🧾 Why the Environmental Crime Directive Was Revised

The Commission’s evaluation of the 2008 Environmental Crime Directive revealed several weaknesses:

• Low number of successful prosecutions and limited use of criminal law.
• Sanctions that were often too low to deter highly profitable offences.
• Inconsistent definitions of key concepts such as “substantial damage”.
• Weak cross‑border cooperation despite the transnational nature of waste crime, wildlife trafficking and illegal pollution.
• Poor quality data, making it difficult to assess trends and the effectiveness of enforcement.

To address these gaps, the Commission proposed a new Environmental Crime Directive in 2021 as part of the European Green Deal, the Zero Pollution Action Plan, the Circular Economy Action Plan and the Biodiversity Strategy for 2030.

The new Directive pursues six main objectives:

• Clarify legal terms and offence definitions.
• Extend the list of environmental crime areas.
• Harmonise types and levels of sanctions.
• Improve cross‑border investigations and prosecutions.
• Standardise the collection and reporting of statistics.
• Strengthen the effectiveness of national enforcement chains.

⚙️ Scope: What Is an Environmental Crime Under the New Rules?

The Environmental Crime Directive requires Member States to criminalise specified conduct when it is unlawful and intentional, and in many cases when committed with at least serious negligence.

Failure to act, where there is a legal duty to act, can also constitute an offence.

The Directive covers a broad range of activities, including:

• Pollution and harmful discharges
• Unlawful emissions, discharges or introductions of materials, substances, energy or ionising radiation into air, soil or water that cause or are likely to cause death, serious injury or substantial environmental damage.

• Products, chemicals and mercury
• Manufacturing, placing on the market, exporting or using substances and mixtures in breach of Union chemicals or mercury legislation, where this results in or is likely to result in serious harm.
• Placing on the market products whose large‑scale use leads to harmful emissions contrary to environmental prohibitions.

• Waste management and ship recycling
• Unlawful collection, transport, treatment or disposal of waste, including as dealer or broker, especially where hazardous waste in a non‑negligible quantity is involved.
• Unlawful waste shipment in non‑negligible quantities.
• Non‑compliant ship recycling contrary to EU ship recycling rules.

• Industrial activities, projects and radioactive substances
• Unlawful operation or closure of industrial installations, major‑accident hazard sites, offshore oil and gas installations or activities involving radioactive materials, where such conduct causes or risks serious harm.
• Execution of projects without the required development consent under environmental impact assessment rules.

• Biodiversity, wildlife and invasive alien species
• Illegal killing, destruction, taking, possession or trade of specified protected wild fauna and flora, beyond negligible quantities.
• Significant deterioration of habitats within protected Natura 2000 sites.
• Serious breaches of invasive alien species rules.

• Deforestation‑related commodities and climate‑relevant gases
• Placing on the Union market or exporting commodities and products in breach of the EU Anti‑Deforestation Regulation, except for negligible quantities.
• Unlawful production, marketing, import, export, use or release of ozone‑depleting substances and fluorinated greenhouse gases, and related products and equipment.

The Directive also requires Member States to criminalise inciting, aiding and abetting these offences, and attempts for selected categories.

🛡️ Penalties, Qualified Offences and Corporate Liability

📜 Qualified environmental offences

Certain particularly serious cases are classed as qualified offences. These are situations where unlawful conduct causes:

• Destruction of, or widespread and substantial damage that is irreversible or long‑lasting to, an ecosystem of considerable size or value, or a protected habitat; or
• Widespread and substantial irreversible or long‑lasting damage to the quality of air, soil or water.

Such qualified offences must be subject to more severe penalties than standard offences and are comparable to what is often described in international debates as “ecocide‑like” conduct.

👤 Penalties for natural persons

Member States must ensure that environmental crimes are punishable by effective, proportionate and dissuasive sanctions for individuals, including:

• Imprisonment of up to at least 10 years for certain offences causing a person’s death.
• Graduated maximum prison terms of at least 8, 5 or 3 years, depending on the category and gravity of the offence.

Accessory penalties or measures can include:

• Obligations to restore the environment within a specified period or to compensate where restoration is not feasible.
• Fines that take account of the offender’s financial situation and the gravity of damage.
• Exclusion from access to public funding, contracts, grants and concessions.
• Disqualification from management positions or, in serious cases, from running for public office.
• Withdrawal of environmental permits and authorisations.
• Publication of court decisions in the public interest, subject to strict data protection safeguards.

🏢 Liability and sanctions for legal persons

Legal persons can be held liable where offences are committed:

• For their benefit by individuals in a leading position (representation, decision‑making or control), or
• As a result of lack of supervision or control.

Sanctions must include criminal or non‑criminal fines with high maximum levels. For the most serious categories of offences, Member States must provide maximum fines of at least:

• 5 % of total worldwide turnover or EUR 40 million; and
• For specified biodiversity‑related offences, 3 % of total worldwide turnover or EUR 24 million.

Additional measures may include:

• Environmental restoration or financial compensation.
• Exclusion from public benefits or funding.
• Withdrawal of permits, disqualification from business activities or judicial winding‑up.
• Closure of establishments used for committing offences.
• Obligations to introduce or strengthen environmental due diligence schemes.
• Publication of decisions imposing sanctions, consistent with privacy rules.

The Directive also provides for aggravating and mitigating circumstances, confiscation of proceeds and instrumentalities, and clear rules on limitation periods to ensure that serious offences can be prosecuted in practice.

🤝 Enforcement, Cooperation and Practitioner Networks

The Environmental Crime Directive strengthens the full enforcement chain and integrates environmental crime into the Union’s broader security architecture.

Key elements include:

• Investigative tools
  Member States must ensure that investigators and prosecutors have access to effective and proportionate investigative techniques, such as surveillance and financial investigations, comparable to those used for other forms of serious and organised crime where appropriate.
• Resources and training
  National authorities responsible for inspections, investigations, prosecutions and adjudication must have sufficient staff and financial, technical and technological capacity. Targeted training for inspectors, police, customs officers, prosecutors and judges is mandatory.
• National coordination and strategies
  Member States must establish mechanisms for coordination and information exchange between environmental inspectorates, police, customs, prosecution services and courts. By May 2027 they must adopt national strategies on combating environmental crime, to be reviewed at least every five years.
• Cross‑border and EU‑level cooperation
  Environmental crime is a priority under EMPACT, the European Multidisciplinary Platform against Criminal Threats. Law enforcement and customs authorities, together with Europol, Eurojust, the European Public Prosecutor’s Office and the European Anti‑Fraud Office, are expected to cooperate in cross‑border cases.
• Environmental enforcement practitioner networks
  The Commission works closely with and financially supports voluntary networks of practitioners, including:
• IMPEL – environmental authorities and inspectorates.
• EnviCrimeNet – police officers specialised in environmental crime.
• ENPE – environmental prosecutors.
• EUFJE – judges dealing with environmental cases.
• Environmental Compliance and Governance Forum
  This expert group brings together Member States and practitioner networks to share experience, develop guidance (for example on combating environmental crime and complaint handling), and advise on governance and policy needs.

📊 Practical Implications for Businesses and Compliance Teams

Although the Environmental Crime Directive is addressed to Member States, it has direct consequences for companies and supply chains operating in or with the EU.

In particular, businesses should:

• Map their exposure to criminalised activities, especially in waste management, transboundary shipments, industrial operations, biodiversity‑sensitive activities, chemicals, fluorinated gases, ozone‑depleting substances and commodities covered by the Anti‑Deforestation Regulation.
• Strengthen internal controls and due diligence, including supplier screening, contract clauses, traceability of materials and clear escalation rules for suspected infringements.
• Review permit compliance and monitoring, ensuring there are documented procedures for emissions, discharges, waste flows and accident prevention, with reliable data collection and record‑keeping.
• Prepare for more assertive enforcement, higher financial penalties and possible restorative obligations, including potential confiscation of assets and publication of sanctions.
• Engage early with competent authorities in case of incidents, accidents or suspected irregularities, to minimise environmental harm and demonstrate cooperation.

✅ How ComplyMarket Supports Alignment with the Environmental Crime Directive

Adapting to Directive (EU) 2024/1203 requires a coherent approach to criminal‑law risk, operational controls and documentation.

ComplyMarket supports manufacturers, traders, waste operators and other market actors by:

• Identifying which offence categories and risk sectors are relevant to the organisation’s activities.
• Reviewing environmental compliance assurance systems, including inspections, monitoring, complaint handling and internal reporting.
• Designing or reinforcing due diligence schemes and supplier controls for areas where breaches of Union law now carry criminal consequences (for example deforestation‑linked commodities or hazardous waste handling).
• Providing structured guidance on interaction with enforcement authorities, practitioner networks and national strategies.

With structured support, companies and their compliance teams can reduce exposure to environmental criminal liability and demonstrate robust governance in line with the new Environmental Crime Directive.