The Minister of the Environment Jaanus Tamkivi replied to the interpellation concerning the measures excluded from the Oil Shale Plan (No 86), submitted by Members of the Riigikogu Valdur Lahtvee, Mart Jüssi, Toomas Trapido, Maret Merisaar, Aleksei Lotman and Marek Strandberg on 22 September.

Tamkivi explained that, together with the draft of the oil shale development plan, the Ministry of Environment had also submitted a Bill on amendments to the Earth’s Crust Act and the Sustainable Development Act to the Government which provided concrete limitations of the volume of oil shale mining and the issuing of new extraction permits. “The total annual volume of oil shale mining of all oil shale mining enterprises will be reduced to 20 million tons per year and the principle of equal treatment will have to be applied where necessary in reducing of the extraction volume, that is, the maximum volume of the annual oil shale mining of every oil shale mining enterprise will have to be reduced proportionally according to the share of the maximum annual extraction volume granted to the oil shale mining enterprise with the extraction permit,” said the Minister of the Environment.

Tamkivi refuted the statement of the interpellators that the amendments introduced to the development plan unilaterally by the Ministry of the Environment had been regarded as insignificant. “This statement is incorrect, because, first, the introducing of the amendment proposals to the development plan in the Ministry of the Environment has never been referred to as insignificant and, second, the oil shale development plan is not just the development plan of the Ministry of the Environment but the development plan of the whole domain which was prepared and implemented with the involvement of four other ministries,” noted Tamkivi. These are the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communications, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Social Affairs and the Ministry of Education and Research. The proposals submitted by all these ministries were considered and negotiated, and most of the proposals were accepted. “The draft of the oil shale development plan was coordinated with all these ministries and one cannot claim that the Ministry of the Environment has unilaterally introduced all the amendments to the development plan. It is impossible that the draft version could have retained its original form without modifications after coordination,” explained Tamkivi. 

The Minister of the Environment also replied to the interpellation concerning air and water pollution in the region of Muuga (No 92), submitted by Members of the Riigikogu Valdur Lahtvee, Marek Strandberg, Aleksei Lotman, Mart Jüssi, Maret Merisaar and Toomas Trapido on 25 September. Tamkivi asserted that the living environment of the people would not deteriorate any more. “The situation is under the control of the Environmental Inspectorate,” said the Minister of the Environment. 

During the open microphone, Marek Strandberg took the floor.

The Riigikogu Press Service