Wednesday morning the messages squeezed on the phone of the Gelders Deputy Ans Mol. “What should we do with this?” Officials in the Licensing and Enforcement department – Mol’s portfolio – immediately searched for the consequences of a ruling in a case that Greenpeace had filed. The judge ruled that the Dutch state is doing too little to stop the deterioration of vulnerable nature reserves – the umpteenth legal tap on the fingers of the state in the nitrogen file. The legal nitrogen goals for 2025 will not be achieved, and those very probably not before 2030.
Mol, member of the BBB, first says she is awake from the ruling. Then she takes that back and says, “It has become so puzzling with the granting of permits.” But she underlines: “We don’t start at zero.” In Gelderland, according to her, it is already considerably reduced and that is, she says, thanks to the agricultural sector: companies innovated, more than four hundred farmers in the province have shown interest in a national buying scheme.
In Utrecht, Deputy Mirjam Sterk (CDA) thought of two things on Wednesday. “For farmers and housing, uncertainty are increasing even further.” For the time being it will be even more complicated to issue permits. But, she says immediately, “it’s good that the central government really has to work with nitrogen measures.”
European goals
Provinces play an important role in the nitrogen approach: they grant permits to farmers to be allowed to emit nitrogen, they carry out the European goals for nature recovery and they try to find a solution per nature area.
In December, the Council of State already came with another far -reaching statement. The highest administrative court ruled that nitrogen permits should be reconsidered with retroactive effect until 2020 if there was ‘internal nations’. This means that companies assumed that they could use ‘nitrogen space’ in their permits if they could save them elsewhere on their company.
Because of that judgment, Gelderland has to review thousands of permits. And what is more important: she cannot use ‘internal nations’ to issue new permits. That locks the whole thing, says Mol. “I can not give companies that want to innovate to reduce nitrogen emissions if extra nitrogen is initially produced.”
Mol expects to suffer more from that ruling than the judge’s judgment in the case brought by Greenpeace. In fact: maybe that judgment can help, she thinks. “It is now very clear that this is not only the problem of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries, Food Security and Nature. That we should not only look at the agricultural sector for solutions. ”
Does the BBB person who follow the party line here? No, Mol assures. “We are not only dealing with a nitrogen problem if we want to act according to the judicial decision. Water is an equal problem in Gelderland. The groundwater level in the Veluwe is low after a few dry years and the stream valleys are dry. If we get nature in order, nitrogen emissions play a less important role. “
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To unite everything in one approach, the National Rural Area (NPLG) program (NPLG) was decorated under the previous cabinet, with a ‘transition fund’ of around 24 billion euros. But this cabinet put a line through it.
Area -oriented approach
Utrecht, one of the two provinces in which the BBB does not participate, has continued the area -oriented approach since then. “We make plans per area with farmers, municipalities, water boards, residents and nature organizations,” says Sterk. In some areas, for example, farmers have already been moved, she says, which immediately yielded profit for nature.
But anyway it would not want Utrecht as fast as Utrecht, Strong emphasizes. “Provinces have worked hard on the area approaches, but then there was a cabinet that said: nice, but we believe in a different approach.” To be able to do more, financially and legally more is needed, she says. Now Utrecht has around 250 million euros for the area approach, money that had already been paid to the provinces. “But to do everything, we came up with an initial estimate that we need around 3.7 billion euros,” outlines strongly.
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The nitrogen ruling offers hope for this vulnerable nature reserve
In addition, there is uncertainty and uncertainty about measures. The government is happy to emphasize innovative techniques to reduce nitrogen emissions. But as long as those innovations are not legally ‘guaranteed’, says Sterk, they increase the uncertainty for farmers. For example, it was with the ’emission -free stable floors’: farmers thought they had built a floor that reduced the emissions of ammonia, but judges concluded that it was too uncertain whether the emissions actually decreased.
The Gelderse Deputy Mol was less grieving about scrapping the NPLG: “That was mainly a waste of time with a lot of consultations. We just have to work. Although of course I would not be sad if we could get the money back. ” Because no province has such a large nitrogen problem as Gelderland, with many large emotors and with the Veluwe the largest vulnerable nature reserve in the Netherlands, she hopes for more money from the government.
Strong also hopes for something else: “The Hague must now really take steps and at the same time see the outstretched hand of the provinces. We all want the same thing: nature recovery and a vital rural area. But the longer you wait, the bigger the task becomes. “
On Friday, the cabinet announced that it will come up with measures within two months.