Polina Tsybulska
In today’s world, where armed conflicts are becoming increasingly frequent, the environmental consequences of war extend beyond national borders, threatening not only local ecosystems but also global stability. Can the Convention on Environmental Impact Assessment in a Transboundary Context (the Espoo Convention) help counter cross-border effects—in Ukraine and elsewhere?
On 25 February 1991, a new international treaty aimed at making multilateral environmental risk assessments mandatory was adopted under the auspices of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE). The Espoo Convention, named after the city in Finland where it was signed, was created for a peaceful world in which states plan infrastructure projects—from dams and nuclear power plants to canals—taking into account foreseeable consequences, conducting mandatory consultations, exchanging information and conducting impact assessments, as provided for in Articles 2–5. It is based on the principles of cooperation and the prevention of damage, allowing countries to agree on coordinated actions to protect shared environmental elements such as rivers, forests and seas.
However, war disrupts the mechanisms of the Convention. Military action is unpredictable, communication between the parties to the conflict is severed, and landmines and other threats restrict access to damaged areas. Today, the question of whether the Espoo Convention can be applied to assess the environmental consequences of war and its indirect transboundary effects is more relevant than ever before.
The experience of Ukraine, which has been at war since 2022, and which since Russia’s all-out invasion has sustained large-scale pollution to its Black Sea waters and rivers, illustrates gaps in the Convention’s mechanisms. At the same time, the experience of other conflicts underscores the Convention’s post-war potential, particularly as a tool for coordinating transboundary environmental impact assessments and fostering environmental cooperation between Ukraine and neighboring states in the restoration of shared ecosystems in the Black Sea and Danube regions.
This topic is relevant not only to experts, but to all who understand that the environmental consequences of conflicts affect each and every one of us.
A guarantee of damage prevention—but what about in wartime?
The Espoo Convention serves as a framework document, obligating more than 45 member states to assess the potential transboundary impacts of major projects—from the construction of dams, nuclear power plants, or canals to industrial complexes and transportation corridors—with the aim of preventing harm to neighboring countries.
Ukraine ratified the Convention on July 20, 1999 and as such is a full signatory. The Convention has also been ratified by many of Ukraine’s neighbors, including Poland (1997), Romania (2001), Slovakia (1999) and Hungary (1997). Russia signed the Convention in the name of the USSR on June 6, 1991, though never ratified it.
The main aim of the Convention is to ensure that no state engages in activities that could cause significant environmental harm abroad without prior consultation and agreement. The Convention’s key articles (2–7) describe the procedure in detail: Article 2 establishes general principles, including the obligation to prevent harm and conduct an environmental impact assessment (EIA); Articles 3–5 regulate the mechanism for notifying an affected party of potential risks, organizing consultations, and conducting a joint assessment of the consequences; Article 6 provides for the adoption of a final decision that takes into account the concerns of neighboring countries, and Article 7 addresses post-project monitoring.
Annex I lists the types of projects covered by the Convention, such as nuclear power plants and large dams, emphasizing the need to assess their impact on water, air and biodiversity.
The central concept is “proposed activity,” which forms the framework of the Convention: this refers to controlled, pre-planned projects where states can anticipate environmental impacts and implement procedures to combat these. For example, the construction of infrastructure, such as a canal or a hydropower plant, requires a clear plan. An impact assessment is a tool for preventing harm and ensuring a balance between development and environmental protection.
War, however, does not fit into this framework: military actions are not “planned activities,” but chaos, in which there is no possibility of control, planning or assessment. Attacks on dams or industrial facilities, such as the destruction of the Kakhovka dam in 2023, which resulted in the flooding of vast areas and the pollution of the Black Sea, cannot be assessed in advance due to their essential unpredictability and the lack of cooperation.
This means the Espoo Convention is less effective in dealing with the direct consequences of conflicts, where consultations and other procedures are impossible. At the same time, it can be applied to indirect effects, such as post-destruction recovery, as a way of assessing the impact of rebuilding technical structures or canals to avoid new transboundary risks for neighboring countries. In peacetime the Convention’s framework serves as a safeguard against harm, but it requires adaptation to the realities of war.
An important addition to the Espoo Convention is the Protocol on Strategic Environmental Assessment (PSEA), which was signed in Kyiv on May 21, 2003, and entered into force on July 11, 2010. Unlike the Convention itself, which focuses primarily on the assessment of the impact of individual projects (project-level EIA), the Kyiv PSEA extends the principles of assessment to policies, plans and programs (strategic-level EIA). It requires participating states to conduct a strategic environmental assessment when developing national strategies, sectoral plans, or territorial programs, which allows for environmental impacts to be taken into account much earlier and more comprehensively.
In the context of military operations and post-war recovery, the Kyiv PSEA may even be more useful than the basic Convention. It enables the assessment not only of individual recovery projects, but entire national or regional reconstruction plans—for example, a strategy for restoring water management in the Dnipro River basin or a program for rehabilitating Ukraine’s Black Sea coastal zones. A strategic approach like this helps identify cumulative and transboundary risks at early stages and integrate environmental requirements into overall reconstruction policy, rather than reacting to them post-factum.
Ukraine, as a party to both documents, actively uses SEAs in the context of its European integration process. For example, it conducted a strategic environmental assessment and transboundary consultations on the completion of power units No. 3 and No. 4 of the Khmelnitskyi nuclear power plant in accordance with the Kyiv PSEA and the Espoo Convention. The project involves completing the construction of two units that were put on hold back in Soviet times. Since the plant is located in western Ukraine, the project has potential transboundary impacts—in terms of radiation safety, effects in the Dnipro River basin, and air quality—on Poland, Romania, Moldova, Slovakia and Hungary.
Ukraine officially sent notifications to neighboring states in 2024. The most active consultations took place with Poland: a virtual meeting was held on January 14, 2026, during which the Ukrainian side provided the necessary materials and answers to questions from Polish experts. Following the consultations, the parties deemed them concluded.
This is one of the most striking contemporary examples of the application of both documents (Espoo + the Kyiv PSEA) in Ukraine during the European integration process. While the Khmelnitskyi project is considered strategic (it is included in the Ukraine Plan 2024–2027 (p. 210)), the EIA was also conducted as part of Kyiv’s national energy strategy.
The Kyiv PSEA allows for the integration of environmental impact assessment with the principles of sustainable development and public participation, which is particularly important given the limited resources and high risks of the post-war period. The protocol therefore expands the toolkit of the Espoo Convention, transforming it from a reactive mechanism into a proactive planning tool.
International financing can serve as a powerful catalyst for this approach. Donors can require that the Convention be a mandatory condition for the allocation of funds to projects that directly address ongoing sources of pollution—from cleaning up river sediments and soils to modernizing protective structures and monitoring systems. This kind of impact assessment allows not only for restoring what has been destroyed, but also for anticipating in advance how these measures will affect neighboring countries and adjusting them in real time. As a result, funds are used not merely to “patch holes,” but to rapidly neutralize threats that continue to spread across borders.
This transforms the Espoo Convention from a formal instrument into a practical mechanism for regional environmental security. When a transboundary assessment becomes a prerequisite for funding, international donors are effectively investing not only in the recovery of a single country, but in the protection of the environment across the entire region. In this way, Espoo can serve as a bridge between humanitarian aid and long-term environmental planning, meaning that every hryvnia, euro or dollar spent on stopping and reducing pollution simultaneously protects the interests of all neighboring countries.
Does the Convention cover wartime scenarios?
The text of the Espoo Convention contains no explicit references to war or armed conflicts—the document was drafted for peacetime, with a focus on cooperation among states in assessing the environmental risks of planned projects. The absence of specific provisions on wartime scenarios creates significant gaps: military action, which often results in massive environmental damage—such as deliberate attacks on dams or industrial facilities—does not fall under the definition of “proposed activity,” which forms the basis of the Convention.
According to Article 1 of the Convention, a “proposed activity” is any activity or any substantial change in an activity, subject to a ruling by a competent authority in line with applicable national procedures. That is, it refers to activities that may have a significant transboundary impact and require prior assessment, specifically controlled, economic or infrastructure projects where planning and consultation are possible.
Military actions, on the other hand, are unpredictable acts of aggression where chaos, danger and an absence of dialogue make an impact assessment and consultation with the affected party impossible. For example, the destruction of the Kakhovka Hydropower Plant in June 2023 could not be assessed under the Espoo Convention because it was not “planned” in the sense of the Convention, but was rather an act of ecocide.
An important exception is Article 2, paragraph 8, which allows for restrictions on the application of the Convention for projects related to national security if they threaten a party’s defense interests. This provision gives states flexibility in emergency situations but does not cover aggression or war crimes—it does not shield against liability for intentional damage, such as attacks on civilian infrastructure. An analysis in Sergiusz Urban’s 2023 study emphasizes that this exception does not apply to armed conflicts, where integration with international humanitarian law (IHL) is required, but the scope of the Espoo Convention remains limited.
The aftermath of the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh is a striking example of this. Armenia and Azerbaijan, both parties to the Espoo Convention, were faced with severe transboundary pollution of the Kura and Aras river basins. Military operations, fires, minefields, and damage to industrial facilities led to heavy metals, sediments, and munitions residues entering the rivers. The pollution spread downstream, threatening the water resources of both countries, as well as the Caspian Sea.
The Espoo Convention was not formally applied while active hostilities were ongoing in Nagorno-Karabakh and has not been used to this day. No official communication between Armenia and Azerbaijan regarding the application of the Convention after 2020 or 2023 has been recorded—neither in Foreign Ministry memos, nor in submissions to the UNECE Implementation Committee, nor in the peace agreement signed in 2025.
Although there have been no direct government negotiations on the matter, independent experts and think tanks are actively proposing the use of the mechanisms of the Espoo Convention and the Kyiv PSEA as a tool for building trust and peace. In particular, the authors of the Caucasus Edition recommend including environmental cooperation under the auspices of the Espoo Convention in a future peace agreement, which they see as a means of “depoliticizing” environmental issues. However, such proposals remain largely theoretical: amid deep mutual distrust and a lack of political will; the Convention currently exists only as a potential, but as yet unrealized, instrument for post-conflict settlement.
Applying the Convention in practice
In practice, the application of the Espoo Convention reveals serious challenges, especially in the context of armed conflict, where mechanisms designed for peacetime clash with the realities of war. Key challenges include breakdowns in communication between parties due to hostilities, which makes mandatory consultations and the exchange of information impossible; the absence of the trust that is fundamental for joint impact assessments; limited monitoring when access to affected areas is blocked by mines or shelling; and destruction of infrastructure, leading to unpredictable transboundary consequences. Military action itself is a source of large-scale transboundary environmental impacts— from the contamination of water systems and soils to the spread of toxins in the atmosphere.
Russia signed the Espoo Convention on June 6, 1991, when it was still part of the USSR as the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR). Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Russian Federation, as its legal successor state, inherited this signature but, as the UN registry shows, it had still not ratified the convention as of 2026.
The Russian government last seriously considered ratification in 2013, but these plans were definitively shelved after Moscow’s annexation of Crimea in 2014. The international reaction to the occupation of Crimea and the subsequent deterioration of relations with Europe were the main factors that shifted Russia’s position. This means that Moscow is bound only to the principle of “good faith,” enshrined in Article 18 of the 1969 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties—a weak legal instrument that imposes no obligations for assessment or consultation.
Given that Ukraine has ratified the Convention, such asymmetry exacerbates challenges in conflicts where an aggressor can evade responsibility for transboundary harm.
A good example of Ukraine’s use of the Espoo Convention is the construction of the Danube-Black Sea deep-water channel through the Bystre Estuary, which began in 2004. The area is part of a UNESCO biosphere reserve. The project, which was aimed at improving navigation and exports, involved dredging, which threatened biodiversity through disruption of the hydrological balance, sediment pollution, the loss of sturgeon and damage to ecosystems.
Romania filed a complaint against Ukraine with the UNECE, accusing it of violating the Espoo Convention due to a lack of consultations and an assessment of transboundary effects on the Danube Delta (shared by several countries), which also had the potential to affect Moldova’s water resources.
In 2006, a UNECE expert group found significant negative transboundary effects; in May 2008, at an Espoo MOP (Meeting of Parties) Ukraine was issued with a warning, and work was halted; the investigation continued until 2022, when an agreement on monitoring was concluded with Romania. As a result, in 2023, the canal was significantly deepened to facilitate grain exports via an alternative route—the depth increased from 3.9 m to 6.5–7 m. Although in November 2022 Ukraine and Romania signed a bilateral agreement on further cooperation under the Espoo Convention, and in May 2025 the Implementation Committee lifted the caution it had issued to Ukraine, the real impact of these agreements on the environment remains debatable.
Formally, the Convention allowed for the resolution of this long-standing dispute and the creation of a monitoring mechanism. Wartime conditions, however, have significantly complicated comprehensive monitoring of the Danube Delta’s ecosystems. Furthermore, the EU’s priorities have shifted, with the logistical necessity of grain exports and support for Ukraine outweighing environmental requirements. As noted in the European Commission’s official response to the European Parliament’s inquiry, the deepening of the Bystre Channel was studied within the context of EU transport schemes, which effectively legitimized the fast-tracking of work. However, it is interesting to note that the Bystre estuary is not included as an official European corridor in the main Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T). For the EU, the Romanian Sulina Canal remains the main route through the Danube Delta.
Ultimately, the Convention fulfilled its role as a diplomatic tool but failed to prevent further pressure on the vulnerable ecosystem of the Danube Delta.
Read more: More dredging, more freight: How the war in Ukraine threatens the Danube River Biosphere Reserve
Russia’s controversial Nord Stream gas pipeline is another interesting case: as a signatory without ratification, Russia selectively applied the Espoo Convention to the pipeline. The project involved laying pipes along the bed of the Baltic Sea from Vyborg (Russia) to Germany, passing through the economic zones of Denmark, Sweden, and Finland. Russia voluntarily conducted an EIA and consultations, sending notifications to affected parties and organizing hearings to legitimize the project and obtain EU approval. However, there is no record of any interaction with Ukraine, which confirms Russia’s selectivity.
It is also interesting to examine the case of the Balkans. Following the Yugoslav Wars of the 1990s, the Balkans utilized the Espoo Convention for reconstruction projects.
The Danube and Drina rivers were polluted by bombing, and the post-conflict stabilization plan (the 1995 Dayton Accords) required cooperation on hydropower plants and other technical structures that affect the environment.
One example is the Buk Bijela hydropower plant on the Drina River in Bosnia & Herzegovina, which prompted neighboring Montenegro to file a complaint in 2020 regarding the lack of proper consultations and an assessment of transboundary impacts. This led to a review by the Espoo Implementation Committee. UNECE recommended conducting a full EIA, as the project is highly detrimental: it involves flooding of the Tara Canyon (a UNESCO site), changes to the hydrological regime, threats to biodiversity, and risks to public health. The Committee also noted violations of Articles 3–5 of the Espoo Convention (Bosnia and Herzegovina did not provide notification of the planned activity, and consultations in Montenegro were not held), and recommended revising the permit in light of a new EIA. Similarly, the Committee called for “(b) Review the final decision on the construction of the Buk Bijela hydropower plant, taking due account of the outcomes of the environmental impact assessment,” emphasizing the harm caused by cumulative effects with other hydropower plants. A Bankwatch article criticizes the EIA for the Buk Bijela project for ignoring the cumulative impacts that would result in combination with other nearby hydropower plants, such as the three units near Foča, which makes the project even more harmful to ecosystems.
Another example is the Stanari thermal power plant (TPP) in Bosnia & Herzegovina, where Croatia and other neighbors have complained about the lack of a transboundary EIA regarding air (SO2, NOx) and water pollution.
Can the Convention cover the environmental consequences of military action and its transboundary effects?
Although the text of the Espoo Convention contains no direct references to war or armed conflicts, there is potential for the parallel application of the Espoo Convention with international humanitarian law (IHL) and the Geneva Conventions (1949, Additional Protocol I 1977, Articles 35 and 55), which prohibit intentional environmental harm, such as attacks on dams or water pollution.
For example, in the case of the destruction of the Kakhovka dam, where flooding caused pollution of the Dnipro River and the Black Sea, the Espoo Convention could assist in post-war environmental impact assessments for neighboring countries such as Romania or Bulgaria, in conjunction with the principles of the Geneva Conventions against widespread, long-term and severe environmental damage.
The Espoo Convention can be useful for:
- carrying out assessments of the environmental impacts of reconstruction projects, such as the rebuilding of technical structures or industrial facilities, where the EIA will ensure that reconstruction does not cause new transboundary risks (e.g., river pollution);
- coordinating projects to restore marine, aquatic and other ecosystems, such as cleaning up oil slicks in the Black Sea following the 2024 spill, through joint monitoring and consultations;
- managing transboundary environmental risks, e.g., assessing the cumulative impact of minefields or chemical pollution on neighboring countries.
The Espoo Convention could potentially serve as a tool for green recovery in conflict-affected regions, where the assessment of post-war projects prevents new crises. For Ukraine, this means the potential for coordination with EU neighbors in restoring ecosystems, where pollution risks require joint action.
In the post-war Balkans, the Convention was used to conduct environmental impact assessments in cases where new hydropower facilities were planned. And although formally this resulted in certain procedural steps and recommendations to conduct a new impact assessment, no real resolution of environmental problems has occurred—the projects continue to raise serious concerns about flooding, changes in the hydrological regime, and threats to a UNESCO natural heritage site.
These cases demonstrate that even in a post-conflict context, the Espoo Convention often serves only as a diplomatic tool, rather than as an effective mechanism for protecting ecosystems. Nonetheless, the Convention can be an important instrument for coordinating environmental aspects of recovery by facilitating the assessment of risks, the recovery of ecosystems and the development of international cooperation on environmental security.
Translated by Alastair Gill
Main image source: eu4environment
