ClientEarth Communications
7th July 2025
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The Commission just revealed in a report that EU environmental laws are increasingly being ignored by Member States. ClientEarth law and policy advisor Roxane Chaplain explains why it matters and how transparency can help fix this issue.
Today, the European Commission published its long-awaited update of the Environmental Implementation Review (EIR) which highlights a widening gap in the enforcement and application of EU environmental law by Member States.
The new EIR – under the heading “better implementation of EU environmental rules protects human health and supports economic growth” - is published at a critical time: more than ever Europe is experiencing the triple planetary crisis (climate change, biodiversity collapse, and pollution) with record-breaking heatwaves.
The report and its interactive map show an urgent need to improve the implementation of environmental legislation in various areas, such as in circular economy, water, air pollution and biodiversity.
One of its key indicators is the number of legal challenges launched by the Commission against Member States for breaching environmental laws. The report reveals for instance that, as of 2 April 2025, there were 309 ongoing infringement cases concerning EU environmental law, excluding climate law. This is about 19% of the overall Commission case load across all areas of EU law. In 20% of these cases, the Court has delivered a ruling with which the Member State has not yet complied.
As the European Green Deal faces increasing political pressure and some of its key environmental legislation is currently being renegotiated, delayed or simply dropped, the failure to enforce existing legislation is not only unacceptable, but also inconsistent with the EU environmental and climate targets. The widening implementation gap jeopardizes the EU’s environmental ambitions and breaches Member States’ legal obligations to comply with EU law.
The report also stresses that the lack of enforcement is very expensive: the Commission estimates that the annual cost of non-compliance with environmental law now exceeds €180 billion, representing approximately 1% of the EU Gross Domestic Product (GDP) — a figure that has tripled in just six years. These costs are mostly borne by society through increased health costs and environmental degradation.
In contrast, the EIR highlights that the investment gap between Member States' current environmental spending and the spending level necessary to close this implementation gap would be €122 billion annually.
In other words, an effective implementation of environmental law is not only needed to protect the environment and public health, but also a good investment to be made by Member States to prevent the costly consequences of environmental degradation.
Unfortunately, while the 2025 EIR highlights the scale of the problem, it does not suggest any changes to address its root causes.
To improve the implementation of environmental legislation and respect for the rule of law, the EU must urgently reform the way it handles infringements. Infringement procedures are the ones by which the Commission – sometimes up to the Court of Justice of the EU – requires Member States to comply with EU law. These procedures are lengthy and opened by the Commission on a discretionary basis. In fact, despite being the “guardian of the Treaties”, the Commission conducts infringement cases behind closed doors. It is unclear how infringement procedures are conducted and how Member State compliance is monitored.
The infringements database only contains very limited information, but the complaints, the letter of formal notice or the reasoned opinion, as well as answers by the Member State or the Commission’s response to a complaint, are not published. Also, the so-called “EU Pilot procedure”, defined as pre-infringement dialogue, is mostly kept from the public and stakeholders.
Additionally, there is limited transparency at EU level in the way Member States implement EU environmental law. Checking studies, Member States’ reports, audits or inspections on how they implement EU environmental law are not disclosed to the public.
This constitutes a major barrier to effective enforcement of EU law: by not publishing information on why precisely Member States are investigated for not complying with EU environmental law, the Commission prevents scrutiny by the public which in turn, decreases pressure on the Member State to remedy its breach.
This lack of transparency is a political choice from the Commission, not a legal obligation. The Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU) has confirmed that the Commission is permitted to withhold access to information on the basis that it forms part of an ongoing infringement procedure, but it is not under a legal obligation to do so.
Yet, transparency in implementing environmental law is essential for several reasons:
Ensure parliamentary monitoring and effective lawmaking: as co-legislator, the European Parliament needs access to real-time data to question delays and Member States’ non-compliance with EU law. Legislators should be aware of how the law is implemented in the Member States and what infringement are underway when updating legislation.
Protect democratic rights, citizens’ trust and civil society engagement with the EU institutions: NGOs and citizen groups play a vital role in monitoring implementation and supporting enforcement through complaints and public pressure. But they cannot act effectively without access to complaint and compliance data. Citizens have a right to know how EU law is enforced. The CJEU has repeatedly affirmed that access to environmental information is a fundamental right, rooted in EU primary law, the Charter of Fundamental Rights, and the Aarhus Convention
In a briefing published in March 2025 together with the European Environmental Bureau, NABU and BirdLife Europe and Central Asia, ClientEarth underlined that only full transparency of the enforcement process can improve efficiency of the enforcement process, protect the rule of law, ensure public accountability and build public trust.
To comply with the Aarhus Convention, the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU, and recommendations of the European Ombudsman, a transparent approach to infringement procedure should contain the following actions:
The infringements database should be expanded so that all letters of formal notice, reasoned opinions, referrals to the CJEU, all relevant annexes, and all replies by the Member States are added to the database.
A database for complaints should be set up with information about the Member State, the legislation and provisions complained about and a summary of the issue.
A clear link between the complaints and the infringement database should be made, so that complaints that have been taken up can easily be found and followed in the infringements database.
The pilot procedure should be abolished as it is even more opaque than the infringement process, often very lengthy, and often fails to provide effective results.
There should be a public schedule with advance notice on the release of infringement packages, which should come out on a regular basis.
The proactive publication of all information collected by the Commission to assess Member State compliance with EU law, whether or not it forms part of an ongoing infringement procedure, including conformity checking studies, Member State reports on implementation of EU laws; and audit and other national investigation reports.
These developments do not require any amendments to the Treaties or major legislative changes. They are essentially based on the political will of the European Commission and its ability to ensure respect for the rule of law in the EU.