”Strategies signed by states to address climate change are not respected,” environmentalists from the region say in a letter to the leaders of the European Union (EU) and the Western Balkans, ahead of the summit to be held in Brussels on June 23rd and 24th.
The Ugljevik coal plant in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) again emitted the most sulfur dioxide in the region in 2021 – 86.774 tonnes – despite having desulphurization equipment installed at a cost of 85 million euros.
That is 10 times more than allowed. Kostolac A2 in Serbia emitted 13 times more SO2 than allowed, and block 6 in Thermal Power Plant Tuzla 11.6 times more.
BiH violates the rules and does not meet the agreed goals, environmentalists claim, although in November 2020 it signed the Declaration on the Green Agenda for the Western Balkans at the summit of the countries in the region in Sofia.
The biggest dust polluter in 2021 was the Gacko coal plant (in the southeast BiH), whose emissions more than tripled to 4.960 tons – more than 16 times more than allowed by the National Emission Reduction Plan (NERP).
Environmental associations concerned
Dragan Ostic, an assistant in the “Energy and Climate Change” program at the Center for Environment (CZZS), says that thermal power plants pollute more and more every year.
”They should reduce pollution over the years. To adjust to the very agreements that have been signed, which the state has signed. In essence, they do not do that, they do not respect the strategies to which the state has committed itself, that they will work on solving the problems related to climate change,” Ostic said.
Introduction of carbon dioxide (CO2) taxes
One of the obligations that BiH needs to fulfill is the introduction of a tax on CO2.
If this tax were introduced, BiH would avoid the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), which the EU plans to adopt this year and will activate from 2025 or 2026.
Under this system, all products that emit a lot of carbon dioxide will be subject to a fee when imported into the EU market.
