POSITION | ENVIRONMENTALPOLICY | PROCEDURE ACCELERATION
Germany – Speed Things Up Strengthen personal responsibility through trust-based regulation
6 November 2024 Introduction "For 83 per cent of European companies, the complexity and length of permitting procedures are an obstacle to investing in Europe." (Business Europe February 2024) Strengthen operators' own responsibility and increase the authorities' competences Permitting procedures are the bottleneck for security of supply and the transformation of the economy. Especially in times of crisis, the federal and state governments must speed up all relevant permits and make decisions much more quickly. Acceleration can only succeed in Germany with clear and manageable regulations. Officials can only issue permits as quickly as the law allows. An unmanageable number of undefined legal terms, complex norms that are difficult to understand, a lack of standards and unmanageable individual case regulations drive both project operators and permitting authorities into almost endless procedures. A fundamental revision of European and German environmental law is therefore unavoidable. In order to realise the agreed climate targets in Germany and Europe, it is imperative that the gas and electricity grids and transport infrastructure are converted, and in particular that industrial infrastructure and production facilities are converted across the board. The procedures should be organised in such a way that planning can be completed quickly and with legal certainty at a reasonable cost. To achieve this, the operators' own responsibility must be strengthened and the authorities' competences increased. The BDI calls for: ▪
Trust-based regulation for more personal responsibility on the part of project operators
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Speeding up procedures must become a top priority
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Strengthen the decision-making power and competences of the permitting authorities
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Relieve administrative courts and reduce the depth of scrutiny
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Consolidate and modernise EU environmental law and implement it 1:1 in Germany
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Rapid implementation of "low hanging fruits" in Germany (deadline regulation, partial measures, spatial compatibility, standards)
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Driving forward digitalisation
Catrin Schiffer | Environment, Technology and Sustainability | T: +49 30 2028-1582 | c.schiffer@bdi.eu | www.bdi.eu