Bulgarian TPP Carries Highest Pollution Cost in Europe

The Maritsa Iztok-2 Thermal Power Plant (TPP) is topping by far a European list of the continent's most pollutive industrial facilities, a report published Tuesday shows.

This is one position up compared to 2009, when Bulgaria's biggest TPP was second.

The ranking is about the size of pollution costs the heavy industry carries to citizens.

At the same time Bulgaria ranks seventh among European countries in terms of nominal value of overall pollution costs.

The total cost Europe's society pays for air pollution from Europe's largest industrial facilities amounted to up to EUR 189 B in 2012 alone.

According to the European Environmental Agency (EEA), half of the above-mentioned sum is generated by just a percent (147) of the 14 325 plants assessed between 2008 and 2012.

A report titled "Costs of air pollution from European industrial facilities - an updated assessment" provides an evaluation of harmful impacts caused by air pollution.

Twenty-six of the thirty facilities named individually within the report are power-generating facilities. Most of them are located either in Germany or in Eastern Europe.

Of these thirty, three facilities are in Bulgaria.

Short of assessing whether the emissions of a given facility are consistent with its legal requirements to operate, the report focuses on damage costs to health and the environment.