It’s often said that social progress is driven by the people, but established through the law. In that sense, a country’s environmental prosperity hinges on its ability to institute a successful legal framework for sustainable development. The legislative process can regulate consumer choices and industrial ventures; and at times, it provides corporations with the leeway to generate profit at the expense of the environment. But environmental law varies from country to country: for instance, EU member states share an overarching legal framework, but their respective environmental laws can differ drastically. To understand why that is the case, we must first look into the concept of approximation.

Approximation is one of the core criteria for attaining and maintaining EU membership. Member states (as well as non-EU countries who wish to join the union) have to constantly assess and adjust their national laws to ensure they align with the European Union’s centralized legal framework. That, of course, includes environmental law.

The various discrepancies in member state laws are owed to the fact that approximation, as the name suggests, comes with an acceptable error margin. National laws that don’t correspond with the EU’s outlines but still fall within that margin are addressed diplomatically, while countries that fail to conform altogether are subject to consequences, usually in the form of fines. Perhaps the most memorable example of this is the EUR 40 million fine the EU issued to Italy back in 2014 over its failure to address illegal waste dumping. Not only was that the heftiest fine ever issued by the European Union at the time, it also came with an additional penalty of EUR 42.8 million for every six months the Mediterranean country failed to remedy the issue.

But what does this way of homogenizing environmental regulations mean for European governments? One might think that more affluent member states can continue to abuse environmental law in favor of their industrial activity as long as they can afford to pay the fines, much like corporate giants do when confronted with international law. While this is an interesting take on power dynamics within the EU, studies show that the price of non-compliance is steep: a report published by the European Commission suggests that the cost – and foregone benefits – of not achieving the EU’s environmental targets can be as high as EUR 80 billion per year. Considering the increasing importance of the environment for what we consider healthy, robust development, that sum is hardly surprising.

That being said, the EU is a political union first. More accurately, it’s an attempt to harmonize the unique interests and ambitions of 27 different countries, many of which are often contradictory. A country that consistently fails to conform EU law can find itself diplomatically isolated in negotiations, especially if its non-compliance incurs financial or political cost for other member states.

So what is the scope of EU environmental law? A cursory review of European legislature makes it clear that it covers all major areas of ecological interest, from pollution to waste management and impact control. For instance, there is a standard for what industrial emissions should look like, both quality- and quantity-wise, and the European Commission has developed quantitative measures to help evaluate whether those standards are met within the EU’s industrial complex. Water, on the other hand, is approached much more broadly: EU experts have devised different targets for water quality in natural ecosystems, residential and public areas, and wasterwater discharges.