ITALY Law and Practice Contributed by: David A Röttgen, Andrea Farì, Francesco Fonderico and Ermanno Fonderico, Ambientalex Studio Legale
4.2 Environmental Permits/Approvals As a general rule, environmental permits are required and are granted after an administrative procedure is carried out. This procedure is regulated by the rel- evant sectoral environmental legislation, often inte- grated into the Administrative Procedure Act, or APA (Law No 241/1990). This “single authorisation model” is quite common. Some authorisations (such as IPPC authorisations) are of European origin, while others are derived nationally – for example, the Environmen- tal Single Permit ( Autorizzazione Unica Ambientale , or AUA), and those in respect of renewable energy plants, remediation of brownfields, and the Regional Single Authorisation Provision ( Provvedimento Autor- izzatorio Unico Regionale , or PAUR). Further, some permitting procedures have been streamlined and simplified in order to realise projects provided for in the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP) implementing the Next Generation EU (NGEU). The request for an environmental permit must be filed by the respective competent authority. Under Italian environmental law, there is a wide variety of compe- tent authorities, both at national and local levels. The procedures may vary from region to region, and even from province to province. The Certified Declaration Scheme As a general rule, environmental permits are granted expressly after an administrative procedure is com- pleted. However, particularly for projects not subject to an EIA, a simplified model – called a certified dec- laration scheme – may be applied. In terms of this scheme, an applicant will submit a professionally certified declaration of compliance with the relevant standards. Such certified declaration allows the appli- cant to start the activity immediately, or after a period of 30 or 60 days. Thus, the competent authority does not grant a permit in advance, but merely conducts a retrospective conformity check on the truthfulness of the declaration. The certified declaration scheme is applied to smaller plants in the energy sector ( Prov- vedimento abilitativo semplificato , or PAS) as well as in the waste sector (known as Procedura semplificata ).
mainly listed in the Code. Furthermore, the Criminal Code sanctions conduct that damages the respec- tive environmental legal assets, including the following examples: • environmental pollution (Article 452 bis); • death or injury as a consequence of the crime of environmental pollution (Article 452b); • environmental disaster (Article 452c); • negligent crimes against the environment (Article 452 quinquies); • trafficking and abandonment of highly radioactive material (Article 452 sexies); • homeless remediation (Article 452l); and • organised activity for the illegal trafficking of waste (Article 452 quaterdecies). Additional provisions are set forth in Part VI (Articles 299–318) of the Code, which transposed Directive 2004/35/EC. The recent Law No 147/2025, converting Law Decree No 116/2025 (also known as the Terra dei Fuochi Law Decree) into law, has increased the penalties and transformed many of the offences from contraven- tions to crimes. 4. Environmental Incidents and Permits 4.1 Investigative and Access Powers Environmental regulators, both at national and local level, have a wide range of powers to prevent and sanction administrative or criminal offences affecting the environment. Relevant provisions are mainly found in: • the Code of Criminal Procedure (inspections, searches, sequestration, etc); • the Administrative Sanctions Act (Law No 689/1981); • the Code; and • the respective environmental permits. The authorities are permitted to carry out inspections aimed at verifying that the conditions set in the respec- tive environmental permits have been met, including the power to collect and analyse samples.
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