The European Commission will reportedly “seek clarification” from Greece about its recent approvals for offshore oil and gas activities in areas critical for threatened whales and sea turtles.
That’s according to the NGO ClientEarth, which, alongside WWF Greece and Greenpeace Greece, filed a formal complaint with the European executive body in 2023 alleging that the Greek government had granted the concessions without “appropriate assessments” of their impacts on marine biodiversity and habitats. With the permits in hand, the oil companies have been carrying out seismic surveys in the region to verify the existence of oil and gas.
The NGOs in their 2023 complaint alleged that most of the concessions lay in the Hellenic Trench, an area of the Mediterranean Sea that serves as a vital habitat for many threatened marine animals, including loggerhead turtles (Caretta caretta), green sea turtles (Chelonia mydas), sperm whales (Physeter macrocephalus) and Cuvier’s beaked whales (Ziphius cavirostris). The concessions are also close to Natura 2000 sites, a network of marine protected areas across the EU.
In response to the NGOs’ complaint, the European Commission said in August 2024 that EU laws don’t apply to seismic research activities where there hasn’t been any drilling or “alterations to the physical aspect of a site.”
The NGOs countered this in a letter sent to the commission in September, saying their complaint is “not only focused on seismic surveys but covers all phases” of oil and gas activities, from exploration and production to transportation and storage of the products. All these activities are required to undergo detailed scientific impact assessments under EU laws, which Greece had failed to carry out, the letter said.
The commission has now responded to this letter by saying it will probe further, ClientEarth said in a press release.
The commission’s letter isn’t publicly available, but Francesco Maletto, a lawyer for ClientEarth who has a copy of it, told Mongabay it includes the line: “After assessing your reply and the additional information that was provided, we have decided to contact the Greek authorities and seek clarifications [for the NGOs’ allegations]. We are now waiting for the reply of the Greek authorities.”
“After collecting all the information from Greek authorities, the Commission will have to decide whether to escalate to a formal infringement procedure,” Maletto said by email. A formal infringement procedure is a legal mechanism to ensure that EU member states comply with EU laws.
“Fossil fuel drilling, at the direct expense of nature, merits legal scrutiny by the EU Commission and we’re extremely pleased to see that will go ahead as we asked,” Maletto said in the release. “The European Commission is the guardian and enforcer of EU laws. It’s essential they act to ensure that laws are not undermined by Member States as we are seeing here from Greece.”
Banner image of a sperm whale and calf by Gabriel Barathieu via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.0).
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