Requiring a reconsideration
What a requirement produces
| Step | What is required |
|---|---|
| The requirement | Published with the ground, the horizon at issue and the computation behind it |
| The sitting | In public sitting. |
| The answer | Within sixty days, in writing, upon each point |
| The outcome | Entirely for the organ. It may adopt precisely what it adopted before. |
| The record | Permanent, published, and available to anyone reviewing the decision later |
Requirements made
| Act | Ground | Outcome after reconsideration |
|---|---|---|
| Custody arrangements, Sornorum stores | No arrangement beyond the two-hundred-year engineered life of the stores | Act maintained. A study of successor arrangements commissioned, reporting in 2028. |
| Retirement schedule, rolling stock of the transport federation | Stock retired eleven years before the useful life entered in the plan, with no reason recorded | Act reversed in part. Stock offered for repair under Article 33 before retirement. |
| Sealing of 340 hectares, Eastern Region spatial plan | Sealing of soil classed as slow to recover | Act amended. Ninety hectares moved onto ground already sealed. |
Three requirements, one act maintained, one reversed in part, one amended. A power that produced compliance every time would be a power over the outcome, which Article 257(4) declines to give.
Proceedings before a court
Where the matter is an ecological harm within Title II, the Commissioner has standing before the Ecological Chamber under Article 257(3), Article 19(2) and Article 27(1).
Article 27(2): the Chamber may annul the offending act, enjoin the activity in the interim, order restoration on a fixed timetable, order the sequestration of resources sufficient to accomplish it, and declare the personal liability of those responsible.
Article 27(3): interim relief is granted where a credible risk of irreversible harm is shown, and the applicant furnishes no security.
Article 19(3): court fees, security for costs and adverse costs orders are excluded, except where the court finds the action vexatious.
Frequency of use
Standing before the Ecological Chamber extends to actions under Title II. Much of what the Commissioner examines falls outside that Title: deferred maintenance, obligations binding future bodies, and risks transferred without ecological harm. For those matters the powers available are the published opinion and the required reconsideration.
Any person has standing to bring an action in the name of a natural entity, with no showing of personal injury, residence, nationality or economic interest. Communes, cooperatives, unions, scientific institutions and associations hold the same standing. The computations of the Commissioner are published, and actions are frequently brought upon them by other applicants.