MAJOR POLLUTERS will be forced to pay millions in clean-up costs in addition to existing penalties under tough new legislation to be introduced next year.
The measures in the Environmental Liability Bill are now needed to bring Ireland into line with EU law.
Once in place, the new legislation would mean that the entire cost of bringing an area "back to how it was before it was damaged" would have to be met by the offending landowner, company, or farmer.
Currently offenders can be fined up to €10 million. In May, a record €1m fine was given to John Healy, from Blessington, Co Wicklow for illegal dumping near the Blessington reservoir.
Minister for the Environment John Gormley is now to hold a final round of consultations before drafting begins in the autumn.
The taxpayer will face a bill that could run into the tens of millions to clean up the Haulbowline Irish Steel/Ispat site in Cork following decades of steel-making.
However, Mr Gormley intends to grant exemptions where the polluters were complying with State regulations. Liability would not fall on a company or individual if the action was not considered likely to cause damage at the time it occurred.
The spreading of sewage sludge is also to be exempted, the Department of the Environment said last year.
The introduction of the new legislation will not stiffen the EU's existing and frequently controversial birds and habitats directives, which are increasingly unpopular in the west of Ireland.
The Irish Business and Employers Confederation (Ibec)urged the Government to implement the EU law in a "balanced, reasonable and predictable" manner.
Ibec's Donal Buckley said over 700 industrial sites licensed by the Environmental Protection Agency followed the liability rules.
"These plants have performed exceptionally well in meeting and exceeding their environmental responsibilities and should receive due recognition for this success," he told The Irish Times.
Most European countries failed to meet the April 30th, 2007 deadline to bring the EU Liability Directive - the first European law based on the "polluter pays" principle - into their own national law.
The directive obliges companies which caused land contamination that "creates a significant risk to human health," water pollution or damage to habitats to pay for the clean-up and for restoring the habitats to their original state.
Those found guilty of breaches will have to pay for cleaning up contaminated land until it no longer poses a serious health risk, and for restoring the environment "to how it was before it was damaged".
