O. Kopanytsia O. Matviienko S. Biliavskyi
DOI: https://doi.org/10.33994/kndise.2019.64.51
The article highlights the shortcomings of the existing regulatory framework in the field of determining damages caused to the state as a result of environmental pollution by chemicals. The key provisions of the developed, within the framework of research work, ‘method of expert assessment for losses from environmental pollution caused by accidents and fires at high-risk facilities’, which are based on the practical results of expert studies by forensic experts of Kyiv Scientific Research Institute of Forensic Expertise, including on the facts of fires and accidents at high-risk facilities.
The above-mentioned expert studies are relevant, since in Ukraine emergency situations, explosions and fires occur at high-risk facilities, which lead to significant environmental pollution by hazardous chemicals:
– emergency excess emissions of pollutants into the air, cause air pollution above the established maximum permissible levels and can create dangerous conditions for people to stay in the zone of influence of objects;
– discharges of untreated, inadequately treated return water or release of hazardous chemicals in natural water reservoirs in pure form, which leads to the death of living aquatic organisms, creating dangerous conditions for general and special water use;
– contamination of land (soil, subsoil water and groundwater) with hazardous substances in excess of established standards, which leads to deterioration of land, deterioration of soil fertility indicators, termination of the possibility of using land for its intended purpose, including for growing crops, the need for remediation, land reclamation and other expenditure work and activities.
In such emergency situations, determining the amount of pollution of the environment, as well as the corresponding negative effects and the size of damages is a difficult task for state regulatory bodies and this situation is solved primarily by experts.
The authors analyzed a large number of legal acts and reviewed the main definitions that relate to the objects of study, the main methodological approaches to the definition, the features of the application of the methodological approaches of each and the algorithm for conducting environmental engineering forensic research from the definition of losses from environmental pollution.
The scope of the above-mentioned methodology for expert determination of environmental pollution losses concerns not only studies of the environmental consequences of accidents and fires that occurred at high-risk facilities, but also studies of other situations related to environmental pollution, which took place as a result of a violation of environmental protection regulations whose activities are related to hazardous chemicals.
Key words: environment, air, lands, soils, water resources, emergency situations, accidents, fires, chemicals, pollutants, harmful substances, environmental pollution, technological safety, environmental safety, damage from environmental pollution, expert studies, methods of expert research.
