Chain of reasoning
01Assumption
Above 0.5 MW the exclusion based on the capacity threshold in § 3(1) items 47 and 82 no longer applies. Classification depends on the feedstock, waste processing and the other relevant catalogue items.
Why
The catalogue of projects comes from a Council of Ministers regulation; it decides whether the decision may be needed.
EIA regulation, § 3, 2023 amendment, 2026 amendment
Read the section02Dependency
For projects that may potentially have a significant impact, the authority decides on the need for a full assessment within the statutory 30 days. If the environmental decision is required, it precedes the zoning decision and the building permit and is attached to the applications for them.
Why
Without the environmental decision the application for a zoning decision or a building permit is not complete, so the later applications wait for it.
Read the section03Next step
Does the project need an environmental decision before the decisions listed in art. 72(1) of the EIA act?
Why
If so, it precedes those decisions, including the zoning decision and the building permit, which is why we check it first.
Read the section
When it is needed
An environmental decision is required for projects that may always or potentially have a significant environmental impact, listed in the Council of Ministers regulation. For projects that may potentially have a significant impact, the authority first decides whether a full environmental impact assessment is needed; it has 30 days from the start of the proceedings to issue that order.
Basis: Journal of Laws 2026 item 670, Journal of Laws 2019 item 1839
Thresholds in typical investments
Agricultural biogas plants with an electrical capacity above 0.5 MW fall within the catalogue of projects that may potentially have a significant impact. Photovoltaic development enters it from 2 ha, measured along the outline of the outermost modules, and from just 0.5 ha in national parks, nature reserves, landscape parks, protected landscape areas, Natura 2000 sites, ecological sites and nature-and-landscape complexes, and in the buffer zones of parks and reserves.
Hard-surface roads are in the catalogue where the total length of the project exceeds 1 km. Following the 2026 amendment, outside the listed forms of nature protection, extension up to 2 km and reconstruction up to 4 km are excluded.
Basis: Journal of Laws 2019 item 1839, Journal of Laws 2023 item 1724, Journal of Laws 2026 item 1185, Journal of Laws 2026 item 1315
Before the zoning decision and the permit
The environmental decision must be issued before the building permit and before the zoning decision (WZ); it is attached to the applications for those decisions.
That is why we check the project's classification at the very start.