In response to POLITICO's questions, the Italian government said the impacts of the main pollutants have been significantly reduced. The pattern of hesitation and weak enforcement of European law in Taranto isn't isolated.Īccording to an analysis of the past 50 years of so-called infringement proceedings launched by the Commission - legal action intended to force compliance with EU law - carried out by University of Rutgers Professor Daniel Keleman and University of Arizona Assistant Professor Tommaso Pavone, the European Commission has been steadily losing its appetite for confrontation with EU member countries over the enforcement of EU law, launching fewer legal challenges and bringing fewer cases to court since 2004.īut the case in Taranto is unique in terms of scale, health and environmental impact and how it appears to contravene the Commission's central mission of making Europe into an environmental model for the world. But the EU executive has stalled its legal action since 2018, arguing the plant is on track to comply with EU environmental law, referring to information provided by the government. Through a three-month examination of the EU's start-and-stop efforts to address the environmental mess in Taranto, POLITICO found that over the course of more than a decade, the Italian government received several warnings from the Commission, after being sent to the EU’s highest court for inaction in 2011.

Pollution from the steel plant in Italy has rendered local waters unsuitable for mussel production | Photographs by Leonie Cater/POLITICO

Rules of survival shut down