, which makes additional environment policy measures necessary to achieve the 2050 targets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Regulations further set out energy labelling requirements for light sources and are a product-specific measure for the purposes of Regulation 2017/1369 setting a framework for energy labelling.SI29/7/2021International Waste Shipments (Amendment of Regulation (EC) No 1013/2006 and 1418/2007) Regulations 2021 (SI 2021/785)These Regulations amend the Annex to Regulation 1418/2007 to set out export control procedures for a new category of sorted, non-hazardous, plastic waste classified as "B3011".SI1/10/2021Hydrocarbon Oil and Biofuels (Northern Ireland Private Pleasure Craft) Regulations 2021 (SI 2021/780)These Regulations make provision about the use of fuel in private pleasure craft. Keywords: Environmental law; Environmental policy; EU law; Subject; Environment; Other related subjects; European Union EN Environmental law Environmental policy EU law Subject Environment Other related subjects European Union 272 296 25 11/15/21 20210901 NES 210901 EDITORIAL The G7 summit, the Queen's Speech and the Environment Bill all made appearances this quarter. The Bill further aims to place further restrictions on energy pricing.BillFirst reading 21/06/21Clean Air Targets (World Health Organization Guidelines) Bill 2021-22 (HC Bill 52)A Bill to require UK clean air targets to comply with World Health Organization guidelines. [Extracted from the article]

It is widely acknowledged that policies for a more sustainable society require narratives outside the status quo. This contribution studies the EU's environmental policy narrative of a circular economy (CE), which many consider promising in this respect. The results demonstrate that the CE narrative was created to transform EU policy discourses 'from within' but eventually perpetuated the established discourse of ecological modernization. This perpetuation resulted from specific strategic practices used to create the CE narrative, which (1) concealed conflict, (2) strengthened the agency of incumbents, and (3) excluded alternative voices. The analysis uses empirical evidence from 28 interviews with key stakeholders, 84 policy documents and participant observation data at the European Union (EU) level. The results suggest that the development of narratives outside the status quo depends on strategic practices that address (future) conflicts and offer new agency to change agents as well as transition strategies to incumbents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this short article is to provide a brief overview and reflections on the European Union's relatively recent introduction of a biennial Environmental Implementation Review (EIR) cycle as part of its activities in monitoring EU Member States' (MS) implementation of Union environmental law and policy. The EIR reflects an increased level of interest on the part of the Union in seeking to identify ways in which MS may improve upon their track records in implementing EU environmental legislative requirements at national level. Notably, it envisages a more intense form of engagement and dialogue on the part of the European Commission with MS authorities on identifying strengths and weaknesses in terms of individual MS performance as well as identifying common challenges at national level. The article assesses what key outcomes may have emerged thus far with the two EIR cycles that have been completed and how the EIR relates to the other principal supranational supervisory tool used by the EU for the purpose overseeing compliance with the EU environmental acquis, namely the use of law enforcement action via infringement proceedings. Ultimately, the article posits the view that the tools of EIR and law enforcement may be best seen to be in a complementary and mutually supportive relationship, each needing the other to be able to make a sufficient impression and impact on MS in terms of inducing them to address the subject of implementation with the degree of importance and urgency it deserves. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hungary is one of the European Union's most dynamically developing countries in Central-Eastern Europe with a high income and increasing level of environmental degradation. The present study explores the dynamic relationship between economic growth, electricity consumption, carbon emissions and urbanization in Hungary for period 1974–2014 based on annual data. Using autoregressive distributed lag model, we found long-run relationship among the variables in the presence of structural breaks and Toda–Yamamoto procedure were applied to test causality. The findings indicate that electricity consumption is positively linked with carbon emissions in the long run, which implies that the energy efficiency should be improved. Urbanization has also positive effect on carbon emissions meaning that the number of cities increases the emissions. Causality results suggest that Hungary is growing at the cost of the environment and the lack of the coordination of economic and environmental objectives to fulfill emission reduction targets can reduce economic growth. The reconsideration of the economic and energy policy is vital for ensuring sustainable development and stricter environmental policy is suggested. These results contribute not only to the expansion of the existing literature, but also improves the methodological background by employing a new variable to capture urbanization effect on carbon emissions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Long-term changes, from 1984 to 2010, in the indicators of microbial pollution (total viable count, coliforms, Escherichia coli, enterococci, and Clostridium perfringens) are analysed in the Riga Hydropower Plant Reservoir, an essential source of drinking water for Riga, the capital of Latvia. Counts in microbial indicators fluctuated seasonally and were related to physicochemical parameters (nitrogen compounds, turbidity, temperature, and pH). The changes in microbial pollution were brought about by two major socio-economic developments. Firstly, Latvia's independence from the USSR in 1991 which facilitated a distinct reduction in most microorganism counts due to a sharp decline in industrial and agricultural production. This resulted in a significant drop in point and nonpoint pollution in the river basin. A further development was Latvia joining the European Union in 2004. The corresponding focus on water management, including wastewater treatment, was a major priority of environmental investment and lead to improvements in microbial water quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The past decade has been a dynamic one for biodiversity offsetting policy. Efforts to incorporate offsetting into the Convention on Biological Diversity as a compliance mechanism did not succeed. The expansion of offsetting outside of the Natura 2000 network in the European Union (EU), which looked all but inevitable in the early 2010s, was withdrawn in the face of unexpectedly strong opposition from environmental groups and the business sector. Highly publicised offsetting programmes in some EU countries have had mixed outcomes, and many observers describe offsetting as a failed policy. And yet four years of interviews and policy analysis in Brussels, Spain, and England suggest that reports of offsetting's death may be exaggerated. While the possibility of an overarching EU Directive aimed at harmonising offsetting policy and practice across the region's countries seems unlikely, in Spain, offsetting has returned to the national policy arena via adoption as an implementation tool within the national Green Infrastructure Strategy. Offsetting in England persists in a handful of counties as a locally situated development strategy, and seems to have returned at the national level despite its spectacular flame‐out in 2014. This is not, after all, a high‐profile failure of neoliberal environmental policy. Rather, we see offsetting's persistence as a result of policy refugia: the retreat to small but amenable jurisdictions where offsetting policies can wait out inclement policy conditions and then emerge to recolonise the policy landscape when conditions improve. Highly publicised offsetting programmes in some EU countries have had mixed outcomes, and many observers describe offsetting as a failed policy. However, our analysis of offset policy development in the EU, Spain, and England suggests that offsetting has not failed but persists as a result of policy refugia: it has retreated to small but amenable jurisdictions from which it can emerge to recolonise the policy landscape as conditions improve. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Environmental policy in the European Union is a hot topic for both practitioners and researchers. Their interests are attracted mainly by the main tool of this policy—emissions trading within the EU ETS. In literature focusing on the impacts of the EU ETS, the EU is usually considered to be a compact unit and its structure is omitted there. In particular, the impacts on a single company (regardless its geographical location), on a sector of industry (regardless the member countries), or on some subset of the involved companies with respect to non-EU competitors are often explored. However, through the eyes of national governments, it is vital for the countries to keep their national industrial sectors competitive not only against companies from countries outside the EU but also from other EU countries. This paper focuses on the influence of the EU ETS on the national steel sectors in the EU and their competitiveness. The hybrid PROMETHEE-DEA approach is used to assess how the price of emission allowance and grandfathering within the EU ETS impact the technical efficiency and competitiveness of these national sectors. The results of this study show that the volatile allowance price influences the efficiency and grandfathering affects the competitiveness of the EU national steel sectors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The date on which that transitional provision expires is amended from 31 March 2021 to 31 December 2021.SITBDRecognised Auction Platforms (Amendment and Miscellaneous Provisions) Regulations 2021 (SI 2021 Draft)These Regulations amend financial services legislation relating to the auctioning of emissions allowances, to ensure that the rules which applied to the auctioning of emissions allowances created as part of the EU Emissions Trading Scheme will continue to work in the UK in relation to the auctioning of allowances created under the UK Emissions Trading Scheme established under the Greenhouse Gas Emissions Trading Scheme Order 2020.SSI29 January 2021Single Use Carrier Bags Charge (Coronavirus) (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2021 (SSI 2021/53)These Regulations amend the Single Use Carrier Bags Charge (Scotland) Regulations 2014 Regulation 7(2) by replacing the date on which the provision ceases to have effect with 31 May 2021. The local authority's screening officer concluded that no environmental impact assessment (EIA) was necessary, as the development was not EIA development within the Town and Country Planning (Environmental Impact Assessment) Regulations 2017 Regulation 3, not being likely to have significant environmental effects. [Extracted from the article]

Climate change has turned the Arctic simultaneously into an environmentally highly fragile space and a region offering manifold economic opportunities. The notion of 'Arctic Paradox' aptly captures the trade-off between environmental protection needs and economic prospects. We investigate how the European Union has positioned itself regarding this Paradox by asking to what extent its Arctic policy discourse integrates environmental concerns. Analysis involving the main strategies of EU institutions, and the EU's Arctic and major non-Arctic members finds three co-existing coalitions with differing visions of environmental policy integration in the Arctic. The aggregate EU discourse on the Arctic is currently 'green by omission', that is, by explicitly avoiding a clear stance on the trade-off embodied in the 'Arctic Paradox'. We attempt to explain this, and conclude by discussing the likelihood of the EU developing a genuinely environment-oriented Arctic policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this Policy Brief, we argue that current U.S. waste disposal strategies (recycling, displacement and disposal) do not address waste reduction, are perceived as socially unfair, and cannot keep pace with the ever-increasing proportion of plastic waste discarded. Factors including low demand for recycled plastic, recent bans on importation of foreign plastic waste, cheap feedstocks and an increase in the production of single-use plastic items are converging to worsen the problem of plastic waste. Plastic waste is ubiquitous in the environment, and threatens human health, wildlife, and ecosystems. We discuss how current policies developed, and examine four major policy strategies used by the European Union (product bans, extended producer responsibility laws, taxes and fees, and ecolabeling). Finally, we provide recommendations as to which would be most effective in moving the U.S. away from its overreliance on recycling and disposal, and toward reduction of the amount of plastic waste generated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, the EU has experienced different integration 'crises' in its policy domains. Some policy fields such as the environment have been driven by an integration process of consensus among the Member States while others, such as migration and asylum policy, have not reached a high level of integration because of differences between the states. Although some scholars have attempted to identify the dynamics of integration processes in the EU through political theories such as neofunctionalism and intergovernmentalism, these theories may not be helpful to explain the lack of integration seen in the last several years in migration and asylum policy. To identify some of the dynamics of EU collective action and its influence on the European integration process (or the reverse), this paper proposes to analyse EU environmental policy and EU refugee protection policy through the lens of public goods theory. Analysis of the production process of public goods, in this case, as refugee protection and climate stability, gives interesting insight into the different levels of integration in both policy domains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Geopolitical risks and environmental policy have become increasingly important in the European Union (EU), which is committed to tackling climate change and protecting the environment. However, geopolitical risks can undermine its environmental policy objectives. Thus, the study evaluates the relationship between geopolitical risks and environmental policy in nineteen EU countries from 1994 to 2020 through panel bootstrap Granger causality. The results show that geopolitical risks significantly influence environmental policy in Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Luxembourg, and Romania. On the other hand, the findings reveal that environmental policy causes geopolitical risks only in Latvia, while there is no relationship in the remaining countries. Therefore, policymakers must develop resilience to geopolitical risks, promote renewable energy, strengthen environmental regulations, and address social and economic implications to reduce environmental policy vulnerability to geopolitical risks. • Geopolitical risks affect ecological policies in Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Luxembourg, and Romania. • Environmental policy causes geopolitical risks only in Latvia. • Policymakers, promote renewables, enhance regulations to cut vulnerability to geopolitical risks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dragonflies and damselflies, within the order of Odonata, are important ecological indicators with widely recognised conservation value. They are generally better researched and protected than other invertebrates, yet, they have received limited protection from the European Union (EU)'s Habitats Directive, which serves as the major legislative tool for species conservation in Europe.We reviewed the conservation status and trends, legal protection status, and knowledge gaps of Odonates within the EU. Among the 22 threatened and 27 endemic species in EU, respectively 19 and 11 of them are not protected by the Directive. Out of the 35 species which are threatened and/or listed on the Annexes, 61.5% of them are declining.Nevertheless, threatened non‐Annex species are more likely to have a decreasing population trend than Annex species. There are also 26% of threatened non‐Annex species with unknown trends. Inaccuracies in evaluating Odonata trends are also revealed due to the lack of standardised methodology and incomplete surveys.Moreover, most conservation research focuses on climate change's effects on range shift, therefore knowledge gaps exist in understating how water and habitat qualities, the most important Odonate trend drivers, shape Odonata conservation status.There is an urgent need to revise the legal protection status of Odonata in Europe, for instance by revising the EU Habitats Directive Annexes to include threatened damselflies and dragonflies.There is also an urgent need for systematic, standardised, and regular survey to be able to investigate trends and drivers of change to identify priority conservation actions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Waste has been generating environmental problems for a long time, but some, such as packaging and plastics, have a proven utility (as we are verifying during the coronavirus epidemic); justifying the intervention of the Law. This regulation has evolved according to the perception of the environmental problems posed by waste, packaging and plastics; specifically, from the idea of "produce, use and throw away" it has moved to the circular economy. The work analyzes this normative evolution in the European Union and in Spain, from the original regulation to the current one, which already incorporates the philosophy of the circular economy, mainly in relation to plastics, and particularly at the national level, with projects and standards new in this matter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]