Specific Principles
Prevention principle
The prevention principle aims to prevent environmental damage; such as to protected species or to natural habitats, water and soil; rather than to react to it. It requires preventive measures to be taken to anticipate and avoid environmental damage before it happens.
Unlike the precautionary principle (see below), it is applied in law and policy when the risk of harm to the environment is clear. However, the precautionary and prevention principles have been closely linked to one another; for example, in the case of ozone-depleting chemicals.
In the 1970s, there was the general consensus (but no proof) at the international level that chlorofluorocarbons could destroy the ozone layer. Thus, their use was cautioned (precautionary). By the late 1980s, scientific evidence emerged that depletion of the stratospheric ozone layer increased ultraviolet radiation exposure, exacerbating the risk of skin cancers and cataracts in humans and animals. This prompted a preventive approach, requiring the phase-out of chlorofluorocarbons. Until the agreement of the Montreal Protocol in 1987, there was uncertainty as to which principle was being relied upon, but there was a scientific consensus on the risk of harm by the time the Protocol came into force in 1989.
The prevention principle was one of eleven objectives and principles listed in the First EU Environmental Action Programme in 1973. Later on, it was applied to EU waste policy (e.g. incineration, landfill and wastewater), water management requirements, protection of biodiversity, environmental impact assessment and other fields on environmental regulation. Nowadays, it is central to the planning policy and underlies lots of environmental legislation.
The preamble of the SEA Directive emphasises that the adoption of environmental assessment procedures at the planning and programming level should benefit undertakings by providing a more consistent framework in which to operate by the inclusion of the relevant environmental information into decision making. The inclusion of a wider set of factors in decision making should contribute to more sustainable and effective solutions.