The new payment falls on thousands of companies: up to 30,000 euros per year

Thousands of companies will start paying the environmental damage fee from the beginning of 2025. The payments will be collected into a new environmental damage fund.

The environmental damage fee is charged either once or every year, according to the Ministry of the Environment’s announcement.

In 2025, companies will pay a one-time payment of 400 euros to the fund for activities that cause the risk of environmental pollution.

The annual fee is 200–30,000 euros. It will be levied for the first time in 2026. The fee is always applied to the activities carried out in the previous year.

Applies to mines and many industrial sectors

The obligation to pay applies to almost all activities that are subject to permission and notification and must be registered based on the Environmental Protection Act, such as various mining and waste handling activities as well as forest, metal and energy production activities, fuel distribution stations, peat production and certain animal shelters.

The largest payment category of 30,000 euros includes, among other things, mining operations, which include one or more mining waste waste areas that cause the risk of a major accident.

Wastewater treatment plants and hazardous waste treatment plants also pay 10,000-20,000 euros per year.

Let’s prepare for insolvency

The collected funds will be used to pay compensation for environmental damages and their prevention and restoration costs, when the compensation cannot be collected from the actual responsible party, for example due to insolvency or because the responsible party cannot be identified.

The aim of the new environmental damage fund is to ensure that the state does not have to pay the environmental obligations of operators with tax funds.

The fund replaces the current oil protection fund and mandatory environmental damage insurance.

Environmental damage fees are borne by the South Ostrobothnia Business, Transport and Environment Center.

Grants are awarded from the fund to organizations responsible for organizing rescue operations for the procurement of environmental damage prevention.