Environment Minister Mihael Zmajlovic has said that it is up to investors into the power plant in the Istrian town of Plomin to decide whether the planned additional facility in the power plant will be coal-based or gas-based.
"The investor is the Croatian electricity provider (HEP), and the ministry in charge of the issue is the economy ministry. Over the past two years the ministry has conducted procedures to assess the impact of the plant on the environment. The expert commission has made its assessment and as a result, given the go-ahead for the implementation of the project, provided that, I emphasise, the strictest measures for environmental protection are implemented", Minister Zmajlovic said in Zagreb on Monday after opening an international conference on waste management.
Whether the new plant will be coal-based or gas-based is a decision at the discretion of the investors, he said adding that in the event of the coal-based plant, it should have a minimum impact on the environment.
Earlier in the day, two civil society environmental organisations filed a lawsuit with the Administrative Court in Rijeka against the Environment Ministry over the issuance of its approval for the future Plomin C facility.
Environmental activists insist on the postponement of the start of the construction of the new block in Plomin until a final ruling of the legal action.
The two NGOs -- Green Action and Green Istria -- said they had lodged the legal action as they believed that the Administrative Court would substantiate their concern and would rule to stop this is environmentally and economically perilous project.
