EU enlargement and environmental policy

Table 2    CO2 emissions in the transition countries (in Mton.)*

* Source: Cofala et al. (1999)

The new accession countries are obliged to adopt the whole body of environmental
directives of the EU i.e. the environmental acquis before the accession. However given the
current economic recession and weak assertiveness of the institutions, the direct adoption of
the standards might show to be inefficient and ineffective. The costs of adoption and
fulfillment of the current EU legislature, based mainly on command and control measures,
might become prohibitive for some countries. Furthermore, a relatively small space remains
for the use of cost-efficient instruments, which would lower the implementation costs of
command and control policies through the use of direct incentives. The application of
economic instruments in the CEEC (e.g. pollution fees) has been introduced as a tool of
environmental policy since the 1970s and 1980s. However their cost and profit implications
have become real with the beginning of the economic reforms. Currently the economic
instruments are applied mainly for revenue raising. Their incentive effects on polluters remain
neglected. Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia primarily use pollution permits, fees and
non-compliance fees. Such a system generally has two-tiered price levels, where the former
applies for the emissions above the level set by the standard and the later is charged for the
non-compliance with the standard. Hungary on the other hand uses product charges for
damaging goods. The fees are supplemented with a number of fiscal instruments. Only
Slovenia has introduced CO2 taxes. Several specifics for the use of economic instruments in
CEEC have to be considered: (i) the final implications of revenue raising instruments depend

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