The European Commission has taken Germany to court for giving the go-ahead to a coal power plant that risked harming migrating fish by affecting their river water, it announced on Thursday.
According to the European Court of Justice, it can apply fines if it finds out that an EU-member state failed to comply with the bloc’s laws.
The Moorburg power plant, which was connected to the energy grid on March 1, has been lambasted by environmentalists.
They argued that it was inappropriate to keep investing in coal as an energy source.
The environmentalists also criticised the plan of use of river water for cooling purposes.
The EU executive weighed in, finding that Germany had failed to apply the union’s environmental laws when it authorised the construction of the power plant, situated near the northern city of Hamburg.
“The project in question risks having a negative impact on a number of protected fish species,’’ the commission said.
Report says species affected by the project included salmon and lamprey, which pass near the power plant when they migrate to the North Sea.
According to the commission, the fish are harmed in the process by which water is taken from an arm of the nearby Elbe River to cool the power plant.
“The German authorities had failed to carry out the appropriate assessment.
“They should have looked into alternative cooling processes which could avoid the killing of the protected species concerned,’’ the commission said.
EU executive said that it informed Berlin of its findings in November 2014.
