To protect your company from unlimited and unquantifiable costs, you need to assess your risk exposure under the Environmental Liability Directive (ELD) due to enter UK law next year.
The directive is designed to protect sensitive environments from damage. These include rivers, ground water and more than 5,000 Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) located across England and Wales.
If you operate near the countryside, woodland, an estuary, river, lake, or ground watercourse, the chances are you will be at risk. Any damage, including the impact of waste, effluent, fire, or even building work could make you liable under the environmental liability directive.
From 2009, when the environmental liability directive is planned to take effect, companies that do damage will be required by law to return the environment affected to its previous state. If that’s impossible, companies will be ordered to pay for environmental improvements elsewhere.
A whole range of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) are defined under the environmental liability directive as special interest groups - including environmental pressure groups. They will be monitoring companies and reporting any environmental damage to the authorities.
Understand how the Environmental Liability Directive will affect your business
In the light of the substantial new liability placed on business by the environmental liability directive, EEF has joined up with Chubb Insurance to brief the senior management team in your company on:
- The business risk represented by the ELD for you as a manufacturing company
- The new liabilities you face and how to assess them for your business
- How to ensure you are protected from any defined risk exposure
We are running a series of breakfast seminars for senior managers around the country. For more information and to book your place, visit our Environmental Liability Directive site.