Licensing as a regulatory technique: the example of integrated pollution prevention and control

Abstract

Introduction In this chapter we examine the most traditional and prevalent tool through which environmental regulators exercise ongoing control over regulated parties, that is the licence (or authorisation or permit – the terms seem to be used indiscriminately in legislation). We consider elsewhere other areas of environmental law that have licensing at their centre (e.g. water in Chapter 10, waste in Chapter 11, planning in Chapter 13). Here though, we examine in detail the permitting scheme under the Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control (IPPC) Directive, using it as an opportunity to study in detail one particular system of licensing. Direct regulation by licensing is at the core of the regime: Art. 4 requires Member States to ‘take the necessary measures to ensure that no new installation is operated without a permit issued in accordance with this Directive’. The study of the IPPC Directive allows us to examine a number of features of licensing regimes more generally, including for example, in section 4, the use of a variety of ‘standards’. As well as being a good example of a permitting system, the IPPC Directive is also much more, simultaneously responding to certain concerns about direct environmental regulation (and indeed about European Community (EC) environmental regulation), as we will see; in part this is about flexibility, but we will also discuss the IPPC Directive's use of procedure to control flexibility, including procedures that encourage learning and reflection and participatory procedures, as discussed in Chapter 3.