Module 7:
Public Participation in the EIA Process

Purpose

Objectives

• EIA screening stage;
• preparation of the EIA report;
• review of EIA report;
• expert review of the EIA report;
• issuing the EIA decision;
• appealling the EIA decision;
• post-decision analysis.

Contents: Public Participation in the EIA Process

Introduction

7.2 EIA Screening Stage The EIA Act is a procedure for assessing industrial projects that may have an impact on the environment. When an EIA procedure is required, it is to be conducted by an independent party and applicants, or the subjects of the study, may not claim that the study is unnecessary on the grounds that all other permits are at their disposal. The EIA procedure results in the issuance of the EIA Act. The EIA Act is an administrative act that must be granted before an applicant/developer can obtain a construction permit. The new EIA regulation does not explicitly state that a construction permit will automatically be granted after an EIA decision is obtained by an investor, but an investor cannot act without having all necessary documents and permits. This is why interested parties may ask the RIE to stops the development or construction of a facility, which operates without any of the necessary permits. If an investor that has obtained a construction permit without having first received a favorable EIA decision, any NGO or citizen may request that the RIE or the Construction Control Inspectorate (CCI) stop the construction activities. Interested parties may inquire whether all of the necessary and legal procedures were followed and the necessary documents approved by authorities in order for a given investor/developer in order to obtain the construction permit. In order to investigate, interested parties will need to know: information where to find the construction permit; information about the necessary documents for obtaining the construction permit (this information is also useful for businesses); how to request information. 7.2.1 Who issues construction permits? To find out if an investor has received a construction permit, interested parties can first ask the Building Department of their local municipality. Construction permits are issued by the main town architecture officer.

Case 7.1 In a village near Sofia - Mircovo - the mayor issued a construction permit without having an EIA decision. Upon recognizing his error, the mayor rescinded the construction permit. The investor subsequently appealed the new decision for annulling the permit. The regional court in Sofia stated that the mayor's decision was correct, based on the argument that without the necessary EIA decision the permit could not be granted. What examples do you know?

7.2.2 What information is required to obtain a construction permit? Investors require a number of documents in order to acquire a construction permit from the local Construction Department, including documents concerning the prevention of environmental problems as well as public and occupational health problems. Box 7.1 indicates the documents required to obtain a construction permit. Box 7.1 Documents Necessary to Obtain a Construction Permit An official area plan of the place in question, stamped and signed by the following officials: the Regional Hygienic Epidemiologic Inspectorate (RHEI): Such an authorization indicates that the industrial or commercial site is not in contradiction with Regulation No. 7 of the Ministry of Health and that this site would pose no public health risk. the Regional Environmental Inspectorate (REI): The REI authorization indicates whether or not the site plan must be submitted to an EIA act study. the permit is also signed by other authorities, including the Fire Protection Office, the energy company, etc. Projects of the future industrial plant, containing all the necessary parts (architectural, technological, electrical, heating and ventilation, etc. and an EIA report) must be inspected and approved by: the RHEI: The RHEI examines all parts of the project except the EIA report, and issues a document called a "sanitary expertise." Interested persons can ask the RHEI directly if the document has been issued for a given plant.

7.2.3 How do interested parties request information? Boxes 7.2 and 7.3 illustrate samples of how an interested party might submit a written request to the RHEI and REI authorities requesting information about the permitting process of a given investor/developer.
Box 7.2 Sample Request Letter for RHEI To: Director Hygiene Epidemiological Inspection Town of _______________________ Address Date: _________________   From: Your Name/Your Organization Your Address Your Telephone/Fax Dear Sir/Madam, In connection with the (name of project/case) I would like to receive information about the following issues and questions: Has the RHEI approved an areas plan for the (case)? Has the RHEI issued a sanitary expertise on the (case)? If the RHEI has given its aproval, could you please then inform me of whether it has prescribed any requirements for the invester regarding necessary measures or improvements? What have been the results of this action to date? I appreciate your attention to these requests and look forward to your response. With best regards, Your Name	Interested parties should include information about the case, including citations from the mass media, personal information or signs of public interest/protest in their letters to officials to motivate a response and to provide factual evidence of public interest.
Box 7.2 Sample Request Letter for RHEI To: Director REI Town of _______________________ Address Date: _________________   From: Your Name/Your Organization Your Address Your Telephone/Fax Dear Sir/Madam, In connection with some brief announcements that occurred in the media recently about the future building of a waste storage depot for toxic and dangerous industrial wastes, we would like to receive information from you regarding the following: Has the REI approved and signed an area plan for the investor? Has the REI required an EIA Act on the area plan for the (site) for this industrial toxic waste storage? Is there any EIA Act (either for the place or for the storage itself?) and has the REI issued any decision on it? If not, which authority has taken the decision and what is the outcome of this decision? If there has been an EIA Report, in what way has it beenannounced for public discussions? Is the report currently available to the public? With best regards, Your Name

7.2.4 What Activities are Included in the EIA? The list of activities that must be submitted to the EIA is prescribed in the EPL. As the EIA Act is issued either by the Minister of the Environment, or by the Director of the Regional Inspectorate of the Environment (RIE), there is a division of governmental jurisdiction over the EIA. It is also important to know that an EIA also must be conducted for projects of general area plans of certain areas (zones). The EIA is required especially for industrial zones placed near residential areas or for zones with different kinds of activities planned to occur simultaneously, i.e. industrial plants, together with commercial sites and agricultural areas. With the further development of the process of land restitution and privatization in Bulgaria, the number of uses and applications of the EIA process should increase. 7.2.5 Who Has Authority to Make Decisions in the EIA Process? Article 13 of Regulation No. 1 of the EIA (State Journal No. 73/1995) defines which authority makes which decisions in the EIA process, and for which types of projects. There are relatively complicated criteria, and interested parties should consult the article closely before beginning an action to see whether the activity is listed. Interested parties should also be sure which authority has the power to issue the AA. In cases where authorities other than those authorized make decisions, then the EIA act can be cancelled. In addition, an interested person can propose that the competent authorities require an EIA study on an activity regardless of the nature of the project or the stage of its implementation according to Article 20/3 of the EPL. For activities already implemented, an EIA study can be conducted at the request of the competent authorities. Regulation No. 1 of the EIA processes (published in the State Newspaper of the Bulgarian Government (No. 73/1995), allows for the possibility to request that an EIA study be conducted on an already existing site. In addition, an EIA may also be requested by interested parties for investigation of the impact of a single element of an industrial site, for example an EIA on air pollution only. This is only the case for EIA acts of an industrial activity or site already in existence or already implemented. The EIA acts of future industrial plants, however, require investigation of the impacts of all the necessary elements. Interested parties may request the CA to conduct EIA studies by referring either to the current conditions of an investor's activities, or to other data, indicating the activities' impact on the environment. Such data can be information from the mass media about the investor's illegal activities, or indications of the actual effects of the activity. Interested parties should direct such a request to the competent authority. There is no legal guarantee that this suggestion will be accepted, however. This provision also enables interested parties to request repetitions of EIA studies after an initial EIA permit has been given. The repetition may be made every fifth year - and thus provides an excellent possibility for qualified "post-decision analysis/management" with a thorough public participation component. Interested parties should not miss out on any opportunity to use this important opportunity.

Case 7.2 In Rousse, the mayor encouraged two of the largest industrial plants, a chemical and an electronics plant, to contract independent experts to conduct an EIA study on the impact of their activities on levels of air pollution. The mayor's actions were motivated by pressure from citizens concerned about the air quality in the community. The air had developed an unpleasant smell and was increasingly difficult to breath. People began contacting various authorities to complain, including the municipal officers, the RHEI, the REI, and local newspapers and NGOs. One local NGO, Ecoglasnost, sent a letter of protest to the mayor. Local newspapers covered the story with front page columns. At the same time, the chemical plant (situated on the opposite side of the Danube in Romania) gave no response. The mayor of the Romanian town of Giurgevo was asked by the mayor of Rousse for an explanation. In reply, the mayor sent a letter indicating that the Giurgevo chemical plants had not been operating due to technical problems, and were therefore not at fault for the transboundary air pollution. The Environmental Division of Rousse organized an administrative meeting with the Chief Executive of the local services and two regional inspectorates. The results of the meeting indicated that the industrial plants were responsible for the pollutants. Public pressure caused the mayor to press the plants to conduct an EIA on air pollution impacts of their activities. The public was interested in information regarding air, ground water and drinking water contamination. Although the plants were state owned, and accountable only to the Minister of Industry, they agreed to an EIA on air quality. What examples do you know?

7.3 Preparation of the EIA Report The competent authority can decide what will be the scope for the EIA for a given site. The new EIA regulation, State Journal No. 73/95, is far more descriptive of the scope of the EIA report. In special annexes the scope of the different types of EIA reports is defined according to the objective of the report. The first annex discusses EIA reports regarding Land Use Plans; the second is focused on EIA reports about projects; and the third gives the content of the EIA report about already existing facilities. The competent authority may decide to reduce the scope of an EIA report regarding existing facilities. The CA defines the scope and decides whether the report "shall cover all or only some of the components of the environment, touched by the existing facility." 7.3.1 Preliminary Versus Final EIA Reports Article 6/3, Regulation No. 1 of the EIA provides that the investor must prepare a preliminary EIA report, which should be submitted to the competent authority. The regulation outlines the format of the preliminary and final EIA reports in Article 6/2,4 of the Regulation No. 1. The difference between a preliminary and final EIA is that the final report has a more detailed structure and a greater number of environmental issues which are included and discussed. The distinction between the preliminary and the final EIA report was not provided by the EPL. The EPL defines only the term "EIA report." The idea of "preliminary" and "final" EIA reports was created later in Regulation No. 1 of the EPL. The necessity for such a distinction is explained by the need to control greater numbers of projects in the initial stages of planning, and controlling the same projects again in the next, more detailed stage of planning when significant changes in the project are difficult to make. Now Article 6/3 of the EIA regulation says that for some projects, the preliminary EIA report is obligatory. For interested parties, it is important to know that the preliminary EIA report is obligatory always when the character of the agricultural land changes. The competent authorities oftentimes take advantage of this dual structure and make decisions on the basis only of the preliminary EIA report, without submitting the EIA report to a public discussion. In the new EIA regulation, this practice has been institutionalized and it is explicitly provided that the final decision can be taken on the basis of the preliminary EIA report. This is not provided by the law, however. In this sense, the regulations are illegal since a decision taken on the basis of a preliminary EIA report is issued without public discussion of the report.

Case 7.3 A waste storage for industrial toxic wastes was planned to be built in the eastern industrial zone of the town of Rousse. A big railway company was the invester. The location was pointed out by some community officers, but they prescribed a preliminary EIA report for the area. The invester hired a team of engineers to conduct the EIA study, and asked a hydrogeologist and a toxicologies to join the team. The results produced by the engineers did not contain anything which might be disturbing to the public, but the hydrogeologist and toxicologist pointed out that the zone was a wetlands, and that toxic contamination of the soil and the ground water would be certain. The source of drinking water for the city was next to the wetlands area proposed as the toxic waste disposal site. The toxicologist therefore concluded that the project was a high ecological risk and it was subsequently rejected. The head of the engineering team included their materials in the preliminary EIA report, but wrote a different conclusion, indicating that "there is a certain ecological risk, but there are technical methods of avoiding this...". It was not written down clearly that those technical methods were extremely expensive, perhaps multiplying the cost of the project by ten times. The invester asked the local REI to issue a final decision of the EIA on the basis of this preliminary report. The REI sent the report to the next higher authority, the Minister of the Environment, who approved the report and gave a final EIA decision. However, the storage facility has still not been built, and it's fate remains uncertain. What examples do you know?

7.3.2 Independent EIA Specialists The EIA reports, both preliminary and final, must be prepared by an "independent specialist" who should not have personal or professional links of any sort with the investor. Interested parties may question the competency or independence of the expert preparing an EIA report thorough a court appeal of an EIA decision. Interested parties must consult Article 4 of the new EIA regulation and be sure that the specialist preparing the report is truly independent and that s/he responds to all the conditions of Article 4. If the specialist is well qualified, not independent, or does not have a license, the EIA decision can be appealed on that basis. Up to now there is no jurisprudence on this issue. Interested parties should know who the final author of the EIA report is, to be certain that s/he is experienced -- both a competent and independent expert. One possibility for interested parties to question the competency of the EIA expert is by focusing on Article 21/1 of the EPL, which requires expert assessment also of the potential social impacts. Social impact analysis is not a task to be taken lightly by inexperience experts. If interested parties believe that an EIA expert is not competent or independent, they should find documents or witnesses to document their case. If there are only witnesses - prepare a written declaration, have the declaration authenticated by a notary, and consult a lawyer. 7.4 Review of EIA Report The EIA regulation provides explicit procedures for public participation. The EIA report (preliminary as well as final) is submitted to the CA who is charged with arranging public discussion on it. There is relatively little practice in Bulgaria of public participation during the discussions, but those instances that did include such public involvement illustrate the positive effects it has during the discussions of the final EIA decision: 7.4.1 Announcement of Public Discussion The announcement for public discussion must be made a least one month before the date of the discussion and must be made though the national and local mass media. One obstacle, however, is the cost of such public announcement, and one obstacle cited by competent authorities is that of the high costs necessary to adequately reach the broad public. Interested parties should be continually informed about what EIA public discussions are announced. One of the potential options is to select an individual or an NGO to do the job of looking for such announcements and to inform potentially interested parties (NGOs, community leaders, Local Councellors in the affected municipalities, etc.) about the possibility to take part in the public discussions. Interested parties should ensure that the announcement of public discussion is done thoroughly through public information campaigns on both local and national levels. During the period of one month prior to the public discussion, the investor must let the public see and consult the draft EIA report and background materials. The EIA decision can be cancelled on this procedural ground if the public has not been given proper access to the EIA documentation (the EIA report as well as background materials) although no jurisprudence exists on this matter in Bulgaria. During this one month period before the public discussion, everyone interested can submit written opinions, remarks and objections. As outlined in EIA Regulation, Article 11, the investor collects all these submissions and includes them as part of the EIA report. If the public submissions are not included in the final report - this also may serve as a legal basis for cancelling the decision, although once again, there is no jurisprudence in this issue in Bulgaria. Regulation No. 1 of the EIA Act does not clearly describe the precise procedures of public announcements. An investor may, therefore, try to avoid a "real" public announcement (for example, by writing an order that a pubic announcement has been made and written opinions are expected in 30 days, and hanging this document in the office corridor). 7.4.2 Organizing Public Discussions There are no specific rules or criteria for organizing public discussions. From the legal point of view this is not regulated, instead quality must be ensured by the interested parties. The EIA decision can only be cancelled on procedural ground if: there was not public discussion; the public discussion was held less than one month from the announcement; the public discussion was not at all announced in the mass media. There is, however, no jurisprudence on this issue in Bulgaria. If there are no adequate attempts to organize public discussion by the competent authority, interested parties can organize their own public hearings on the preliminary EIA report and submit these results as a part of the official process. If there controversial issues arise in the initial EIA public hearings, the competent authority makes the decision whether there is a need for a second public discussion. Interested parties should consider whether there has been any substantial controversial issue identified during accessibility of the EIA report or during the public discussion. If so, the interested parties may request the authorities to organize another public discussion where these would be analyzed in appropriate depth. The results from the public discussion should be included in the final EIA report, that is prepared afterwards. If the results of the public discussion are not included in the final report - this alone may also serve as a legal basis for cancelling the decision. There is also no jurisprudence on this issue in Bulgaria.

Box 7.4 Although every EIA case is unique and may requre particular expertise, interested parties should encourage EIA teams to be diverse and objective in opinion by assuring that all parties are independent of the investor in question, and that represent a variety of backgrounds and areas of expertise in environment, health and social fields. The following might be used as a guideline: an engineer in electronics an engineer in ventilation systems or chemical engineering a forestry or biology specialist a toxicologies or health specialist a hydrogeologist others It may be in practice that in small communities in Bulgaria that do not have enough or certain experts available for preparing EIA studies, that some of the work may be conducted by members of the environmental councels of the REI. If the interested parties are suspicious of such an approach, they shoud stay very well informed of the REI's work and organize public hearings on the reports to assure all issues are examined objectively and thoroughly without bias.

Box 7.5 Lessons from the Czech Republic: Organizing Independent Public Discussions on EIA Reports

The Czech EIA system does not provide adequate requirements for gathering citizens' comments after the EIA report is published. The EIA report is just made available for 30 days to citizens, who can read it, make copies, and provide written submissions. The information campaigns on the availability of the EIA report "for public review" are usually done in a very inadequate manner. In addition, the EIA reports are usually so complex that the task of reviewing them (usually in the office of the administration - because no one has money to make his/her own copy of it) is an extremely difficult one. The combination of these issues has quite a detrimental effect on the quality of public participation in the EIA process. Interested citizens usually do not learn about their opportunities to inspect the EIA report, and even if they do manage to learn about it (usually through very informal channels), they are not able to provide qualified comments of the (usually very complex) EIA report. They thus miss a key opportunity for providing their comments in a timely and effective manner and - when they voice their comments later in the process - are accused of non-constructive behavior. The Public Environmental Assessment Center (CR) therefore developed a system of "nonformal public reviews of EIA reports." The system is based on the presumption that NGOs can, if state agencies fail to do so, organize their own public discussions and can present these public submissions as a part of the official process. Important: Your aim should be to gather citizens' comments and not trying to pursuade them to identify with your arguments. These attempts may upset many people and create a feeling that you are just trying to manipulate public opinion. Therefore, consider carefully the results of exhibiting your own comments on the EIA report, and gathering signatures for petitions. The above process has proven to have numerous benefits to NGO who organizes it. In particular the process: Generates a lot of new data and expertise; Identifies (both from the attendance at the hearing as well as from the comments that were voiced) general feelings of the community towards the proposal - and a basis for further steps on this knowledge; Identifieskey supporters and opponents of the NGO actions on the proposals; Provides NGOs with substantive political power.

The system is organized as follows: Learn (either through formal or non-formal channels) about the accessibility of EIA reports; Contact local activists and organize - in a locally known and accessible place (such as cinema, theatre, library) - an independent public hearing on the EIA report; Undertake a thorough invitation campaign in order to get the message to all intereted citizens - invite general public, but also media, Local Councellors, administrators, local scholars and external experts; Invite proponents and experts who prepared the EIA report and ask them to present their findings to the public - if they do not accept the invitation, present the EIA report on your own; Prepare posters summarizing key parts of the EIA report and exhibit them at the entrance to the place where the hearing is held - newcomers can thus quickly learn what the discussion is about, and posters also provide important background information during potential breaks of the public hearing; Gather comments, organize them and submit them to the responsible authority as a part of the official submission process.

7.5 Expert Review of the EIA Report The review of the EIA report is done through a special Expert Council which gives it's opinion on the project. There is no provision for the obligatory representative of NGOs in the Expert Councils. There is often no provision of proper environmental health specialists either, and few Councils have a toxicologist at their disposal. The local administration must be represented in the Expert Council, that prepares the decisions of the RIE. Usually a specialist of the Ecological Department of the local community is present (or an ecological expert of the community in small communities that do not have such a department). Expert Councils may also include experts who have not taken part in the same procedure up to this stage of the procedure. This is one basis on which interested parties can request that authorities include their representatives in the Expert Councils. On a nonformal basis interested parties can choose a representative for the Expert Council and may insist on allowing their representative to take part as a member of the Council, or at least to be present as a citizen at the session of the Expert Council. In this situation the authority will have to publicly choose - either to let the public know and decide, or to be less respected for the lack of democratic attitude. It would be good to create a practice of letting NGOs take part in the formation of the Expert Councils, although no jurisprudence exists in Bulgaria to guarantee this. Interested parties can try to obtain information about who is included in the Expert Council. If they believe that any of the experts are not independent, they can ask the authority to exclude the person from the Council. Interested parties may find it useful to follow the work of EIA experts all over the country (or at least find out what previous cases they have been involved in, how independent they were perceived, etc.) and document this, since it may be necessary to possess materials proving the dependence of an expert. NGOs may also submit counter expertise opinions on the subject to a Expert Council.

Box 7.6 Suggestion The local RIE Council is gathered at least once a month ( or - in bigger cities - every week). The agenda of each Expert Council meeting is made several days (at least) prior to the meeting. The Council has a Secretary - a staffmember of the REI. The interested parties could therefore also ask the Council Secretary what EIA projects are put on the agenda for the next meeting, or what were on the agenda of a previous meeting, or for some future period. The best way to request this information would be in written form, addressed to the Director of the local REI, asking to have a copy of (or to be informed regularly about) the agenda(s) which are of interest.

7.6 Issuing the EIA Decision Once the Expert Council had given it's opinion on the subject of an EIA study, the authority issues a decision. The EIA regulation provides that the CA can issue the following types of decisions for an EIA study: a positive EIA decision if the environmental legislation is respected; an order for the completion of the EIA report if the data are not sufficient enough for the CA to make a decision; a negative decision that means either the temporary or the final closure of the existing facility or the prevention of the investor to develop an activity or to begin the construction. Interested parties should closely follow whether the EIA decision is motivated according to the directives and texts of Article 14 of the EIA regulation. Sometimes a decision may not treat all obligatory issues. In this case, the decision can be cancelled on this ground, although there is no jurisprudence on this issue in Bulgaria. This is especially the case for EIA acts of future sites for industrial plants or others. If the EIA study has been conducted at an existing plant, then it is possible that the EIA may have been conducted on a single issue only -- as in the case of air pollution presented earlier. But it is important to keep in mind that such a "single-issue" EIA study may be conducted only in instances when it has been approved by the CA (in the case example above, the local community mayor). An expert (or a team of EIA experts) is not authorized to make such a decision. Under such circumstances, the EIA act would be illegal. In case of a positive EIA decision there may be certain conditions, which if violated would violate the EIA permit and face all possible consequent actions. The regulation does not give explanation of the kind of conditions which can be included as part of the decision - their specification depends primarily on the activities of interest parties. Interested parties may ask the authority to issue the decision under some special conditions, for example: Mitigation and compensation measures - executing some activities that are favorable for the environment or an affected community (see EIA table no. 3); Post-decision monitoring - organizing a self-monitoring system with obligatory submissions of results to the public. The EIA decision must be announced through the mass media. The competent authority also must give copies of the decision to all interested physical or legal persons and must assure the free access of the general public to the decision. Decisions may be appealed in court in the 14-day period from that of its publication (for decisions of RIE) or in 30 days from the time of the Minister's decisions. The definition in the EPL of what an "interested party" can be is a very broad one. In Article 11/2 of the Regulation No. 1, it is said that "the state authorities, the local administrative authorities, the organizations of the public (NGOs), the public" take part in the discussion of the EIA project. These same persons, to whom it is given the right to take part in the public discussion, may also have access to the EIA decision, and the same persons can appeal the EIA decision.

Case 7.4 Sometimes, conditions of the final EIA decision can be suggested during the public discussion by the public itself. Such an example is the case about the factory for the treatment of radioactive waste (FTRW) near Kozloduy. The project was submitted to public discussion and during the discussion the public objected that in the factory there should not be treated "fresh" liquid waste. The final EIA decision was positive, but as condition it was stated that the factory should not treat "fresh" liquid radioactive waste. Thus the scope of activity of the factory was corrected in the conditions of the EIA decision. What examples do you know?

7.7 Appealing the EIA Decision The notion of an "interested party" in the EIA procedure is very broad, including all those who are affected by the project. Therefore, even those affected by the project in an indirect way may appeal an EIA decision. The appeals can be based on violations of the EPL and Regulation No. 1, already mentioned in the previous chapters and paragraphs. Interested parties should also be aware of what is said about the conditions under which the decision is issued in "Post Decision Analysis" below. Appeals are brought into court through the competent authority that has issued the decision. The appeal must be filed in the register of the CA. In instances where the appealing party does not have the possibility to visit the CA's office, or when the CA's office is already closed, the appeal can be filed by registered mail or in the regular post. In the latter case there would not be proof of having sent the letter. When an appeal is filed by letter, the date on the envelope is considered to be the date of the appeal's submittal. Interested parties should also refer to Module 9: Challenging the Decisions of Public and Private Institutions regarding methods for challenging the actions of the government, municipalities and other public and private institutions. 7.8 Post-Decision Analysis There are neither explicit directives regarding what should be the post-decision analysis process nor what should be the tools and deadlines for such a process. Interested parties may, however use the following legal tools for initiating public participation in the post-decision analysis: 7.8.1 Article14/4 of Regulation No. 1 A provision in Article14/4 of Regulation No. 1 states that: "The final EIA decision describes the conditions of a positive decision, and regarding fulfillment of these conditions, the CA will exercise control." The Regulation clearly stipulates that the CA can impose conditions on the investor. In most CA practice these conditions amount to nothing beyond recommendations for improvement of the EIA report. Interested parties may directly challenge the decision in this case and make an appeal based on non-compliance with the law. When using Article 14/4 of Regulation No. 1 for this purpose, interested parties may suggest conditions at the preparation stage of the EIA decision that may be used afterwards for exercising control over the investor's activity. (Such control is possible even if it is not explicitly provided in the EIA decision. The general powers of the RIE are to control the activity of persons, when this activity can potentially damage the environment.) The EIA decision can, however, provide "special" conditions regarding the concrete activity, and measures for exercising post-decision control. These conditions can be linked with deadlines for specific parties of the project, within concrete stages of the project. Also, a condition for issuing the final decision can request the investor's obligation to provide: data regarding the state of nature in the neighborhood of the facility; data about the levels of pollution in the working rooms (the main polluting substances can be listed in a special list) - this condition can be asked jointly with the trade unions at the facility; data about the way in which the investor is addressing some of the most dangerous products, or waste, mentioned in a special list. Conditions may also be put in the final EIA decision regarding obligations for the investor to allow representatives of the CA into the facility at any time for monitoring purposes. Interested parties may also request that a CA representative may be accompanied by an NGO or other representative of the interested parties during these monitoring visits. The control of the facility is, in general, a prerogative of the RIE, but such a clause would have great importance if included in the conditions for issuing a positive EIA decision. (The control of a facility is, in fact, a prerogative of the regional HEI, but control on the environmental impact of a facility is the prerogative of the REI). 7.8.2. Article 20/3 and Article 20/4 of the EPL Besides Annex No .1, according to Article 20/3 of the EPL, an interested party may propose to competent authorities to conduct an EIA study on an activity without any limitation as to the character of the project or the stage of its implementation. For activities already implemented, an EIA study can be conducted upon request of competent authorities. Interested parties may request the CA to require, when issuing the actual permit, to repeat an EIA study. Article 20/4 of the EPL enables repetition of EIA study after the first EIA permit has been given. In order to make such a request, according to Article 20/4 of the EPO, it is enough that the facility is assessed as a "big polluting" facility. In such a case, the EIA process must be repeated every fifth year. This provides an excellent opportunity for qualified "post-decision analysis/management" with a thorough public participation component. Interested parties should not miss the opportunity to use this important method of involvement. For other cases, however, there is no legal guarantee that the suggestion above will be accepted - but interested parties can use this type of the post-decision analysis under the general provision for requesting the undertaking of new EIA (see Article 20/3 of the EPL). Further information on this is described above in the "Screening Stage" of EIA.