Swedish
Stockholm municipality concluded a contract with the company Fortum Distribution AB to construct a tunnel for power lines between two areas in Stockholm. The Environmental Court in Stockholm granted a permit for the construction. The environmental organisation Djurgården-Lilla Värtans Miljöskyddsförening appealed the case to the Environmental Court of Appeal, but the Court found that it did not have a right to litigate, as it did not fulfil the requirements of chapter 16 section 13 of the Environmental Code. Accordingly, non-profit organisations must to have a right to litigate, among other requirements, have at least 2000 members.
The organisation appealed to the Supreme Courts and claimed that the membership requirement was contrary to the Aarhus Convention and, since the Convention had been signed and approved by the EC, also to EC law. Consequently, the Supreme Court resolved to request a preliminary ruling from the Court of Justice. The Supreme Courts wanted to know if the EIA Directive included the kind of activity permitted in the case, if the public should have the right to appeal such a permit and if a state has the possibility to exclude small environmental organisations from the right to appeal.
The Court of Justice gave its judgment in case C-263/08 Djurgården-Lilla Värtans Miljöskyddsförening vs Stockholms kommun genom dess marknämnd [2009] ECR I-09967. The Court of Justice stated that the activity in question was within the scope of the EIA Directive, that the public shall have a right to appeal decisions about these kinds of permits and that EU law precludes a limit of 2000 members for environmental organisations to have a right to appeal decisions.
Consequently, the Supreme Court, on the background of the CJEU judgment, decided to set aside the decision of the Environmental Court of Appeal to dismiss the appeal of the environmental organisation.