Reporting environmental pollution

You can report for:

• air pollution
• soil contamination
• odor or noise nuisance

But also, for example, when someone illegally dumps waste.

Supervisors

The municipality must protect the environment in its territory. For this purpose, the municipality has supervisors. These supervisors:

• checking that everyone is following the rules
• give information
• may enter businesses and other places (other than homes)
• May view documents and make copies
• Taking samples and examining stuff
• stopping and examining vehicles
• request information

Everyone must give full cooperation to the supervisor. A supervisor may request the assistance of the police.

Other organizations

Other organizations that check that everyone is complying with the environmental rules are the police, the province, Rijkswaterstaat, the water board, the Inspection Service of the Ministry of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality, the Dutch Food and Consumer Product Safety Authority(NVWA) and the Environmental and Transport Inspectorate.

If you suspect an environmental violation or crime, you can report it in several ways:

• You can report to the police, the municipality, the water board (for serious water pollution) or the environmental or executive service. Acute serious complaints can be reported 24 hours a day to the environmental complaints line of the province of Limburg: 043-3617070. You can also report other complaints outside office hours (Monday through Thursday between 16.30 and 08.30 and in the weekend from Friday 12.30 to Monday 08.30) to the environmental complaints line of the province of Limburg: 043-3617070. To report environmental complaints at the other times (during office hours), please contact the municipality of Kerkrade under the telephone number: 14 045.The hotline of the province will pass on urgent complaints directly to the picket service working for the municipality of Kerkrade. Non-urgent environmental complaints are passed on to the municipality of Kerkrade by the hotline at the beginning of each working day. If another agency is responsible, the municipality will forward your complaint.
• Furthermore, you can also submit a request for enforcement. You then ask the municipality to send a warning within a certain period of time stating that the municipality will apply administrative coercion if the environmental violation continues. Also, in certain cases, you can ask the municipality to take other measures, such as imposing a penalty payment.
• Under the Civil Code, you can sue in court in tort. In fact, an environmental violation can also be unlawful against the suing party.

What else can the municipality do?

The supervisor first tries to make arrangements with the offender who is breaking the rules. If that fails, the municipality can do a number of things:

• Revoke all or part of the environmental permit or exemption
• eliminate the undesirable situation
• close all or part of the business
• fine.

The municipality, like the police, can also take criminal action. The municipality does this together with the public prosecutor's office (OM). For example:

• file a report
• issue a warning
• reach a settlement where the offender pays
• seize sth.
• prosecution and sentencing to a fine or imprisonment

Damages

• You can seek compensation from the person responsible for the damage you suffered.
• If you can't work it out together, you can file a request for compensation in court.