Background nitrogen mood
State beats MOB, judge doesn't know everything either
Who would have ever thought that climate minister and D66 party leader Rob Jetten would take down the flag because he knocked out MOB? This week it happened. For nitrogen-following Netherlands, it was the week of Porthos, the Rotterdam mega project to store nitrogen under the sea.
Climate activists Valentijn Wösten and Johan Vollenbroek were against this and thought they would put a spoke in the wheel of this project at the end of last year. In an interim ruling, the Council of State seemed to agree with their objections, but how surprising was this the final statement this week.
Franchise under pressure
However, this is not thanks to a victory for science, as some believe. Maybe a little more common sense. The statement can go many ways. For example, it gradually means an end to the VAR-like rulings (credit Martin Scholten) that MOB, the Living Environment Association, Stichting Groen Kempenland and other clubs elicit from the courts. Until now, with the help of the same legal franchise – a fixed formula with a legal license test at the end, with the help of Aerius and a few concrete concepts, such as significant – the clubs have been able to go ahead in the fight against nitrogen emissions. Now the pressure shifts to a key in advance. Moreover, what is significant if the court allows 2 to 0,1 mol extra deposition for 0,57 years in an already overburdened area?
Make better use of pretest
Companies that now need a new permit must certainly now make it clear that they will not cause too much nitrogen emissions and on the basis of more location-specific criteria. This means more work for consultancies rather than lawyers. The Porthos ruling provides them with a series of guidelines for this. Not only in the legal or scientific field. It is clear from the underlying documents from Arcadis, among others, that if other emphases are also used in part, if relativising factors are emphasized more and here and there much deeper and more technical elaborations are given, it will also become more difficult for the court(s) to to oversee everything. Whoever submits the most impressive file wins.
The judgment also shows that, compared to earlier judgments, points have also been 'forgotten' this time. Which helped to give the state an edge. It even sets a precedent, because it comes from the Council of State. All in all, the Porthos ruling also seems to create more opportunities for agriculture. Which all, that depends on the creativity of advisers and lawyers.
Nevertheless, some livestock farming concepts remain difficult to maintain, even though they are encouraged by organizations such as Dierenbescherming. An example is the Beter-Leven stables, which are not considered organic. The extra emissions weigh like a burden for them.
Flemish farmers also want equal rights
While the discussion among farmers in the Netherlands and in politics about the further nitrogen problem has subsided somewhat, farmers in Flanders are taking to the streets, led by FDF Belgium and Landelijke Toekomst, a mainly regional organization from the Belgian Kempen. The action took place in Antwerp.
own thresholds
Action leader Sabina Vandeweijer says that Flemish farmers want to express their dissatisfaction with the unequal treatment of farmers in terms of nitrogen compared to the rest of the business community. "Industry may work with a deposition threshold of 1%, agriculture must make do with a threshold of 0,28%. If all goes well, that threshold will be raised to 2025% for us in 0,8." The reason for this difference in treatment would be that 'the industry has done much more in the past'. It sounds a bit like the Dutch difference in treatment between traffic and agricultural emissions.
Farmer's caution
Vandeweijer does not want to stop at this one protest, but wants to continue, even though the Belgian Farmers' Union is keeping aloof for the time being, à la LTO Nederland. VandeWeijer: "The Boerenbond does not think it is the right time yet, and wants to play it more politically, via the CDNV (the Belgian CDA)." VandeWeijer no longer believes in that. FDF-Belgium and Landelijke Toekomst do want to hold a very public-friendly campaign. Lessons have been learned from previous experiences elsewhere.
Klaas van der Horst
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