If the polluted water is discharged in the canalization, the authori- authori-ty is the WCE

2. If the water is discharged in any other water (i.e. river, lake or the sea), the permit is issued by the MoE according to Article 12 of the Law for the Protection of the Air, of the Water and of the Soil from Pollution (LPAWSP).

6.2.3 Permits for Construction on Agricultural Land

The permit for construction on agricultural land is needed when the character of the agricultural land does not change, but when the investor intends to build or construct on the land. The permit is issued under Regulation No. 2 for Constructions in Agricultural Land (State Journal No. 47/1993).

6.2.4 Permits for Changing the Character of Agricultural Land The permit to change the character of agricultural land is always required when the character of the agricultural land is altered, i.e.

when an investor builds a construction on the land that is not directly linked with agriculture. The permit is issued by the Land Commission by the Council of Ministers and the matter is regulated by the Law for the Protection of the Arable Land and the Pastures (LPALP).

There is also a Regulation for the application of LPALP.

6.2.5 Permits for Treating Hazardous Waste

The permits for treating dangerous waste are issued under Article 8 of Regulation No. 153/6.VIII.1993. If the activity is smaller and within the territory of a single RIE, the permit is issued by the RIE. For greater activities, the permit is issued by the MoE.

6.2.6 Permits for Importing, Producing and Treating Hazardous Materials

The permits for importing, producing, and treating hazardous materi-als are issued by the Ministry of Health and the Inspectorates of the MoH. The matter is regulated by the Law on Public Health (LPH) and the regulations for the application of the LPH. There are also some regulations issued for specifying the dispositions of the LPH.

The most important of the permits of this kind is Regulation No 27/17.VIII.1995, the permit for the importation of goods, which is of significant importance for human health. The regulation contains a list of goods of significant importance for the human health.

8

6.3 O THER R IGHTS AND O BLIGATIONS OF B USINESS

Bulgarian legislation imposes some additional obligations on businesses that are also of importance here.

6.3.1 Taxes

One such obligation on business is the tax that businesses must pay for consumption of natural resources and pollution greater than that per-missible under the permit or by law. This tax is referred to in Articles 3 and 3a of the EPL as a “sanction.” Rules for paying these sanctions are given in Regulation No. 24/4.II.1993. The principle of Regulation No.

24 is that if the authority measures the quantity of pollutants of a given industrial activity, and if the quantity is greater than an established median, the owner of the facility must pay the “excess of pollution.”

There are formulas according to which the abnormal pollution is mea-sured, and any unit of pollutants has a prescribed “price.” This regula-tion is also more commonly referred to as the “polluters pay”principle.

There are some problems with the “polluters pay” approach. First, due to the fact that the administration in Bulgaria is not as strong as the administration in more developed countries, there are not enough guar-antees that the administration will apply the rule to all parties. Second, the administration in Bulgaria is not supplied with sophisticated enough tools for measuring the abnormal pollution. This is a second source of error in the appreciation of pollution. Third, sanctions are imposed in a given moment, but if an industry does not pay the sanction, there is no procedure for collecting accumulated interest on the sum. Legislators have argued that it is not possible to have “interest” on a sanction.

There is a great deal of work for NGOs and businesses to correct these inconsistencies.

There is not yet a separate law for “paying taxes for the consumed resources.” For some resources the tax is defined in an already existing law (i.e. the tax for the extraction of sand, the tax for the use of water).

6.3.2 Regulations on Construction in Residential Areas

Another obligation for the business is to construct facilities at a mini-mum distance from residential areas. These rules are given in

Regulation No. 7/1992 of the Ministry of Construction. There is a long list for the different distances according to the different type of facility.

6.3.3 Obligations of Reporting Under Ecofunds

Although discussed to some degree above, it is also worth mentioning

again the obligations prescribed in Regulation No. 168/17.VIII.1995

for businesses that have received money from the Ecofunds to report

data about the results of the supported activity and how the resources

were spent.

Module 7:

Public Participation in the EIA Process

P UBLIC P ARTICIPATION T RAINING

Participant Workbook

THE REGIONAL ENVIRONMENTAL CENTER

for Central and Eastern Europe

P ^URPOSE

The purpose of Module 7 is to introduce participants to options and possibilities for public participation in the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) Process in

Bulgaria. The module follows the order of the process by which the EIA procedure is conducted, identifying along the way opportunities and methods for the public to be involved.

O ^BJECTIVES

At the end of this module training, participants should have an understanding of opportunities and methods of public participation in the following stages of the EIA process, and methods for applying these methods to their own particular public participation strategy:

- EIA screening stage;

- preparation of the EIA report;

- review of EIA report;

- expert review of the EIA report;

- issuing the EIA decision;

- appealling the EIA decision;

- post-decision analysis.

In document Awakening Participation:Building Capacity for Public Participation in Environmental Decisionmaking (Pldal 99-102)