«75% of production activities would close»- Corriere.it

Last October, the European Commission presented a proposal to amend the directive on air quality. A few days ago, the “Padan bloc”, i.e. the Northern Regions – Lombardy, Piedmont, Veneto and Emilia-Romagna – presented their position in Brussels against the new measures that should be introduced by the EU in the next two years, but which will officially enter into force only in 2030. The governor of the Lombardy Region Attilio Fontana has defined them as “unreasonable”, adding that they would imply the closure of “75 per cent of production activities” in the Po Valley, as well as “preventing the circulation of the three quarters of the vehicles circulating today, close 75 percent of farms and agricultural activities in the area”. While for the governor of Piedmont, Alberto Cirio, and the president of the Veneto regional council, Roberto Ciambetti, they would be “absolutely unreachable”.

The proposals

“Together with other EU policies, the proposed directive will reduce the number of deaths attributable to the main air pollutant – fine particulate matter (PM2.5) – by more than 75 per cent in ten years”, explains the Commission. “It will also reduce the amount and severity of diseases caused or made worse by air pollution, such as respiratory and cardiovascular diseases. The most sensitive and vulnerable populations will benefit above all”. In particular, a periodic review of the air quality standards is proposed to re-evaluate them in line with the latest scientific evidence and with social and technological developments. The annual limit value for fine particulate matter (PM2.5) will be reduced by more than half in 2030, from 25 to 10 micrograms per cubic meter in 2030.

Climate justice and the right to clean air

But the proposals also concern citizens and their right to clean air. “The revision”, states the Commission’s website, “will ensure that people who suffer damage to their health as a result of air pollution have the right to be compensated if they breach EU air quality rules. They will also have the right to be represented by non-governmental organizations in class actions for damages. The proposal it will also bring greater clarity on access to justiceeffective sanctions and better public information on air quality”.

The criticisms of Regions and industry

“Our hearing – said Ciambetti – has the aim of making the EU Parliament aware of the need to take into consideration the peculiarities of the single territories in achieving the objectives set by the Directive in terms of reduction of pollution indexes. Objectives that must be concrete and achievable through truly usable tools and practicable actions by all subjects, at European, national and local level”. According to Confindustria, the objectives set by the Commission would present “excessively optimistic” scenarios, while the results would be “underestimated”. The position paper presented in March reads how, for industrialists: “ reaching the limits proposed by the European Commission is not feasible in the Po Valley by 2030, nor, most likely, by 2050, even with huge reductions in activities that would have an unsustainable impact”. Another strongly criticized point instead concerns the compensation for damages which would presuppose a causal link “between the violation and the damage” and which it would expose the administrations “to instrumental requests for compensation not supported by clear scientific data, considerably increasing the risk of opportunistic disputes and exposure to the administration’s liability, with inevitable indirect consequences also on the authorization procedures and on the configuration of the sanctioning system”.

The response of doctors and citizens

They mention the benefits for people’s health, but also the economic ones the epidemiologists, researchers, biologists and citizens who signed the open letter addressed to the Prime Minister, to the Minister of the Environment, but also to the governors of the Regions themselves who protested in Brussels. “Any further flexibility and derogation in the implementation of measures, even radical ones where necessary, for the reduction of polluting emissions”, reads the text, “does nothing but aggravate the damage to citizens’ health in terms of illness and death, exacerbate the environmental crisis, that of the climate and the resulting extreme events and unsustainably increase health costs (including pandemics) and the damage resulting from extreme events (floods, droughts, landslides, etc.)”.