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Environmental Risks and Insurance
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7. ENVIRONMENTAL RISKS AND INSURANCE
The acting environmental legislation and its standards and methods, do not yet fully meet the environmental objectives. For example, Belarus still does not have a legal basis for the application and development of such an effective environmental management practice as environmental insurance.
It is impossible to asses possible negative consequences of a natural disaster or an accident in advance. However, according to the “polluter pays” principle, there are certain legal tools that help to relieve such consequences by getting compensation. Compulsory environmental insurance of potentially harmful enterprises is an effective tool, since the amount of the insurance payments is subject to the environmental activities of companies. Thus, companies are urged to take measures to reinforce the environmental safety and prevent accidents. If a company refuses to carry environmental insurance it can be forced to closure.
In the Russian Federation, the issues of insurance of hydro-technical facilities has also been high on the agenda because of the need to attract private capitals into the environmental field in order to ensure effective industrial and environmental safety of those facilities, to prevent or relieve accidents or damages, and to protect human right for a favorable environment.
In the Republic of Belarus in the shortest possible time it is necessary to produce a package of documents providing for compulsory environmental insurance of potentially hazardous enterprises based on the appropriate experience of the Russian Federation and other countries.
Then, it is necessary to legally regulate the issues of protection of public health and environment in the process of production, use, storage and transportation of pesticides, mineral fertilizers and other chemicals used in agriculture. At the same time it is necessary to make environmental amendments to the acting laws “On environmental protection” and “On industrial safety of hazardous enterprises”.
Alongside with the legislative improvements, it is necessary to continue developing standard setting and methodological documents regulating other fields of use and protection of natural resources. In particular it is necessary to improve the criteria and standards of quality of air and soil, and of control over the disposal and utilization of hazardous wastes.
The basic documents regulating the issues of emergency and accident prevention and relief are the Water Code of the Republic of Belarus and the Law of Belarus “On protection of the population and territories from natural and technogenic disasters.”
An emergency situation is a situation resulting from an accident, catastrophe, natural or other disaster that has caused or may cause human victims, damage to people’s health and natural environment, significant financial losses and harm to people’s living conditions.
Emergency prevention is a system of measures taken in advance to maximally reduce the risks of emergency situations as well as to protect people’s health and to lessen the environmental damage and financial losses in case of emergency situations.
Emergency situations are classified as local, restricted, regional, national and transboundary.
In order to take urgent measures to prevent or relieve natural disasters caused by harmful impact of water as well as accidents at water facilities, the Council of Ministers of Belarus and local executive and administrative bodies set up ad hoc commissions, authorized to take the decisions, which are mandatory for all legal entities and persons.
The state system of emergency prevention and relief consists of a central governmental body for emergency situations, other state governmental bodies, local executive and administrative bodies, and companies, institutions and organizations, which, regardless of their legal status, are authorizes to safeguard the population and territories from the emergency situations.
As for prevention and relief of harmful water effects and consequences of the accidents at water facilities, the Water Code of Belarus specifies that the water users must carry out prevention or relief activities, approved by the local executive and administrative bodies, departments of Environmental Ministry and other state agencies in case of
- floods, inundations, under-flooding;
- destruction of the banks, protection dams and other facilities;
- swamping or salinization of soils;
- soil erosion, gullies, landslides, etc.
In case of an accident at water facilities, legal entities or persons guilty of the accident must immediately work to liquidate or to relieve its consequences. They must also inform the appropriate local executive and administrative bodies, departments of Environmental Ministry, state sanitary control bodies, and state industrial and nuclear safety bodies.
In order to reduce the adverse impact of pipelines on water bodies, the law “On arterial pipeline transport” requires to use the draw-in and other modern technical solutions ensuring environmental safety of water bodies, navigation, preservation of valuable kinds of fish, water plants and animals at the points where pipelines cross water body.
In compliance with the law of the Republic of Belarus “On protection of the population and territories from natural and technogenic disasters”, a national system of reserve stocks of emergency supplies is being currently established. The order of making, using and replenishing these stocks is regulated by the Provisions of the Council of Ministers.
The Resolution of the Council of Ministers of the Republic of Belarus “On the approval of the list of rescue and relief works” defines the list of works aimed at the relief (localization) of hydrodynamic accidents (breaks of dams, weirs, locks) and catastrophic flooding.
The law “On protection of the population and territories from natural and technogenic disasters”, provides that the persons guilty of the law infringement, creation of conditions causing emergency situations or failure to take measures to protect lives and health of people, or other illegal actins bare responsibility in compliance with the legislation of the Republic of Belarus.
To forecast and urgently prevent the emergency situations, to enhance safety of the population residing within a river basin and to develop feasibility studies of engineering works aimed to reduce damage, mathematic models of water movement and admixture transportation within a system of water bodies is used. Such mathematic modeling helps to define the mode of change in the levels, discharges and concentrations of admixtures within a given system of water bodies. This enables to assess the threat to the population and buildings located in proximity to water facilities and recommend corrective measures.
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