The article is dedicated to the critical understanding of the Project Criminal Code of Ukraine of the new conceptual model of differentiation of the offense of criminal offense against environmental safety. As a result of the conducted follow-up, the progress and shortcomings of the updated concept were revealed, as well as the development of scientifically grounded propositions to improve the relevant provisions of the Project.In particular, it was found that the debatable points of the concept proposed in the Project are that: according to it, any chemical pollution of the environment is immediately recognized as a crime of the 3rd or 5th degree of gravity; the proposed method actually makes it impossible to differentiate responsibility for manifestations of both biological and chemical pollution, which differ significantly in the degree of public danger; in fact, any manifestations of biological pollution of the environment - even those that caused multi-million losses, can only be recognized as those that caused the creation of a corresponding danger; the occurrence of consequences in the form of causing significant damage to the environment is not given any qualifying meaning in section 5.3; it involves the construction of unqualified pollution as a tort of creating danger, which clearly does not contribute to a balanced distinction between criminally illegal and non-criminal behavior.Taking into account all the reservations expressed above, two alternative models of regulation, in particular differentiation, of criminal responsibility for committing criminal offenses against environmental safety provided for in section 5.3 of the Project were proposed, which, importantly, are fully correlated with the model of division of criminal offenses by severity embodied in the Project. In addition, it is noted that at the same time relevant changes should be made to articles 2.5.2, 2.5.3, 2.5.4 and 2.5.5 of the Project, as a result of which, firstly, not only “significant” and “ severe” as well as “insignificant” and “significant” damage to the environment; second, all four established types of environmental damage must be correlated with the corresponding indicators of property damage.Prospects for further scientific research in the researched field are determined.